Amanda Holden has opened up about her son’s tragic stillbirth while praising the NHS for their outstanding work in a new BBC documentary.
The Britain’s Got Talent star, 49, choked up when she recalled the moment she was about to give birth to her seven-month-old stillborn baby boy in 2011.
Appearing on BBC’s Dear NHS Superstars special, Amanda shared the heartbreaking details how she found out her son, Theo, had stopped breathing.
Dressed in a champagne-gold silk camisole top, she said: “I remember waking up and thinking I hadn’t felt my baby kick for most of the night which was unusual because he was so active.
Amanda praised the NHS staff for helping her to go through the ordeal when she had a stillbirth in 2011 (Image: BBC/DearNHSSuperstars)
“I tried all the things they tell you to do, but he wasn’t moving. But I didn’t panic.”
She dashed to a hospital where she was cared for by her friend Jackie, who was a midwife working there at the time.
While Jackie went outside the ward and asked for a second opinion from an obstetrician, Amanda said she could hear a terrible, guttural screaming.
“It was the most bizarre thing that’s ever happened to me because it was me,” Amanda continued. “And I didn’t know I was doing it. I just had no control over myself.
“I thought it was somebody in another room making the noise, screaming and crying.”
She became emotional when she talked about the ‘keepsakes’ she could take from Theo (Image: BBC/DearNHSSuperstars)
Tragically, baby Theo died inside the womb and Amanda chose to have a C-section to have him taken out.
As her voice trembled recalling the stillbirth, she continued: “I kept saying ‘I can’t hold a baby, I can’t. I can’t hold a dead baby’.
“I was terrified. Just as the baby was coming out, my husband Chris had to leave the room. He couldn’t bear it.”
Amanda did not have the strength to do it until Jackie told her how gorgeous Theo was.
She says: “That’s when I held him even though he was fast asleep. The one thing I remember is his perfectly formed eyebrows, which all my children have.”
Amanda became emotional when she and Chris were given “keepsakes” of Theo to take home with them.
The couple got his footprints, a little bit of his hair and the blanket he was born in.
The TV star said she couldn’t have gone through the devastating ordeal if it wasn’t for the help of the incredible NHS staff.
“I’ll do anything for that hospital because that’s where my son was born and that’s where we were treated like family members, that’s the best way to describe it,” she added.
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
