Grandmother opens up about her decision to give birth to her own son's baby daughter

A grandmother has surprised the world by giving birth to her son's baby daughter.

61-year-old Cecile Eledge gave birth to her own granddaughter after offering to be a surrogate for her son 32-year-old son, Matthew and his husband Elliot Dougherty, 29, who wanted to start a family after they married in 2015.

After Elliot’s sister Lea Yribe, 26, stepped forward to donate her eggs to the couple, Cecile decided she wanted to be the one to carry the baby.

Cecile – who was deemed by doctors to have the "body of a 40-year-old woman – fell pregnant after the first IVF attempt and claims her pregnancy experience wasn't "that big a deal" and "no different" to when she gave birth to her own two children 30 years earlier.

The family happily welcomed the baby girl, Uma Louise Dougherty-Eledge, on March 25 of this year.

"I loved being pregnant, and I knew I was healthy enough to do it, and [the offer] was something that naturally came out," Cecile revealed to Good Morning Britain.

Matthew recalled: "We're from Nebraska, so for a queer couple, adoption and foster care were a little bit of a path we weren't quite ready to navigate, so we decided we wanted to go for IVF.

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"When [Elliot's] sister offered to donate her eggs, we were immediately excited by the option for a number of reasons, so we immediately said yes to that, then we were navigating how we would do the surrogacy; we had a conversation over family dinner and my mum volunteered.

"At the time we thought it was a really kind gesture but we didn't really think it was a realistic one. We laughed it off."

But the surrogacy ended up becoming a reality, thanks to Cecile’s "selfless act".

"She's the type of individual that wanted to help us build a family and it was truly a selfless act," Matthew added.