Sam Frost reveals if she will vaccinate her unborn child
Known for her controversial vaccine stance, now Sam Frost has revealed if she will immunise her child, as she shows off her baby bump in Stellar.
Stellar
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The transition from dating-show ingenue to high-profile media personality may never come for many who desire it. But Sam Frost has put in the work, establishing herself as not only a reality TV star but also an actor, author and mental health advocate. Now, after a string of relationships that were, she reflects candidly, akin to “trying to put a square peg into a round hole”, the 33-year-old is engaged, expecting and moving on to motherhood. In their first official photo shoot during her pregnancy, Frost and her fiancé Jordie Hansen, a landscaper and two-time Australian Survivor castaway, talk about what comes next – besides a new baby, of course. As she tells Stellar, “I feel the happiest and most myself I’ve ever been”
Few women in Australia have sought love with as much application, dedication and public investment as Sam Frost.
For a time in the mid-2010s, the erstwhile finance manager from Melbourne made the pursuit of romance her day job, securing an engagement on season two of The Bachelor Australia.
When that relationship fizzled out before the finale even aired in October 2014, Frost became the obvious choice to front the inaugural series of The Bachelorette Australia the following year.
Sure enough, the audience cheered her on, clearly enraptured by her disarming mix of fragility and fun, and turned Frost’s season into a ratings smash.
“Working with Sam on The Bachelorette was a delight,” franchise host Osher Günsberg tells Stellar. “Her comeback story after what happened on The Bachelor was something every fan of the show – and those of us who make it – were so invested in.
“I watched her navigate that emotionally intense situation daily, and the way she’d hold such a firm boundary for herself based on deep self-respect was so wonderful.”
The bond between Frost and her final-rose recipient may have lasted just 18 months, but all the while, her career – as well as her online and social-media presence – began to soar. An enduring relationship just seemed to elude her.
But nine years after she became a household name in her quest for everlasting love, Frost has happily put the date cards and long-stemmed roses behind her.
With her fiancé, Survivor: Heroes V Villains contestant Jordie Hansen, by her side and a baby due in a couple of weeks, Frost joined Stellar for an intimate photo shoot and interview in which she reveals she has finally discovered the key to romantic bliss.
“You have to know who you are before you can be in a relationship,” she says emphatically.
“I look back on past relationships and dating and I feel like I was trying to put a square peg into a round hole. I was trying to make it work because I wanted it so badly, but it wasn’t the right fit.”
Indeed, Frost says it was only when she decided to take care of her heart and wellbeing, instead of seeking someone else to fill a perceived gap, that love gently found her.
That Hansen is a fellow reality TV star isn’t what connects them; during their hour-long chat with Stellar, it’s a subject they hardly raise.
Rather, they reflect on a relationship that began in a country pub in Victoria, deepened on an outback road trip and solidified with their move to the Sunshine Coast.
In Noosa, Hansen, 26, surfs and works as a landscaper while Frost, 33, awaits the birth of their baby. It’s a boy and, as Frost’s burgeoning belly indicates, his arrival is imminent.
Frost’s private connection with Hansen has been natural and easy, she says. They met through her brother Alex, who competed with Hansen in Australian Survivor: Blood V Water, which was filmed in 2021.
In May 2022, two months after admitting to Stellar that she was “casually seeing someone”, Frost became engaged to Hansen; they learnt they were expecting shortly after.
Hansen remembers when an elated Frost called him from Sydney early one morning after she received a positive pregnancy test; he was on a landscaping site and burst into tears.
“While 33 isn’t that old [when it comes to fertility, it’s] something that people start to think about,” Hansen reflects. “So when she said she was pregnant, obviously I was excited for me, but it also took the stress away from Sam.”
Frost explains: “I have a handful of very special women in my life who have had a difficult and long journey trying to fall pregnant. I’ve been by their side as they experienced the overwhelming grief and pain. My heart aches for them.
It’s something I’ve been conscious of and, [while] witnessing the heartbreaking struggle of my loved ones, I guess I mentally prepared myself for an uphill battle.”
But when Hansen left for Samoa to film his second Australian Survivor stint for Network 10, Frost was nine weeks into her pregnancy and struggling with vomiting and fatigue, which left her bedridden and unable to eat little more than Vegemite on toast.
At about 18 weeks she turned a corner, but now she is trepidatious about what’s next. “I’m feeling overwhelmed. When the doctors and midwives ask about my birth plan, I’m like,
‘I don’t have one,’” she says. “I’d love to have a natural birth, but you just never know what’s going to happen.”
In October 2021, at a time when parts of the country were in lockdown, Frost uploaded a video to Instagram revealing doubts about getting vaccinated against Covid.
While the ensuing fury led her to remove the post and she went on to have the jab, she assures there will be no hesitancy around vaccinating her son.
“I’ve had my whooping cough vaccine and of course I’m going to vaccinate my child,” she says. “It’s a no-brainer for me. I was a bit hesitant about the Covid vaccine because it was brand new.”
Two months after the controversy, Frost left Home And Away, even though her character, nurse Jasmine Delaney, had been a fan favourite and Frost still had three years on her contract.
She said she wanted to prioritise her mental health and spend time with the people she loved, even if it meant she sometimes panicked about money and her mortgage. But, she figured, concentrating on her wellbeing meant that “the rest [would] fall into place”.
When reminded of that comment, Frost becomes emotional. “I have goosebumps,” she says. “It was a scary time leaving my job, but when I think about where I was, compared to where I am now, it’s a complete transformation. I feel the happiest and most myself I’ve ever been.”
Certainly, she and Hansen are having fun. He regards their relationship as a “win for the everyman” while she says it has been a revelation.
“You feel it intuitively when you meet the right person,” she tells Stellar.
“I’ve obviously had previous relationships and thought, maybe this is all there is. I went through my 20s and early 30s feeling like I had to sacrifice, but when you meet the right person, it’s: ‘Oh, this is what everyone’s talking about.’
With Jord, he’s got everything – he’s such a deeply complex and layered person, and he’s funny. All we do is laugh. That’s as good as it gets.”
But behind that easy larrikinism, Hansen is steered by some sincere parental advice.
“My dad always used to say, ‘You’ve got to find someone who ticks all your boxes, and then one day you’ll find someone who makes new boxes that you didn’t even know you needed and ticks them.’
“I didn’t believe it; I thought you just settled. But, no, Sam has created all these new boxes that I didn’t know I needed.”
As Hansen recounts their first meeting and subsequent date – in short, she invited herself over and purchased a toothbrush on the way – Frost playfully tries to stop him giving away such details. It only makes him double down.
“From then, I just couldn’t get rid of her,” he jokes to Stellar.
From the start, Frost was open with him about her battles with depression and anxiety, chronicled in her 2022 book Believe and shared through Believe By Sam Frost, the online community she and her sister Kristine Ross began in 2020.
“Mental health isn’t a flaw, it’s a part of human existence,” Hansen points out. “We all struggle, and something Sam and I did well was put our cards on the table early.
“We were both sick of games and pretending we’re superhuman when we’re not.” When they’re together, he reveals, rather than ask how she is, he asks: “How is your soul?”
The couple acknowledge that Frost could be mentally vulnerable during and after her pregnancy due to changing hormones, and she has been vocal about her experience with the lack of mental health care for expectant mothers.
As she tells Stellar, she suffered a trauma response in hospital while filling out a routine mental health questionnaire and, despite being told she would be referred to a psychologist, she heard nothing – even after she followed up four times.
“It’s not good enough,” she says. “I’m a proactive person, but what about the vulnerable people who are not following up?”
While Frost hasn’t ruled out a Summer Bay return, she and Hansen are now focused on parenting and using their platforms to have conversations about mental health and Indigenous rights, respectively.
“We love entertaining, but we’ve got more going on,” Hansen says.
As for Frost, she says, “When I left Home And Away, I was doing what was right for me. Now I’ve met my soulmate and I’m going to be a mum. Had I not made that choice, this wouldn’t have happened.”
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