Warwick Davis opens up about devastating death of first child
Warwick Davis has opened up about the devastating death of his first child and how he and his wife Samantha coped.
Warwick Davis has opened up about the devastating death of his first child.
The 52-year-old actor and his wife Samantha, 51, lost their baby son Lloyd just nine days after he was born in 1991 - due to complications from the dwarfism genes he inherited from both of his parents - and Warwick admitted he will never get over the pain.
A few years later, Warwick and Samantha suffered another blow when their son George was stillborn at 19 weeks.
Warwick - who has daughter Annabelle and son Harrison with Samantha - told PEOPLE: "I think it brings you closer together, or something like that, but it's an experience I wouldn't wish on anyone, it's devastating.
"You do learn to live with it, eventually, over time, you're able to better understand why it happened and can come to terms with it a bit more, but you never get over it.
"I think the losses shaped our family dynamic, we love Annabelle and Harrison all that more because they're here with us.
"We'll always remember what happened with George and Lloyd. We'll always be grateful that we had them for the short time that we did."
Speaking in 2018 on 'Bear’s Mission with Bear Grylls', Warwick opened up about his losses.
He said: "Prior to Annabelle and Harrison we had a baby boy, Lloyd, who inherited both our conditions… and that is something that proves fatal.
"It’s something that a baby won’t survive. But Lloyd he lived for survived for nine days, but yeah he was beautiful… but it was a tough time. And yeah, we had a stillborn too."
Samantha also previously spoke to the Daily Mail about Lloyd, saying: "We found out later that he was the first in the world to survive at all. The doctors actually learned a lot from Lloyd, hopefully that will help other people. But it hit us like a train.
"When they wanted to turn the machine off I said, 'No, no, no', but they said, 'Look, we'll just give him to you and he will just go to sleep in your arms'. And he did. I'm so glad he didn't die on the machine now. We gave him everything we could.
"People who lose a baby never do. But, and it may sound like an odd thing to say, we are better people for it. I think you develop a certain empathy when you've been through what we have. It could easily have broken us, but it didn't. If anything we became stronger as a couple.”