Lake Bell Shares Her Son's Traumatic Home Birth Story

Lake Bell is getting candid about the scary birth of her son Ozgood back in 2017.

The 40-year-old actress previously had an “empowering” experience delivering daughter Nova at home but things didn’t go the same for her son’s homebirth.

“We had him at home. I was huge, he was 11 lbs…he had the cord wrapped around and he was on my chest. He was not coming to. Now you’re in really f**king life and death. Your child is there and the entire room is trying to resuscitate him and they can’t. The paramedics are on their way, he’s still there. This person you don’t know,” Lake explained on Dax Shepard’s podcast Armchair Expert.

Lake‘s husband Scott Campbell joined the paramedics to take Ozgood to the hospital where he was resuscitated but was “in the NICU for 11 days.”

Lake added, “He was hypoxic, he was without oxygen for longer than the four minutes that is associated with being okay…We were told that he could [have] cerebral palsy or never walk or talk. That was our reality…Children’s Hospital Los Angeles saved his life.”

While Ozgood was able to leave the hospital with a clean bill of health, Lake says the experience was the “most egregious up and down of my entire life” and left her feeling guilty.

“I took it on because I insisted on having a home birth. I’ve dealt with that since. You could blame the midwife, you could blame yourself, but ultimately the result is the only thing that matters. I’ve gone through therapy and was medicated for a year-and-a-half. I did wean myself off but I was on antidepressants to help kind of regulate. I barely take Advil but I was like, this is absolutely imperative in order for me to function,” Lake added.

Thankfully, Lake is doing better and two-year-old Ozgood is hitting all his milestones early!