Kate Silverton: 'My baby's everything I imagined'

Kate Silverton: 'My baby's everything I imagined'
Kate Silverton: 'My baby's everything I imagined' (Image credit: PA)

Kate Silverton has shown off the baby she thought she would never have - and said the little girl is everything she could have hoped for. The BBC newsreader gave birth to first child Clemency in November after years of IVF heartbreak and fears she would be unable to give birth. And showing off her daughter for an interview with Hello! magazine, she beamed: "I still can't quite believe that she's here." Presenter Kate said: "Seeing her smile melts me to the core. It's the culmination of everything I ever dared imagine or hope for." She and husband Mike Heron feared they could never become parents after an earlier operation in which Kate lost an ovary. Four rounds of failed IVF meant they were considering adoption when she unexpectedly fell pregnant. "When I have her in my arms, feeding her in the early hours, with Mike sleeping by my side, I look down at her little face and still feel overwhelmed by what's happened. "Whether it's the beaming smile I get when I lean over her crib in the morning or when her bottom lip trembles if she's uncertain about something, I just live for those moments now. She's just adorable." Kate, 41, has embraced her new role. She said: "We chose not to have any help in the early days as we liked the idea of working as a team with her, to learn as much as we could instinctively, although I admit it has been a rather steep learning curve." And she is still reflecting on how lucky she has been to conceive naturally. "I'm not sure how this happened, but I will give thanks every day for the rest of my life that I have experienced giving birth and now have a daughter," she said.

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 

An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.