The Human Race

In the final episode of the season, Dan and Nadine reflect on the story behind the show and what they've learned from their guests. They also share an update on their own journey.

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Jessica Jordan always knew she wanted to become a Mum, “I just had this huge maternal drive to nurture”. She didn’t want to simply wait for the universe to deliver a partner, so Jessica decided to go it alone. She encountered a series of obstacles; a diagnosis of endometriosis, low ovarian reserve, a previous surgical injury to one of her Fallopian tubes, unsuccessful transfers, a miscarriage, and an additional surgery, on her path to becoming a mother, finally conceiving her daughter Hazel.

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In the second - and final - part of Emma Saunders' story, she talks about facing the outcome of her fertility journey and the positives in her life. "You get better at living with it," she tells Dan and Nadine.

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Like many women, Emma Saunders is often asked if she has kids. She’s thought carefully about her answer: "I think it would be very disrespectful to Ella and Alfie to pretend that they didn’t exist so it’s important for me to say 'yes', but I follow that up really quickly with 'but they died young'." Emma shared her decade-long and incredibly difficult fertility story with The Human Race podcast. We've decided to split her story in to two parts. Both are available now. You can listen to part two when you're ready.

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Arrun Soma and Jake Vollebregt made headlines with their big gay, Christian-Hindu, civil wedding – but after buying their first home and getting a couple of dogs, they knew that something was missing. They wanted a family: “It was actually about having a family, no matter how that family was made up,” they tell Dan and Nadine.

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Nadine and Dan have some big news in this special epsode of The Human Race.

And after asking their guests to be vulnerable and authentic, they thought it was only fair that they followed suit.

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Kellie Addison didn’t want her own children but she spent nine months spewing everyday for someone else to have a child. She is one of a handful of selfless Kiwi women who have been a surrogate. Her reasoning was simple: “As far as I was aware I had a fully functioning uterus and if someone else could get use out of that, that would be great."

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Best known as Shortland Street’s Dr Harper Whitley, Ria Vandervis’ journey to motherhood wasn’t an easy one. When she miscarried at 12 weeks, Ria had to continue her character's pregnancy and act out giving birth on screen. That was just the first of many struggles in a six-year fertility journey. She explains the setbacks, struggles and traumas she endured on the road to having her son, Teddy.

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For a gay couple, there are extra layers of complexity involved in the baby-making battle - donors, doctors, legal agreements. But is the system outdated? Is it time for change? Taryn and Sasha Kljakovic tell Dan and Nadine about the challenges they navigated on their way to conceiving their two beautiful children.

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Media power couple Sharyn and Bryce Casey have two healthy boys - but it was a tough road getting there. They had three miscarriages during a five-year wait for their first son, Tyson. Then their second, Reuben, was born weeks premature. In a rare long-form interview, they tell their full story, sharing what they’ve learnt to help others navigating fertility challenges. The conversation is candid and confronting, but with plenty of the trademark humour they’ve brought to their hugely popular radio and TV shows.

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