MOTHER-of-two Sarah Szmaglik is looking forward to celebrating the birth of a third child in around two weeks' time - but it will not be hers.

For the 29-year-old, from Chepstow, has taken on the role of a host surrogate mum for a couple from the Midlands.

And the birth will be the culmination of a journey toward surrogacy begun around 10 years ago when her mother mentioned to her the story of Kim Cotton, the UK's first surrogate mum.

Ms Szmaglik, who lives in Thornwell, with her sons Preston, aged nine, and Louis, aged four, had enjoyed being pregnant with her first child and determined to keep in mind the possibility of one day helping into parenthood someone who could not have a child themselves.

"I remember my mum telling me about Kim Cotton, but I'd never heard of surrogacy before," said Ms Szmaglik, who runs her own mobile hairdressing business, called Precious Hair.

"I'd enjoyed being pregnant and the idea started to grow, so I did some research and the advice was to make sure that you have finished building your own family first before entering into surrogacy.

"I didn't realise either how many women suffer by not being able to have children, and I would like to think that someone would do it for me."

Having had her second child, Ms Smzaglik returned to the idea and joined Childlessness Overcome Through Surrogacy (COTS), one of the founders of which, in 1988, was Kim Cotton. A voluntary surrogacy organisation working in the UK, COTS provides support and advice to surrogates and intended parents, and through its Triangle group enables surrogates to meet intended parents.

It is up to the surrogate to choose which intended parents she wishes to meet, based on having read their details.

Two years ago, Ms Smzaglik met the couple whose baby she will give birth to shortly. After getting to know them - and they her - for around three months, they decided to go ahead.

"At first there are no expectations, and you try to build a bond, a friendship," said Ms Szmaglik.

The couple for whom she is carrying the baby, who do not wish to be named, live and work in the Midlands. The woman was born without a womb but has ovaries, and embryos were created and frozen using her eggs and her husband's sperm.

"We came to COTS as what they call intended parents and we had met a woman who was a potential host surrogate. We got on well, but her personal circumstances changed and it didn't go ahead," said the woman.

"Then Sarah asked to contact us and things have gone from there. It has been an amazing journey.

"It is important to trust each other and to be friends and we have spent a lot of time getting to know each other and deciding to go ahead."

A first IVF (in vitro fertilisation) procedure was carried out using two of the couple's frozen embryos, but Ms Smzaglik miscarried. After a few months however, they decided to try again.

"To be a surrogate you have to look at things differently. Either you can do it or you can't, and I knew I could, provided it was not my egg (biological baby)," said Ms Smzaglik.

"With the miscarriage, I felt more gutted for them. But we have become very good friends and I knew I wanted to try again, if they did."

The second IVF procedure - different to the first though again using the woman's egg and her husband's sperm and called a fresh embryo transfer - took place last summer and has led to the point where both parties are looking forward to the birth.

"I'll be having the baby at the Royal Gwent Hospital and I've been told this will be the first surrogate birth there for about 10 years," said Ms Smzaglik. Neither she nor the parents know the sex, after choosing not to know before the birth.

"I enjoy being pregnant, things like feeling the baby move, and I wouldn't rule out doing this again."

Throughout, Ms Smzaglik has been keen to involve her sons, so they can understand as far as they are able, what she is doing and why.

"They have seen us getting to know each other and becoming friends, and know I am having a baby, but that I am doing it to help other people," she said.

"I've had great support from my family, and my mum is super-proud!"

More than 900 babies have been born through surrogates linked to COTS, either through straight surrogacy - where the surrogate's own egg is fertilised with the intend father's sperm - or gestational (host IVF) surrogacy, the route taken by Ms Smzaglik and the couple whose baby she is carrying.

"Surrogacy is not something that is talked about all that much, but I think it is important to try to raise awareness, for women who might want to consider becoming a surrogate, and for people who wish to become parents who cannot by themselves, but who want to look at options other than adoption," she said.

For more information on surrogacy, visit the COTS website at www.surrogacy.org.uk