Strictly Come Dancing star Dani Harmer has opened up about the traumatic birth of her first child.
The Strictly star, 36, talked about the difficult experience during an appearance on Vanessa yesterday (Wednesday, May 14).
Strictly Come Dancing star Dani Harmer on traumatic birth of her first child
In 2016, Dani gave birth to her daughter, Avarie-Belle Betsy Rachel Brough.
However, giving birth proved to be a traumatic experience for the former Strictly star.
Appearing on Vanessa yesterday, Dani told show host Vanessa Feltz that giving birth to her first child is an experience that took her a long time to get over.
“I had a really traumatic first birth,” she said. “I was in labour with her [Avarie-Belle] for five days, which then resulted in an emergency cesarean, which is very different from an elective one.”
Dani revealed that she’d initially hoped to have a natural birth, listening to “whale music and giving birth in the water”.
“It was really, really scary,” she then continued. “Not just for me, but for my partner as well. I think it was probably more traumatic for him because he had to witness the whole thing.”
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‘I can almost cry about it’
Dani continued. “And it was scary for him thinking not only might he lose his baby, but he might lose me as well,” she then said.
“I don’t remember much of it because I was drugged up on a lot of different things, but it was an experience I really didn’t want to have to repeat,” she said.
“So when we fell pregnant with my second, I really wanted to go for an elective caesarean,” she then said.
“I found that they were really trying to persuade me to go for a natural birth, and I said to them, ‘unless you can guarantee me that I’m going to give birth naturally, one hundred percent, then otherwise I will want an elective one’,” she then added.
Strictly Come Dancing star Dani Harmer talks giving birth for a second time
Dani then went on to say that she’d heard that having an elective cesarean was much “calmer”, which “thankfully, it was”.
“I had a very, very different experience the second time round.
“But the first time, it was horrible. If I think back to that first birth, I can almost cry about it, and it took a really long time to get over it,” she then confessed.
She then explained that that was why there is such a “big gap” between her two children. Dani had her second child, son Rowan, in 2022, six years after her first.
Read more: Strictly star Kai Widdrington addresses ‘snub’ after being left with no partner: ‘It’s never nice’
Vanessa airs on weekdays from 12.30 on Channel 5 and My5.
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