The harrowing birth that left baby Ariarne Titmus fighting for life

Ariarne Titmus was fighting for every breath after a troubled birth when the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck. Her battle for survival tells the story of her entire life. WARNING: GRAPHIC FOOTAGE

The footage is confronting. A blue baby just minutes old wearing an oxygen mask. A doctor lifts a motionless little leg and injects a needle.

The seemingly prone and lifeless state of her body would distress any new parent.

Ariarne Titmus is fighting for every last breath after a troubled birth when the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck.

But the pool queen swears this much — and her father Steve agrees — the incredible footage of Ariarne’s battle for survival tells the story not simply of her birth but her entire life.

Of her fight. Her grittiness. Of that little aura she has which throws off the vibe that, no matter what the odds, she will somehow get to where she wants to go.

The video of Ariarne’s birth which Steve took on camera at a Launceston hospital on September 7, 2000 – a week before the Sydney Olympics — tells a story which needed no background words or haunting music to give it dramatic gravitas.

The rawness is confronting.

Ariarne Titmus was fighting for breath after a troubled birth when the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck. Picture: From video taken at the time by her father Steve Titmus

Ariarne’s battle for survival tells the story not simply of her birth but her entire life. Picture: From video taken at the time by her father Steve Titmus

There is not a member of the Titmus family who does not believe that surviving this life-threatening experience put an invisible coat of armour on her.

As the great Tasmanian-born swimmer prepares for her gold medal assault in Paris, Steve, a Channel 7 newsreader on the Gold Coast, often thinks back to those first fateful minutes.

“We really believe that first hour set up her mindset for life,’’ Steve said.

“That was the start of her character as a fighter for life. It’s almost as if from that point she was never going to give up.’’

No matter what the odds, Ariarne Titmus will somehow get to where she wants to go.

Ariarne also senses as much.

“I truly believe in those things,’’ she said.

“I believe there is something inside me that got me going (that day). I could have not made it but I believe I have carried that through my life. I feel I have that fight when I race and in life. I feel really grateful to be here.’’

Steve believed Ariarne was born to be a water baby. In the video of her first bath at the hospital Robyn is heard saying in the background “wait until dad takes you for a swim.’’

“Every time something happens at a big meet I still get flashbacks of her first swim. I see her little face smiling, dipping under the water and the teacher saying “don’t put your head under water ... there’s plenty of time for that.

‘She and her sister loved the water and I remember when they would try and be little mermaids.’’

The Titmus family play a key role, not simply as support for Ariarne, but as Good Samaritans for the parents of swimmers group, the PODS.

As president of the group Robin has spent countless hours arranging travel options and tickets for the group who have learnt to share each other’s success and commiserate in times of need.

Picture: Supplied

Steve is so sensitised to his daughter’s swimming patterns he can tell how she is going to perform in the first 15m metres of her swim by how high her stroke is in the water.

Steve, whose best man was 60 Minutes reporter Peter Overton, was well entrenched in a news reading job in Launceston when he and the family decided they had to take the massive gamble to move to Brisbane for the sake of his daughter’s career.

As fond as they were of Launceston there were plenty of challenges. At one stage just before moving north Ariarne had to share a lane with patrons and dodge them during training.

There’s no doubt the cold weather put another layer on her resilient soul.

“I can always remember the 5am starts and the sound of the frozen grass crackling under her feet,” he said.

“She’d be wearing a puffer jacket with a hoodie pulled down.

“When we decided to move there was no promises at all about work. I remember going to television stations in Brisbane and saying we have moved from Tasmania because my daughter is hoping to swim for Australia and I sensed they were thinking ‘who is this idiot?’

“I didn’t take offence at all because had it been the other way around I would have been thinking that as well.

“The thing that gives me most pleasure is when I think ‘imagine if we didn’t make the move.’ We left Tasmania and headed into the complete unknown and now she is off to her second Olympics. I still find it amazing.’’

In Paris, Titmus will attempt to become the first Australian woman to defend her Olympic title since the great Dawn Fraser did it more than half a century ago.

That’s in the 400m where the challenge will again from the great United States swimmer Katie Ledecky and new Canadian star Summer McIntosh who has broken more than 50 age records in her homeland.

Then there’s the 200m where she will face her fellow Brisbane squad mate Mollie O’Callaghan.

Challenges are coming from everywhere but, in the life of Australia’s great pool star, they always have.

Originally published as The harrowing birth that left baby Ariarne Titmus fighting for life