Melissa Beth Brisman

Melissa B. Brisman graduated Valedictorian from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and graduated with honors from Harvard Law School. She is an attorney admitted to practice in Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas, and is a licensed certified public accountant.

Melissa first started helping couples become parents in 1996. She was her own first client, guiding and directing the process in which she and her husband, Dan, became parents of twin boys carried by a gestational carrier. A few years later, they had a daughter who was also carried by a gestational carrier.

Melissa’s excellent reputation is based on her compassion and empathy for each intended parent. Her expansive knowledge and experience have allowed her to create a staff that is prepared to successfully help parents build their family. Melissa is considered a true pioneer in this field who advocates for changes in the law in this area and lectures to physicians, potential parents, universities, and lawyers around the world.

Melissa is the first attorney to obtain court orders directing that the genetic parents be placed on the original birth certificates of their children born to gestational carriers in the State of Maine, in 1997, and the State of New Jersey, in 2000. She also argued and won landmark gestational carrier cases before the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in 2001 and the State Supreme Court of New York in 2004, setting legal precedents for birth orders in these states. In 2003, Melissa was the first attorney to obtain a court order placing two women on the birth certificate of their child, without an adoption, in the State of New Jersey; and, in 2005, to place two men on the birth certificate of their children, born through a gestational carrier, without an adoption, in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. In 2008, she was also able to have two women who were validly married in Canada placed on the birth certificate of their child in the State of New York. Since 2012, Melissa joined government officials and other attorneys in lobbying for legislation in New Jersey to promote and regulate compensated surrogacy. In May 2018 these efforts were realized when NJ Governor Phil Murphy signed the New Jersey Gestational Carrier Act.

Melissa has been a keynote speaker at numerous events and organizational activities and for prestigious institutions across the country, including the New Jersey Society for Reproductive Nursing Specialists, the American Society of Reproductive Medicine, Cornell Hospital, and the Donor Egg Conference held each year in Charleston, South Carolina. Melissa has also served as a faculty member for the 2010 International Nursing Conference on Reproductive Health & Infertility. Melissa is a Notable Contributor for GayParentstoBe and has served on the Boards of the American Fertility Association (AFA)/ Path2Parenthood, Fertile Dreams, and Conceive Magazine and has also been the legal advisor and a Board Member of Parents Via Egg Donation (PVED) and the LIVESTRONG Fertility Advisory Committee. Melissa is a professional member of Resolve, Path2Parenthood, the American Bar Association-Family Law Section-Reproductive and Genetic Technology Committee (ABA), the American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM), and the Academy of Adoption & Assisted Reproduction Attorneys (AAARTA).

Melissa was the recipient of the 2017 Advocacy Award from P2P (Path to Parenthood), the 2015 Infertility Hero Award and the 2004 Star of Resolve Award. She is a chapter author of Reproductive Medicine Secrets by Zev Rosenwaks, Fertility Preservation in Male Cancer Patients by John P. Mulhall, and Principles of Oocyte and Embryo Donation by Mark V. Sauer. In 2006, Melissa B. Brisman’s law firm, Melissa B. Brisman, Esq., LLC was named as a finalist for the prestigious 2006 Forbes Enterprise Award. Melissa is also the author of numerous articles on the subjects of gestational carriers and reproductive law.

In 2010 Melissa was invited to Taiwan to assist the government in drafting surrogacy legislation.

Melissa’s law firm drafts and negotiates contracts for many types of reproductive arrangements including gestational carrier contracts, ovum, sperm, and embryo donation contracts and adoptions; works with international couples; finalizes same sex and step parent adoptions; obtains court orders for gestational carrier arrangements to allow the intended parents to go directly on the birth certificate of their child at birth; and reviews insurance books on behalf of intended parents and their gestational carriers.