Addicted to pregnancy: The surrogate mother, 47, who's expecting babies number NINE and TEN.

After serious complications while expecting her eighth child, Jill Hawkins vowed to stop being a  surrogate mother.

But her addiction to pregnancy proved too strong to resist.

Miss Hawkins is due to give birth to twins – her ninth and tenth surrogate babies – three weeks before her 48th birthday.

And she is not planning to stop there.

Ignoring the potentially life-threatening health risks, the legal secretary is determined to squeeze in two more pregnancies before she reaches 50.

During her previous pregnancy  in 2010 Miss Hawkins, who is single and has no children of  her own, spent most of the year on sick leave, confined to bed  for days at a time with nausea and headaches.

After the baby, a boy, was induced, Miss Hawkins promised her worried family that she would call time on her career as a surrogate mother.

But yesterday she spoke of her pride at the prospect of taking her total of babies into double figures. 

At the two-bedroom flat in Brighton which she shares with two cats, she said: ‘My parents were concerned  during the last pregnancy because it could have been life-threatening.

‘But I have forgotten about the terrible bits.

‘I just decided to go for it again. I find being pregnant very fulfilling.

‘I’m a naturally giving person and to be able to give babies away is what I do.

‘I was absolutely ecstatic when I found out I was pregnant with twins. It was like being pregnant for the first time again.’

Miss Hawkins’s first seven babies were conceived using her own eggs and the fathers’ sperm via artificial insemination.

However, she is no longer able to become pregnant naturally and uses IVF.

She is 14 weeks pregnant with twins from frozen embryos produced by a 42-year-old teacher and his 40-year-old wife from the Home Counties.

Addicted to pregnancy: Surrogate mother Jill Hawkins is expecting twins, her ninth and tenth babies, three weeks before she turns 4

The couple have a nine-year-old daughter who was born naturally, but have been unable to have any more childrenbecause the woman’s body has rejected all subsequent embryos which have been conceived.Miss Hawkins said she picked the couple because they were attractive and the husband looked like Kevin Costner.

She went to hospital for a 13-week scan which showed both embryos were healthy.

Number one and two: Lucy (left), who was born in August 1992, and Bertie (right), born two years later

Number three and four: Jamie (left), came into this world in February 1998, and David (right) in October 2001

However, she is already suffering from the same symptoms which blighted her previous pregnancy. ‘I get tired very quickly,’ she said. ‘I have to do everything in short bursts and this time the headaches started at seven weeks.

‘I have a permanent pain in my head. I could take painkillers, but I don’t bother in case it puts the twins at risk.’

Miss Hawkins will find out the sex of the babies in April. They are due in mid-August.

When she had her first baby for a couple, she lied to her bosses about the pregnancy.

She invented a boyfriend and then claimed the baby had  died, causing her colleagues to send her sympathy cards and flowers.

Number five and six: November 2002 saw the arrival of Sam (left), while Alexandra (right) came in August 2004

Number seven and eight: Isabella (left) was born in November 2006 and Oliver (right) in August 2010

And a year after she became a surrogate mother for the third time, Miss Hawkins was diagnosed with depression.

At one point in 2004, she felt so miserable that she attempted suicide by overdosing on anti-depressants.

But she insists that her depression was caused by events during her childhood and her battle to lose weight rather than the mental strain of carrying babies that are given away.

Miss Hawkins, who is paid around £12,000 in ‘expenses’ for each pregnancy, says she has never been in love.

Next in line: This scan shows one of the twins from frozen embryos produced by a 42-year-old teacher and his 40-year-old wife

After her seventh surrogacy she planned to join a dating agency, but then she agreed  to be a surrogate mother  again instead.

She added: ‘I don’t just decide to get pregnant on a whim. I think long and hard about it.

‘I never want to keep them. I am not maternal and very selfish. Not many woman can give babies away. It’s very emotional giving birth.

‘The one thing you are screaming to do is to hold that baby.

‘It is an overwhelming feeling and you have to be strong to counter that.

‘People think I’m mad, but  my friends are not surprised  any more.’

Miss Hawkins is the most  prolific surrogate mother living in Britain.

Carole Horlock, from Stevenage in Hertfordshire, who has given birth to 12 surrogate babies, moved to France four years ago.