Chen Tesler, a religious woman from Northern Israel who pioneered surrogacy in the national religious sector by carrying twins to term for another family, gave birth to her own child one year later.
The Tesler family with their newborn son at Rambam. Photography: Courtesy of the Tesler Family.
About a year ago, Chen Tesler, a thirty-four-year-old teacher from Kiryat Shmuel, gave birth to twins, acting as a surrogate for a family that was unable to have children. Her reasons for doing so were purely altruistic, after giving birth to her own three children.
While becoming a surrogate is not unusual in and of itself, Tesler, who is religious, is considered a pioneer as one of the first women from Israel’s national religious sector to take on such a role.
Shortly after giving birth to the twins, Tesler became pregnant again. Now, one year later, she came to the Division of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Rambam Health Care Campus where she gave birth to her fourth child. While recovering from childbirth and sharing photos from the auspicious event with the twins’ mother, Tesler received photos from the twins’ first birthday celebration. "We keep in touch and keep up with each other's lives," Tesler says. "What I did a year ago was an act of kindness, dedicated entirely to the happiness of other people. It filled me with great joy,” she explains. “Now, by expanding our family, I am coming full circle with pure happiness of my own."