Labor of Love

OB-GYN Professionals Morgan and Sudheer “Dr. Jay” Jayaprabhu Share Their Story of Infertility and Adoption
By Jenny McCormack Walker

Morgan and Sudheer Jayaprabhu met through their work in labor and delivery. Over the course of their careers, Morgan, a nurse practitioner, and “Dr. Jay,” an obstetrician and gynecologist, have welcomed thousands of babies into the world. Despite treating a whole gamut of women’s health issues, nothing prepared the couple to face their own challenge of infertility. 

When they married in October of 2017, Sudheer had already developed a wonderful relationship with Morgan’s two teenagers, Davis and Lexie, but he had no biological children of his own. 

“I really wanted that for him,” Morgan said. “We decided early on that we wanted to have a child together.”

About the same time, the couple made another important decision: to completely surrender their lives to Jesus.  

“I was searching for happiness,” Sudheer said. “We were Christians, but we really had not turned our lives completely over to God. We decided that we wanted to focus on what he had for us individually, as a couple, and as a family. We wanted to be intentional about focusing on Christ.”

While the couple’s decisions to expand their family and center their life on their faith were made separately, over the next year, those decisions would become inextricably interwoven.

“I never had fertility issues with my older children, and I didn’t expect it to be difficult,” Morgan said. “We tried for a year with no success, and [then] we met with a doctor in Shreveport, who gave us a few options to consider.”

After several unsuccessful intrauterine insemination procedures, the couple had to decide whether to move forward with in-vitro fertilization. 

“Despite the challenges, we still believed we would be parents,” Morgan said, “but IVF is very expensive. So, we prayed about the specific amount of money we would need, and within a month, we had a surplus of money that we had never had before and have never had since. We knew God had provided that as an answer to our prayer.”

The Jayaprabhus were excited to move forward with the IVF procedure. Three embryos were implanted, and Morgan became pregnant. However, after only six weeks, the pregnancy ended in a miscarriage.

“It took two years for me to work through the feelings that came with that,” Morgan said. “As a woman, it’s hard not to be able to do what my body is meant to do. We knew God’s plans were not ours, but we still did not have a quench for the desire for us to have a child together. We just prayed, ‘Lord, if you have another idea for us, show us the way.”

As news of their desire for a child began to travel through their professional circles, several nurses approached Sudheer about babies who had been dropped off at the hospital under the Safe Haven Law. They were open to adopting one of the “Moses babies,” but after being presented with four different babies whose adoptions ultimately did not come to pass, Morgan and Sudheer began to feel like God was shutting doors.

“We didn’t understand why God brought us on this journey,” Morgan said. “But, as a family, we were committed to praying through it.” 

One day, they received a text message from a church friend, and their prayers were answered.

“We learned about a local woman who was about 20 weeks into pregnancy and was looking for a family to adopt the baby,” Sudheer said. “Our first meeting was with the birth mom’s sister-in-law, and then we met with the birth mom. Our third meeting was with the entire family. She had been looking at other families—some out of state—and we were so thankful that she chose us.”

Over the next few months, Sudheer provided prenatal care for the birth mother, and Morgan was with her at all of her medical appointments. 

“She could have made a different decision, and we commend her for choosing life,” Morgan said. “She knew there was a perfect family for him. She made a lot of sacrifices in her own personal life to have this baby, and we are so grateful she did.”

When it was time to have the baby, Morgan and Sudheer were right at home in the delivery room—but, this time, they were not celebrating the birth of one of their patients’ children. They were rejoicing in the birth of their own son. Sudheer delivered the baby, Morgan cut the umbilical cord, and Asher Daniel Jayaprabhu made his debut into the world.

“He’s such a happy and smiley baby,” Morgan said. “He gets that from his dad. The name Asher means ‘happy and blessed,’ and that description fits him perfectly.”

Through this experience, Morgan and Sudheer gained valuable insight into infertility, which now helps them with patient care.

“Being able to experience the emotions that come with infertility gives us a new perspective on treating patients who share those issues,” Morgan said. “We don’t just know it from a medical standpoint, but we now also understand it from an emotional standpoint. That really is a different insight we did not have before this journey with Asher.”

Beloved members of their work and church communities, Morgan and Sudheer were far from alone in celebrating the arrival and adoption of baby Asher.

Aside from the professional lessons this experience taught them, the biggest lesson came through relying on their faith.

“We would sometimes wonder why God would give us this desire and then make things so difficult,” Sudheer said. “But, we learned that it’s okay to ask God those questions. He can handle that.”

Morgan agreed.

“I know without a doubt that God led us through IVF,” she shared. “I believe he took us through that whole experience so that we could learn an important lesson: we needed to learn that everything would happen in his time and his way, not ours. I was so focused on having a biological child, but all along, he knew that he had Asher waiting for us.”

Morgan said that their journey is an illustration of God’s love.

“I think adoption is a perfect example of how we are adopted into God’s family,” she said.