Prue Craven: A Groundbreaking Journey to Motherhood Through Uterus Transplantation

Prue’s path to motherhood began with a diagnosis of MRKH syndrome at age 17, when she was told she didn’t have a uterus and would need a surrogate to have biological children. “I was diagnosed with MRKH syndrome when I was 17 years old, so I was told that I didn’t have a uterus and that I would not be able to conceive by myself. I would need to use a surrogate,” Prue explains.

After marrying her husband Tom, they pursued IVF for about two years to create embryos for surrogacy. Their journey took them to Thailand, where they experienced heartbreak through multiple miscarriages and failed embryo transfers. “We had six embryo transfers in total. And over the course of two years, we fell pregnant twice via surrogate. And then, as I said, had two miscarriages in the first term of pregnancy,” Prue recalls of this difficult period.

When their surrogacy attempts in Thailand ended, the couple explored other options, including adoption, and even moved to the UK for a fresh start. “We decided to just move over to the UK and just live a completely different life for a couple of years, to be honest. We just needed to get away from everything here,” she shares.

After returning to Australia, they were considering surrogacy in Ukraine when Prue learned about a uterus transplant clinical trial at RPA Hospital in Sydney. “I was on night shift actually at work because I’m a nurse. And one of the nurses that I was on with just saw it advertised on the Channel 9 website that RPA Hospital was starting a uterine transplant clinical trial,” Prue explains of this pivotal moment.

The COVID pandemic interrupted the trial, but eventually, Prue underwent the groundbreaking procedure. Her donor, Maddie, was a friend of her mother who generously offered to donate her uterus. “She just casually just said, I’ll do it. And she’s just that kind of person that, you know, she wears a heart on her sleeve. She just wants to make other people’s lives better if she can,” Prue says of her donor’s incredible gift.

The transplant surgery was complex and lengthy. “When I woke up and they said, you’ve got the uterus, it’s working, I just, I couldn’t believe it to be honest,” Prue remembers. “And then to wake up with a whole room inside my body, it was definitely a bizarre feeling, like a heaviness that I’ve never felt before.”

Post-transplant, Prue had to take powerful immunosuppressant medications to prevent rejection, which came with significant side effects. “In the first few weeks you get really chronic headaches from the high doses of immunosuppressants. And then, you know, they cause like really bad nausea. I got like really bad tremors,” she explains. The medications also led to diabetes requiring insulin treatment.

Just 32 days after her transplant, Prue experienced her first period – a surreal moment. “It was a really out of body experience. I’ll never forget. It was a novelty for like one day and then I thought, that’s it, I’ve had enough of this,” she laughs.

Six months post-transplant, Prue had her first embryo transfer and was overjoyed to become pregnant on the first attempt. Her pregnancy was classified as high-risk and required intensive monitoring. “I had scans. I had all the regular scans up until about 20 weeks, and then I needed a vaginal scan every one to two weeks until the very end of my pregnancy,” she explains.

The pregnancy journey wasn’t smooth sailing. Prue developed kidney problems midway through her pregnancy, and her daughter Rose’s growth began to slow significantly. “From about halfway through my pregnancy, Rose’s growth started to really drop off. She went from like the 50th to like the third percentile and her growth wasn’t really going up,” she recalls.

At 31 weeks, Prue developed preeclampsia and went into labor. Because the transplanted uterus has no nerve connections, she couldn’t feel the contractions. “I could see my stomach contracting, you know, in front of my eyes, but I couldn’t feel it. It was just like the most indescribable feeling,” she describes of this unique experience.

Rose was delivered via emergency cesarean section and spent three weeks in intensive care before going home with hospital-in-home support. “We took Rose home and we continued to feed her through the nasogastric tube just through my training. I knew how to replace them, I knew how to look after it and I knew how to feed her with the tube,” Prue explains, her nursing background proving invaluable.

Now eight months old, Rose is thriving, and Prue is looking ahead to potentially trying for a second child. The transplanted uterus is temporary – designed to be removed after a maximum of five years or after completing family building. “The plan is for me that I need to wait 12 months from when I had Rose, just because of having the classical Caesar, and then I’m allowed to attempt to try and have another embryo transfer and get pregnant again,” she shares.

Despite all the challenges, Prue reflects on her journey with gratitude: “Prior to having Rosie, I might have felt differently because it’s been such an ordeal to go through this process. And I don’t know if I could do it twice, but now that I have her, it’s hard to say that she wasn’t, you know, it wasn’t all worth it because I’ve been so lucky to get this baby.”

Prue’s extraordinary story highlights not only medical innovation but also the incredible resilience of those who face seemingly insurmountable obstacles on their path to parenthood. Her journey reminds us of the lengths people will go to create their families and the profound joy that can follow years of heartbreak and perseverance.