Baby joy for mum who suffers from rare condition
*** Trigger warning for baby loss and miscarriage *** 
When Jasmine Uddin was diagnosed with a rare pregnancy condition, she thought she would never become a mum.
She had suffered unimaginable heartbreak after experiencing three tragic miscarriages linked to a disorder which means her immune system attacks the placenta which would normally keep the baby healthy whilst in the womb.
But for Jasmine and husband Mohammed Islam medics at our Women’s Hospital provided hope when she was referred to the Rainbow Clinic, a specialist centre for pregnancy loss.
And now the couple are parents to miracle baby boy Isa Zayn, born in June , thanks to tailored and dedicated care at the hospital.
Jasmine said: “We went from burying our baby and thinking we’d never have a child to hearing our son cry and holding him for the very first time. It was the best moment of our entire lives.
“He is only here because of the care and dedication from the Rainbow Clinic. He's proof that there is hope out there and someone like me can go home with my baby.”
The new mum, from Acocks Green, was diagnosed with Chronic Histiocytic Intervillositis (CHI), a rare condition thought to affect one in 10,000 women who fall pregnant across the UK.
CHI can only be diagnosed by testing the placenta often after a miscarriage or stillbirth and there are little to no warning signs during the pregnancy.
There is currently no cure for the condition and once diagnosed it’s highly likely to return in future pregnancies.
Jasmine said: “There was little to no information about it , the only thing we knew for certain was it was highly likely it would come back in future pregnancies.
“We wondered if we would ever be able to bring a baby home.”
After the first miscarriage at 20-weeks in 202 2 , Jasmine became pregnant again a year later but experienced bleeding at 11 weeks and sadly miscarried.
She recalled: “I wasn’t prepared for it to happen so soon. We were truly devastated.
“A lot of the people we encountered hadn’t even heard of CHI and so we were referred then to the Rainbow Clinic.”
But again tragedy struck when Jasmine was nine weeks pregnant and she had another miscarriage.
She said: “The third loss was a real knock for us.
“We were questioning if we would even try again, but Dr Leo Gurney and Dr Sami Saba at the Rainbow Clinic convinced us not to give up yet.
“We found out through this third loss that the CHI was particularly aggressive for me and we decided to start treatment before I was even pregnant.”
Jasmine went on medication to combat the condition three months before becoming pregnant again in November 2024 and she was monitored weekly to check her baby's growth.
At 11-weeks she started experiencing bleeding, but due to the regular monitoring her medication was adjusted and the bleeding was able to be stopped.
She said: “Through the whole pregnancy, we never got our hopes up or got excited.
“We didn’t tell family or friends and kept it hidden for as long as possible.
“Once we got past 24-weeks, we started to think maybe we could finally have our baby.”
By the 34-week growth scan the placenta had stopped working and the safest thing was for Jasmine to have her baby early.
She added: “When we were told the news that Isa was going to delivered , both my husband and I burst into tears. We never thought this day would come, but it finally felt like it might happen.”
After a long and difficult journey, the couple welcomed baby Isa Zayn who was born at 35 weeks weighing just three pounds on Eid al-Adha.
“It felt like I’d waited my whole life for this moment,” said the mum .
“Michelle, who was our midwife in the Rainbow Clinic was with us in the theatre when he was born which was so special.
“We were prepared for him to need extra care, but he was doing remarkably well and we got to hold him straight away and he stayed with me from then on.”
He is now nine months old and is thriving at home with his parents.
“Isa makes my whole world complete , he’s become our entire life,” she beamed.
“Until The Rainbow Clinic, we felt so alone. I didn’t think that someone like me with CHI would ever be able to go home with my baby and we came so close to giving up our dream of having a family, but the care we had was life changing.
“Knowing the support and expertise is there for us, the options for our family to grow are open to us more than we ever thought would be possible.
“I want to highlight this condition so that other families who may be going through the same know there is hope out there and a way to treat it so that you can become parents.”