Brigitte Nielsen talks getting pregnant at 54: 'There was a lot of disappointment'
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Actress/model Brigitte Nielsen is 54 and expecting her fifth child. (Instagram)
Brigitte Nielsen, who gave birth to her fifth child in June at the age of 54, says she beat the odds.
The model-actress revealed she had her eggs frozen around age 40, shortly after divorcing her fourth husband, Raoul Meyer, and while getting to know her now-fifth hubby, Mattia Dessi, reports People.
At the time, a different method was used to freeze eggs, which yielded a lower success rate, adds the magazine. She says doctors gave her only around a 3 to 4 percent chance of having a child using her own eggs.
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“I didn’t have a lot of eggs, but I had enough,” said Nielsen, who has four older sons from previous relationships. “I wouldn’t do it later than 42 … [by then] you might only have seven good eggs. Out of those seven, to make them into an embryo?”
From there, an embryo had to be implanted. As she described, the IVF process for her was difficult to undergo.
For more photos of Nielsen, visit HollywoodLife.com.
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“There was a lot of disappointment,” said Nielsen, now 55. “It’s that phone call going, ‘It’s negative.’ It’s the waiting. At times you can feel lonely, because a lot of women don’t talk to each other about it, and we should, because there’s nothing wrong with wanting to have a baby, whether you’re 20, 30, 40 or, in my case, 50.”
She says she had to remain realistic about her circumstances. “If you don’t use donor eggs, you have to preserve your own at a reasonable age for there to even be a possibility,” she said. “And 80 percent of the time, it doesn’t work.”
The couple opted to keep the news private for a significant amount of time. They didn’t tell friends and family until the 26-week mark and they didn’t go public with the news until two weeks before her due date.
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In late June, she and Dessi welcomed baby Frida via C-section in Los Angeles. The two weeks between their announcement and the baby’s arrival wasn’t all pleasant, as they endured a lot of criticism.
Since then, things have been smooth sailing.
“My husband and I have been wanting this so much for so many years,” she said. “I finally have my little princess. Becoming a mother is the most beautiful thing in the world.”
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This article originally appeared on Page Six.