The best way to describe chatting to Oti Mabuse is to think of dancing in sunshine. She positively radiates positivity. That instantly recognisable laugh, the warmth that spills out as she talks about everything from her dance school to nappies; I come off the call feeling lighter, brighter and ready to take on the world.
Which is odd when you consider that our conversation was largely centred on prematurity and her own experience of having a premature baby. But Oti’s positive outlook on life has that effect – even in the gloom she finds the silver linings and sends those silver linings spinning over everything she touches.
Mother&Baby chatted with Oti ahead of World Prematurity Day on 17th November, to find out how she coped in those early days, get her advice for parents of premature babies and find out how she’s juggling parenting with her busy schedule, especially now it's been announced she's heading to the jungle for I'm a Celebrity...
Oti Mabuse and her experience with prematurity
Oti Mabuse became a mum for the first time in November 2023, but her baby girl was born two months early and ended up in the Neonatal unit for six weeks.
As she told Mother&Baby in March this year, “it wasn’t fun to see her in an incubator with all the noisy machines around her and the wires, the injections and the blood tests. But the neonatal team at UCLH were so incredible. They were checking on her all the time, as well as all the other babies in there. How they take care of all the children in that unit was so amazing and it allowed me to have time to focus on myself and recovery.”
Now her daughter is turning one, I was keen to discover how she now feels about that period, and whether it’s affected her journey into motherhood and how she parents today.
“It felt like every single little thing was a step to learn, about ourselves, parenthood and her”
It’s clear that the trauma of those early weeks is still with her, but time is a great healer and she talks about it with a certain lightness. “It was so unexpected and we were in a state of shock because we didn't know what was happening or why it was happening. And we tried our best to keep her inside for as long as possible. But, you know, she had that will. She wanted to be born early.”
While those early days, weeks and months are a huge learning curve for any new parent, they’re even more challenging for parents of premature babies. As Oti says, “You're learning how to change their diapers. You're learning what type of nappies to use, and we were very lucky that we had the Pampers Preemie nappies that were really gentle on her skin. We learned how to give her the first bath. We did skin-on-skin and we created an amazing bond. And so it felt like every single little thing was a new step to learn, about ourselves, parenthood and her.”
She’s open about the emotions that come with giving birth prematurely and seeing your baby whisked away to an incubator. “The first everything, the first time you touch them, the first time they're in your arms, all of it is quite scary” she reflects, noting that a premature baby’s skin is so much more fragile and delicate. “You're scared to touch them and you're scared to hurt them. They also have wires and feeding tubes and breathing pumps everywhere. You want to protect them. I think the nappy changes are the scariest thing because it's something that you do constantly. It’s a journey where you have to learn how to do it with the wires and these tiny little bodies.”
It takes a village
I ask how she stayed positive during those challenging early weeks. “My husband, really. And my mum. When I was in there, I met other mums and we were all going through the same thing. And so with my amazing mum and husband, I had other mums who I could relate to and other mums who I could ask for advice when we were breastfeeding or breast pumping or talking about the different stages of the neonatal unit. Even if we had some tough nights, I always had this incredible group of mums that were there to cry with me, pat me on the back and reassure me.”
And that village is still her support network a year later. “We have our own WhatsApp group where we can check on each other. We help each other out, like some of my friends, their kids need physio so you'll send your physio’s number. So we're still very close.”
When we spoke with Oti in March, she told us that Motsi has taken auntie duties in her stride, spoiling her niece as well as her little sister at every opportunity. In those early months she made sure Oti was taking good care of herself with plenty of rest and recuperation, sending her off for a relaxing spa day while she babysat. And as I discover, Motsi is still as hands-on as she was in the those early months.
"I have so many friends, so many family members. But my mom and my husband and my sister are an incredible foundation for me. My mum comes for a few weeks in the year. Motsi comes every Friday or Saturday to Sunday and when she's there I'm like, come on, Auntie. It's your time to work."
And it's not just immediate family who rallied around her in those early weeks and are still a crucial support network, it's also her Oti Mabuse Dance Studio family. "So we have family and we also have our dance school with all the dance mums who, when we're working and teaching, are helping us and taking care of her. It really does take a village, but we have such incredible people around us who are always willing to help."
We talk a lot about how giving birth prematurely affects mothers, but less so about the impact on Dads. How did Marius cope?
“My husband is really resilient. I have to say he's the most resilient human being that I know. I think he thought it was the most incredible thing to ever happen. He just wanted to be a big, big support and that's definitely what he was.”
“He's so in love with her. The relationship they have is like no other. It’s like I disappear in the room when it's just the two of them. She's just, like, get off me. That is my daddy. That's the only person I want to be with” Oti says, laughing.
"It's a long journey..."
Having been through a premature birth and those early weeks in the Neonatal unit, and having had a year to reflect on her experiences, I'm curious to see what advice Oti would give to other parents who are in the NICU with their premature baby right now.
“It's a long journey, but they will definitely make it. They will survive. They have to be patient, but they will get there. They have to just trust that they have the best care.”
I ask her if there's anything she wishes she'd known a year ago when her daughter was in the Neonatal unit. She laughs, "Relax. Just chill out. You know, just relax. I really wished I was a little bit more relaxed, but I did the best at the time that I could."
Oti has spoken in interviews before about how her daughter wouldn't have had the care she received if she'd been born in her husband's home country of Romania or South Africa, and when I ask her about that, she talks animatedly about the wonder that is the NHS neonatal care.
"They do such incredible work. If you think, a premature baby probably weighs less than a small handbag and it's smaller than that and they have to perform surgeries on those little babies - day and night." You can hear the gratitude in her voice when she speaks about it. "Even if you find yourself in a situation where you do have a spontaneous birth like me or your child is born premature, you do have people who are trained and are ready to help you and show you love and protect you and your child."
"It's the same thing as working with Pampers, knowing there's a brand out there that's actually thinking about not just the moms, but about what children in the Neonatal unit need as well, because one in every thirteen children is born premature. And I always want to work with people that can bring as much awareness as possible to things that I'm passionate about."
"I want it to be a motivating factor for when she does amazing things"
We all parent in our own ways and I wonder if Oti's early experiences of prematurity have affected how she parents her daughter. She tells me that she's tried not to approach it as a negative thing. "My mum is a nursery school teacher so she's dealt with children with disabilities, with premature babies, she's dealt with all different types of children that you can imagine. That helped a lot and she kept she kept saying to me, 'stop saying she's premature. She's fine. She's going to be fine'."
It strikes me that Oti has brought her characteristic positivity to parenting, in treating her daughter gently but without seeing prematurity as something negative.
"We've raised her differently to how we would have if we'd let the term 'premature' sound bad. But I keep reminding myself when she's sick or when she hasn't reached certain milestones, that this thing did happen to her and I don't take that experience away from her. I want it to be a motivating factor for when she does amazing things."
She's also discovering the strong-willed, independent streak that many mums of young girls will recognise. "One day she'll say, 'I've been through this whole thing, but I made it out the other side' and it will remind her that she is capable of anything. And she's got the most incredible willpower I've ever seen - if she wants something, she's going to get it. I have to find out how I'm going to raise her to be the strong, independent woman that she is, but also patient. Chill out. You can relax." she laughs.
"We don’t understand how amazing the body is"
As Oti told us when we spoke in March this year, she’s happily back at work and juggling parenting and work. “For some reason, my career is growing at the same time. I'm so grateful because people used to tell me that when you have a baby, people won’t work with you and that's not been true. It’s been the opposite.”
But she was careful not to rush back into work, taking the time to heal and be there for her daughter. "When she was in hospital I stopped working for a really, really, really long time because I wanted to just be there for her as a mum. And then I went back into it very slowly, easing myself in and allowing my body to heal.” I suggest it must be important as a dancer to give your body time to recover from birth and Oti agrees. “You have to listen to your body, because as dancers, we can put ourselves under a lot of pressure. I had to put being a mum at the forefront and just allow my body to heal first before getting back into dancing.”
This is a long way from where she was before having her daughter. As she said when she spoke to Mother&Baby earlier this year, she’d recently caught herself looking at old photographs of herself from years ago, and remembers how obsessed she used to be with being slim. But she knows she’ll never put that kind of pressure on herself again.
“The fact that women can sit and create food and create humans who we deliver, and then we continue to work as mothers while holding up communities and businesses – all these amazing things we do with our bodies. You only get one body and you only get one chance at it.”
“I think the worst thing to do is to be in this position and not appreciate what the body can do. And I really hope that women can get to that point. It might not look amazing, we might not all look like supermodels, but what a body is doing is irrelevant of what it looks like, and I think we should take time and appreciate that.”
Oti Mabuse Dance Studio, tour and I’m a Celebrity
Of course, juggling a career like hers and a child is never easy but this is where Oti’s village comes in again. “Wow, it's really tough. I think as every parent will tell you, you really need as many friends and family as possible. We have an amazing system with the parents that we have at the Oti Mabuse Dance Studio. My mum comes from South Africa to help us with the baby and so do my in-laws. So you do really need a lot of help and I think a lot of parents will tell you that as well.”
She’ll be going on tour in 2025 but this will be a family affair with her husband and daughter joining her. You can hear the excitement in her voice when she talks about it. “Yes, we're going on tour. It's called Viva Carnival. And we're going to be dancing and celebrating all tours from all over the world and we're really excited to be dancing again and on stage and connecting with people and doing what we love.”
At the time of interview, Oti had not yet been allowed to confirm those ‘I’m a Celebrity…’ rumours and she was keeping her lips sealed. “At this point, I can neither confirm nor deny!” she says playfully. We can now confirm however that Oti will be swapping her dancing shoes for jungle boots and we can't wait to watch her in action!
As we finish up our chat, I can hear the joyful chaos of family life in the background – her daughter is turning 1 so the whole family – grandparents, brothers, sisters - are there to celebrate. It’s clear that the village Oti has built is a strongly knit one that's rallied around her for the past year and is still there, supporting her, raising her up and providing those foundations for her and her daughter.
Pampers continues to support Bliss, the UK’s leading charity for babies born premature and sick who promote Family Integrated Care, including those essential nappy change moments, and emotionally support families on the NICU through their volunteer programme – Bliss Champions. To show your support this World Prematurity Day, for every Pack of Pampers nappies and nappy pants purchased in Boots between Nov 6th 2024 and Jan 2nd 2025, Pampers will donate 1 premature nappy to UK premature babies in the UK (T&Cs apply)
Rebecca Lancaster is a Digital Writer for Mother&Baby, drawing on ten years of parenting her two children to help others navigating their own parenting journey. As a freelance writer, she spent ten years working with leading lifestyle brands, from travel companies to food and drink start-ups, and writing everything from hotel reviews to guides to the best British cheeses. She’s particularly interested in travel and introducing her children to the excitement of visiting new places, trying different foods (less successfully) and experiencing different cultures.