In a heartbreaking scene on ITV, swimming champ and Strictly Come Dancing star Ellie Simmonds speaks to her birth mum about why she gave her up for adoption
19:27, 22 May 2025Updated 11:30, 23 May 2025
Ellie Simmonds’ birth mum finally explains why she gave her up in a devastatingly frank phone call, during which she admits: “All I could see is your disability”. In an emotional scene, to air in an ITV documentary on Tuesday, the former Paralympian swimming champion summons up the courage to call her birth mum, leading to a heartrending conversation.
Ellie, 30, was given up for adoption by her birth mother at just ten days old when she found out that Ellie had achondroplasia, a genetic form of dwarfism. Ellie says that a curt medical professional handed her birth mum a fact sheet stating that children like her were often perceived to have lower intelligence and traditionally found work in the circus.
They only reconnected two years ago while Ellie made the documentary Finding My Secret Family, but Ellie has not felt ready to talk to her about her adoption - until now. While making another deeply personal documentary, Ellie Simmonds: Should I Have Children?, she explores societal views of having children with a disability - and whether she herself should have kids.
Finally summoning the courage to make that call, Ellie says: “I want to know what it was like for her to decide to put me up for adoption. For her it was 30 years ago, but it’s quite a sensitive, super emotional situation.”
Her birth mother, who remains anonymous on screen, replies: “It’s really quite traumatic. It’s hard for you to hear. I don’t want to in any way upset you. You’re making a decision at the wrong time of your life, because you’ve just given birth, your hormones are all over the place. You’re physically not right, you’re mentally not right.
"There was a lot in the background going on. I kept the pregnancy a secret, I gave birth on my own. I went to a geneticist and she was very abrupt. She said, ‘There you go, that’s what your baby is going to look like’. I remember thinking I can’t cope with this. Maybe I wanted a magic wand."
She continues: "All I could see was your disability. You can make excuses, but I really did struggle. I grieved the child that I thought you should have been. It was the biggest decision of my life. To give your biological child away… it was momentous. I just handed you over and that’s something you really can never get over. The guilt is horrendous. You live with it all the time.”
She adds: “I didn’t ever forget you. I thought about you every day. When I saw you at the Beijing Paralympics, I thought ‘That’s my Ellie’. I’ve been a number one fan. I’ve watched everything you’ve done, I’m extremely proud. It’s an amazing thing to have a child, there’s no love like it. Forward 30 years and I realise what a fabulous woman you are. It’s just that you were a bit shorter. You’re a completely perfect person in every way.”
Clearly struggling, Ellie is mostly silent and tearful as she processes what her birth mother is saying to her. Finally Ellie tells her: “We don’t want to blame anyone, decisions are decisions. You’re amazing”, to which she replies: “I don’t know Ellie, I think sometimes it was quite cowardly to be honest.”
Afterwards Ellie reflects: “It seems that she held that guilt for a long time. That’s really sad. We put a lot of pressure on the mum in society. It’s amazing that she’s so honest and open. I think people’s fear of a disability is actually a fear of what’s inside of them.”
In the documentary Ellie meets doctors, geneticists and frontline counsellors and also speaks to parents who have faced fraught decisions when discovering their unborn baby has a disability, and asks, what would she do?
Ellie says: “Being a 30-year-old woman, this is the time people think about starting a family. It’s different because I’m living with a disability so I know what it’s like to be a disabled person. If you find out you’ve got a disabled baby, do people think they can’t actually cope with it? “Are they nervous? Do they want a picture perfect baby?”
Ellie meets families in a support group in south London, who all discovered they were having a child with achondroplasia. Rosie and Lloyd found out their son Arlo had dwarfism at a 28-week scan. Rosie says: “I didn't know what dwarfism was. It was one of the hardest times of my life, I was so scared. As soon as he was Earth-side it was totally eradicated.”
Ellie also meets couple Levi and Lewis, who live with their first child Kaylen and his Grandma Bev. They made the difficult decision to terminate their second pregnancy because the baby had DiGeorge syndrome, which causes heart defects, which Kaylen has mildly, but was severe in the baby.
Ellie also meets couple Megan and David, whose baby Cerys has Down’s syndrome. While Megan is pregnant, David says: “When we found out, it was tough. The idea of anyone bullying my child or making fun of them because of their chromosomes - that kills me.” After she’s born, David adds: “Now we have the lived experience, we get all the joy and wonder of a child with Down’s Syndrome.”
During the film, Ellie also makes the shocking discovery that if she became pregnant with a partner who also has dwarfism, there would be a one in four chance of the child having a ‘double dose’, meaning the baby would be unlikely to survive. Ellie says: “No parent should have to go through that. While I’m not at the stage of wanting a baby just yet, it’s something I will have to consider.”
*Ellie Simmonds: Should I Have Children? is on Tuesday 27 May on ITV1 at 9pm.
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