Tara Lipinski.Photo:Jenny Quicksall Photography
Jenny Quicksall Photography
Tara Lipinskihas now added “Mom” to her list of accomplishments.
The Olympic gold medal winner, 41, known for skating into history at the 1998Olympics, reveals to PEOPLE that she andhusband Todd Kapostasy, 40, recently welcomed daughter Georgie, born via surrogate.
Lipinski adds “it’s the best tired I’ve ever been.” She and Kapostasy, a producer and director, whom she wed in 2017, can’t help but take stock in their current bliss, something they feared might never come.
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Tara Lipinski and daughter Georgie.Jenny Quicksall Photography
Georgie, whom Lipinski says is “so calm and peaceful,” arrived following a five-yearstruggle with infertilitythat included multiplepainful miscarriages. It all left Lipinski feeling broken and alone until she and Kapostasy launched their vulnerablenew podcastUnexpectingin August. “I felt so unseen, so unheard for so long. I was tired of not sharing,” she says.
Tara Lipinski and Todd Kapostasy with their daughter Georgie.Jenny Quicksall Photography
The athlete, who is a sportscaster for NBC alongsideJohnny Weir, says infertility taught her a hard lesson. “It made me realize that sometimes life is just not fair,” she says. “For so long I thought, ‘Oh, you get a win, you get a loss, everything evens out.’ As a skater I was able to train harder, force it. But when it came to infertility, there’s things you can’t change.”
After years of trying for a successful pregnancy Lipinski, who suffers fromendometriosis, and Kapostasy learned there was a reproductive immunology issue where her body would reject their fertilized embryo. “I went through four pregnancies, four miscarriages, fourD&Cs [dilation and curettage, an often painful procedure to remove pregnancy tissue from the uterine lining],” she says.
Tara Lipinski’s daughter Georgie.Jenny Quicksall Photography
After her last miscarriage, “It was like, ‘Okay Tara, you’ve put your body through enough.’ That’s when I decided to think of other options.”
The years of struggle put a strain on her marriage, but Lipinski even sees the beauty it that now. “It gave us time to figure out how to support each other,” she says of Kapostasy. “I would have loved for us to not have gone through all this. But now, I can’t imagine it any other way.”
For more on Tara Lipinski’s road to motherhood, pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE, available Friday.
source: people.com
