Our Yorkshire Farm star Amanda Owen has opened up about a medical emergency when she was rushed to hospital
Our Yorkshire Farm star Amanda Owen has revealed how the birth of her first child took a frightening turn, admitting “it all went wrong” after she was rushed into hospital during what was meant to be a planned home birth.
Amanda, widely known as the Yorkshire Shepherdess, has opened up about the complications she faced when delivering her eldest daughter, Raven, at a time when the UK was in the grip of the foot-and-mouth crisis. The outbreak severely restricted movement in the countryside, and for Amanda, then a first-time mother living on the remote family farm, it shaped her entire birth plan.
Speaking on Kate Thornton’s White Wine Question Time, she said: “I mean, if you think about it, I’ve had nine births and everything that everyone predicts and says will happen doesn’t, you know? Basically, my first baby, Raven, she was nine pound two, and completely stuck, and I was having her at home.
“She was a sort of planned home birth, because of course we’re in the throes of foot and mouth, then. So my plan was, you know, to stay at home, give birth, and not venture out of the farm.”
Comparing the restrictions at the time to the far more recent Covid lockdowns, she added: “I mean, in a way, foot and mouth was the rural version of Covid lockdown.”
But the delivery quickly became an emergency. “Yeah, and it all went wrong, and she got stuck and I ended up having to go into hospital, literally, with a baby completely stuck. I didn’t know that your body goes into a permanent contraction, but it does. It’s not good. I had the caesarean, and of course it was, like, well, you know, now natural birth could be an issue.”
Despite that warning, Owen went on to have eight more children — Miles, Edith, Violet, Sidney, Annas, Clemmie, Nancy and Reuben — each with varying and often unexpected birth experiences.
She recalled how predictions about baby size proved wildly inaccurate: “Yeah, and then eight babies later. You know, everyone’s like, oh, if the first one was nine pounds, you know, the next one is gonna be huge.
“Well, Reuben was, like three pound. So it was like, he just fell out after Chinese takeaway. So, you know, to me, everything everyone has ever predicted has gone the opposite way.”
Owen’s reflections come amid ongoing public interest in her life following her split from husband Clive in 2022. The pair, who spent more than two decades together running Ravenseat Farm and raising their nine children, have continued to co-parent and work on the land despite separating.
Their family life was made famous through the hit Channel 5 series Our Yorkshire Farm, which followed their daily routines, challenges and the unique upbringing of their children in the Yorkshire Dales.
