Photo: Serena Williams/Instagram
Serena Williamsis reflecting on the first moments after her daughterOlympiawas born.
In apersonal essayforElle, the 40-year-old tennis star opened up about herharrowing childbirth experienceand revealed that she initially didn’t form a connection with her daughter, now 4, until after she gave birth.
RELATED VIDEO:Serena WilliamsRecalls Being ‘Devastated’ By Emergency C-Section and Postpartum Problems
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Williams said the connection finally came aftergiving birthto Olympia in September 2017. The athlete shares her daughter with husbandAlexis Ohanian.
“When I finally saw her — and I just knew it was going to be a girl, that was one thing I knew about her before we even had it confirmed — I loved her right away,” Williams wrote in her essay. “It wasn’t exactly instantaneous, but it was there, and from that seed, it grew. I couldn’t stop staring at her, my Olympia.”
Williams' birth experience wasn’t an easy one. The tennis championwas rushed into an emergency cesarean section, and after the delivery, a coughing fit made her wound reopen and led doctors to discover multiple,life-threatening blood clots in her body.
Serena Williams/Instagram
After her daughter’s arrival, Williams told PEOPLE that though she feltlucky to be alive, what followed was six weeks in bed recovering, all while trying to adjust to motherhood.
“My whole life I’ve been physically pushing my body to the limits,” she said. “And this is the one time where I couldn’t control anything. I couldn’t push my body. My body pushed to its maximum. That was so hard.”
Since bouncing back from her postpartum complications, Williams is often giving her social media followers a look at her mother-daughter bond with Olympia. Most recently, she shared a series ofthrowback photosfrom Paris Fashion Week, where she twinned with her 4-year-old in the same hot pink Balmain dress.
For themommy-and-me moment, Williams and her little one pose in front of a fireplace, with Olympia sitting on the mantel while her mom stands in front of her. While the tennis star paired her dress with heeled red booties, Olympia opted for a cute pair of gold sandals.
“Hey@olympiaohanian, remember that time when we were in Paris? And we slayyyyyyeddddd,” Williams captioned the photos.
source: people.com
