A Lottery-winning NHS nurse who survived a cervical cancer scare has given birth to a miracle IVF baby, paid for with her winnings.
Rebecca Brown pocketed a life-changing £250,000 when her Mirror-reading family syndicate won the £1million jackpot in August 2016.
But she was left devastated two years later when doctors found pre-cancerous cells of the cervix during a routine test.
Rebecca, 39, was told if she wanted children she should have them “sooner rather than later” amid hysterectomy fears.
So she decided to spend a chunk of her National Lottery winnings on IVF treatment - and fell pregnant after two rounds.
Rebecca is now celebrating the birth of daughter Ethel, who was born by caesarean section weighing 7lbs 10ozs last week.
The orthopaedic nurse, who refused to quit her job despite the win, said her bundle of joy is “priceless”.
She is being supported by her dad David, 64, mum Yvonne, 63, and sister Julie, 37 - the other three syndicate members.
Rebecca told the Mirror: “When I won the Lottery I cried. I never thought I would use it to pay for fertility treatment, that’s for sure.
“I never thought I’d be where I am now. It’s been a bit manic and full-on but totally worth it.
“The day after she was born I was in a daze. I couldn’t believe she was my baby. I thought it was a dream I was going to wake up from.
“I can’t put a value on Ethel. There is no value. She is priceless and worth every penny.”
Asked if Ethel would have been born without the Lottery win, she said: “Ethel would probably be here, but not funded by myself.
“She would be here on contributions from mum, dad, sister. They would have helped me out. They know how important it was for me.”
Rebecca, who works at the Queen’s Medical Centre in Nottingham, had no plans to become a mum after her Lottery win.
But shortly before the routine smear test in 2016 she began chatting about parenthood with a colleague.
“I had started to think that maybe I wanted to have children,” she recalled.
“I had been talking to my friend who had been in a same-sex relationship and had a little boy.
“I spoke about the possibilities of adopting or going down the sperm donor route, but never really discussed it further than that.”
That all changed in February 2018 when her smear uncovered pre-cancerous cells on the internal cells of the cervix.
“I wasn’t prepared for that at all,” she said. “They asked me if I wanted children or if they should just go ahead and do the hysterectomy.
“I said I would like to have children. They said if you want children maybe you should think about that sooner rather than later.
“My dad said I needed a man but I’ve proved that you don’t. Well you do, but you don’t have to be in a relationship.
“I had a cyst on my ovary so I had to have some tumour markers last Christmas, and they turned out to be okay.
“In January last year my IVF cycle started. I had my eggs collected in March and my first one put back a week later.
“Unfortunately that failed but we went straight back in with a frozen embryo, which was Ethel.
“That was in May and here we are nine months later. I knew what I wanted, the smear result just made me realise what I wanted.”
Rebecca, who is single, spent £12,000 of her winnings on IVF using sperm from an anonymous donor.
She said: “You get to choose what you want.
“I said I don’t want to offend anyone. I just said I did not want any ginge and someone of average height, so I was matched quite quick.
“I don’t know who the donor is, it’s anonymous. I know job, height, eye colour, skin tone.
“The donor actually wrote about himself, which was a big tick for me. He said how close he was to his family.”
After discovering she was pregnant Rebecca did a second test before ringing her sister Julie in tears.
“I’ve been very lucky. The pregnancy wasn’t so straight forward but she is perfect.
“We have been really open about Ethel’s story and where she has come from. I was expecting some negative comments but I haven’t had any.
“There is no secret. Ethel is going to be brought up knowing where she came from.
“She will end up being a very lucky girl but she’s going to be brought up, hopefully, to not be a spoilt little girl.
“Ethel has been very spoilt as a baby but we’re going to bring her up as I was brought up.
“My mum and dad always said to me, ‘Nobody’s better than you but you’re no better than anyone else.
“She will be very well-off, no doubt about it, but money won’t make her better than anyone else. She will hopefully be grounded.”
Rebecca, who is on maternity leave, chose her daughter’s name in memory of a former patient.
“She was a really cute, sweet old lady,” she said. “She has always stuck with me, so I really liked the name.”
The family still plays the National Lottery every week using the same numbers.
Rebecca, of Eastwood, Notts, said: “Dad puts it on every week for us in Asda.
“We’ve had a couple of wins since, but hopefully someone else will win now and get to enjoy what we have.”
