Former Bachelor Ben Higgins and his wife, Jessica Clarke, are recalling a scary experience shortly before the birth of their daughter.
“Her blood pressure dropped and so we lost her heartbeat for, like, 10 minutes,” Clarke, 29, said on the Thursday, February 20, episode of the “Almost Famous” podcast. “They flipped me on all fours, so I’m on all fours in my hospital gown and like ten doctors come rushing in. It turns out this is, like, very common and not, like, as big of an emergency as we thought it was. But it was scary.”
Clarke explained that the doctors were gearing up to perform a C-section. Higgins, 35, recalled their daughter’s heart rate dropping, noting, “They could still find it but it was, like, severely low.”
While Higgins wanted to be “present,” he didn’t want to be “hovering” over his wife — so he walked back to his sofa bed and tried to watch Indiana University basketball, but things took a turn.
UPDATE: 2/13/25 at 3:10 p.m. ET. Higgins and Clarke announced their baby girl’s name — Winona “Winnie” Elane — via Instagram on Thursday, February 13. The couple also shared the first photos of the newborn, gushing, “She is everything that we have prayed for and then some.” Winnie was born one day prior at 2:53 […]
“I look up and all of a sudden, like there’s 10 doctors in the room. I remember just looking around like, ‘I don’t understand what’s happening.’ And a nurse comes over and sits by me and she’s like, ‘This is very normal, but like you should prepare to get rolled back into like the OR.’ I’m like, ‘What do you mean? Like this is normal and we’re going to the OR,’” Higgins said. “So by the time it happened and it was done, I was just kind of like not processing it. That was kind of a theme for me. I think for those two days is, like, I was slow to process exactly what was happening when it was happening.”
After Clarke “changed positions,” she explained that their daughter was “fine.” Higgins shared the news on February 12 that the couple, who tied the knot in November 2021, welcomed their daughter.
“Update and more to come but baby girl Higgins has entered the world. She is healthy. @jessclarke_ is doing so well,” he shared via Instagram at the time, while sharing a photo of him and Jessica, with their daughter on her chest. “I don’t yet have words for what just happened but the update right now is we have a daughter and Jess is recovering so well. The nurses and doctors who cared for us should be lifted high. Also I am biased but God spent a little more time on our baby girl because she’s real beautiful! This beauty will be revealed soon but first she needs a bath.”
The next day, the former reality star shared the name of their daughter alongside several snaps of the newborn.
“First, I did not realize I could be more in love and more impressed with @jessclarke_ but after the last 48 hours my heart has exploded for her and our new baby girl,” he wrote via Instagram. “Winona (Winnie for short if she’s ok with it) Elane Higgins was born at 2:53 am on 2/12. Words still are hard for me, I won’t accurately articulate what just happened.”
He continued, “But for the last 2 mornings I wake up feeling like it was a dream, reminding myself of the blessings of Jesus, then looking over to see Jessica and Winona and being mentally reunited with the truth that I am a dad and a husband and that we are a family. Life starts again for us, a new chapter we enter into, and so many moments of lacking the words but feeling God inspired love.”
