After a long, hard struggle, the Hardys received their miracle By MIKE BOLLINGER
Patrick and Shorni Hardy with baby Lili shortly after Lili's birth Oct. 13. The Hardys had tried for several years to have a child without success before and had been told they could not have one naturally before Lili came along. Above, Shorni holds Lili while they were still in the hospital.
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CLAYTON — It took more than 11 years and a lot of setbacks along the way, but Shorni and Patrick Hardy of Clayton received their miracle in October. That miracle came in the form of Lili-Grace Patria Hardy, born Oct. 23 at 7:55 a.m. Lili-Grace weighed 6 pounds, 8 ounces and was 20 inches long. All that sounds like the result of a normal pregnancy and childbirth. It was anything but. Patrick is from New York and Shorni from Jamaica. The couple met in college.
The journey toward having a family started in 2010, when after five years of marriage and struggling to start a family, a trip to the doctor revealed that Shorni couldn’t have children naturally. They decided to start the process of in vitro fertilization treatments, which Shorni described as “a lot of treatments and a lot of shots.” They then learned that one of Shorni’s ovaries was twisted, and emergency surgery was performed. The first four embryos were transferred, but Shorni was still unable to become pregnant. In 2012, the Hardys moved to North Carolina, and in 2015 decided to
