Valerie Adams welcomes second child weeks before due date

Publish Date
Saturday, 30 March 2019, 1:50PM
Getty Images

Getty Images

Dame Valerie Adams has given birth to her second child weeks before the due date.

The Herald understands the Kiwi shot put champion was rushed to Auckland Hospital at the weekend before giving birth to a baby boy, Kepaleli.

Kepaleli was doing well, but the Herald understands Adams required further treatment following the birth due to some minor complications.

Adams' manager Nick Cowan would not comment on the treatment Adams received, but offered a statement on behalf of her and husband Gabriel Price.

"It's been a long week for Dame Valerie and Gabriel," Cowan said. "They thank everyone for their love and support this week and the Auckland Hospital Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for all their hard work and amazing care.

"Kepaleli is doing great. They ask for a little space and privacy while they recuperate and prepare to take Kepaleli home."

Adams announced her and husband Gabriel Price were expecting their second child back in October and revealed in December they were expecting a boy, which was due in mid-April.

This morning Adams wrote on Instagram: "Kepaleli Tava Sydney Adams-Price. Welcome to our family and a safer Aotearoa. A little early - just as keen as mum and just as healthy. Happiest parents in the world."

Adams and Price, childhood friends, married in 2016 in an island extravaganza ceremony.

The pair welcomed their first child, daughter Kimoana, in October 2017. Adams later opened up about her fertility problems to help others in the same position.

Just six months after Kimoana's birth, Adams was back in the throwing circle where she won a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast.

The 34-year-old is targeting her fifth Olympic Games at Tokyo 2020.

"The risk of completing our family and training for the Olympics... I don't want that. First and foremost for me was actually giving Kimoana a sibling and completing a family. For us this is it," she said in Ocotber last year after announcing she was pregnant witrh her second child.

"I don't want to come end of Tokyo, look back and have any regrets.

"I don't want to be one of those should've, would've, could've. I've got the opportunity now, I need to take it. It's the same with sport, if you've got the opportunity, take it."

This article was originally published at nzherald.co.nz and is reproduced here with permission.

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