Sheila Vijeyarasa showed viewers of Channel 9’s Big Miracles that she would stop at nothing to become a mother. With son Phoenix now one, Sheila has published a book about how taking brave little steps in life can help you soar. Editor in Chief Michelle Giglio reports.
It’s 2am and Sheila Vijeyarasa is 36 weeks pregnant – and bleeding profusely. Husband Tyson Salijevic is driving the couple from their home in Queenscliff to North Shore Private Hospital. To say they are anxious is an understatement. Sheila is talking to camera, for the journey of this duo to their pregnancy as a couple in their mid-40s using IVF has been documented and shared with millions of Australians on Channel 9’s Big Miracles.
“I’m trying not to panic,” she admits. They arrive at the hospital, Sheila is still filming and showing Tyson the blood pouring out of her, slapping on her tummy to will their son to kick, show a sign of life. The doctor confirms their baby is fine, but announces it is time for him to come out, via caesarean. They are not ready. “I’m in shock,” Sheila says. Tyson, whose face is visibly white and shaken, is more stark: “It’s terrifying.”
Sheila is wheeled into the delivery room, with the Big Miracles crew right behind them to film the all-important birth. “This is the biggest thing that’s ever happened to me!” Tyson spurts out. Tears are sliding down their faces, the emotion rolling out as they realise they are about to meet their son. Sheila tells her husband: “We’ve had a massive journey.”
For it has been two and a half years since the couple first embarked on IVF. They have been through countless devastating ‘not pregnant’ results, spent upwards of $70,000 on fertilisation, and made the huge decision to use a donor egg. And now their own little miracle is about to arrive.
Daily injections before IVF and a TV crew following their every move were worth it for the precious moment Phoenix was born and placed on Sheila
At first Phoenix makes no sound when he is taken out of the womb. Then suddenly he cries softly, the small wails building up to a crescendo of newborn noise. Sheila and Tyson start laughing and crying at the same time. “You did it sweetheart!” Tyson hugs his wife. “You’re mine, Phoenix. You’re mine,” Sheila sobs. “We’re parents, we’re parents.”
The story of how this couple got to the delivery room has not just been about IVF. It is very much a story of Sheila accepting that the plans she once held about career, love and family had to change for her to succeed.
She has documented it all in her new book, The Power of Little Steps, a follow up of Brave: Courageously Live Your Truth. The Power of Little Steps is a call to women to let go of the limitations they place on themselves, and dare to believe they can make change in their lives, however frightening it may seem.
“I think women collectively go through a lot of challenges, whether it’s fertility struggles or postpartum, returning to work, perimenopause, menopause,” Sheila explains. “And historically the female experience has been one in solitude. It’s been taboo. Topics that they can’t share or talk about with anyone else. There’s been shame around their experience. And so this book is very much to normalise the challenges women go through and give them a roadmap and a solution to help them through dark, challenging, turbulent times.”
Sheila herself has undergone the transformation that she encourages women to pursue – and she lays it all out there in the public eye, exposing all of her vulnerabilities and failures.
These include an unhealthy relationship with a ‘controlling’ partner, facing constant rejection when she lost her job and could not find employment, and the debilitating anxiety and sense of failure Sheila felt when she could not get pregnant using her own eggs.
“I’ve truly transformed into the most empowered, strong woman and mother by becoming a donor mum.”
At 48, Sheila’s journey has been a long time in the making. In her 40s she left a successful career as chief executive officer of a major Australian publisher to become a spiritual healer. A workaholic, she wanted to be able to control all aspects of her life – and fully expected to meet the perfect man, get married at 28 and have three children. But her intimate relationships kept failing, and the stress she was putting herself under was making her physically sick. “I looked like a picture of success on the outside and no one knew my dirty secret: I loathed myself,” she admits in the book.
So Sheila gave away the big bucks and took her own journey, and in the process has become an incredibly successful executive coach, and a sought-after key note speaker and business mentor who now travels Australia and the world, spreading what she has learnt with others.
Little Steps was written because of the need to support women in their time of personal crisis, something which Sheila had not been able to find when she needed it most.
“I was seeking stories that were really raw and that could speak to the depth of my sadness, anger, depression. And I didn’t find a lot of it,” she explains.
“So in this book, I tried to get as close to the pain that I was in so I could communicate that to the reader.
“I’ve realised myself, going through these challenging times, they’re not things that we have to suffer through. On the other side of that is transformation. On the other side of that is the new version of ourselves. On the other side of that is a more empowered woman who knows how to put boundaries in place, who knows how to speak, even if her voice shakes, who knows what she needs, and how to get her needs met.”
It’s all about taking ‘little brave acts.’ “If you take a little brave act every single day of your life, in one year, you’ll transform your life,” Sheila promises.
The IVF journey is a huge part of why Sheila has landed where she is today. When Tyson and Sheila met through a dating site, they were both ready – ready to meet ‘the one,’ ready to settle down, and ready to start having children – if they could.
Sheila has become a successful keynote speaker and author – but says she could not have done it without the support of her husband Tyson, who holds the fort at home when Sheila travels for work
At 45 and 46, they knew there was no time to waste. Within two months of meeting, they had moved in together. By month three, they had started IVF, combining Tyson’s sperm with eggs Sheila had frozen at 38 when she realised her fertility window was running out. But it was not to be. After seven gruelling rounds, they decided to take another path – another plan. What Sheila refers to often in Little Steps as ‘Plan C.’
“We are all living some version of Plan C,” she explains. “We don’t ever expect to be single mothers in our 40s and 50s. We don’t expect the career we threw everything into for 30 years to be suddenly over by redundancy. We don’t expect to find ourselves in a financial situation that’s detrimental because we’re going through a divorce. We don’t expect to have chemotherapy and lose all our hair.
“We’re all living some version of a life we didn’t want or we didn’t expect. And the narrative is, ‘What if it was always meant to be this way?’”
When IVF Australia told the couple that they should consider using a donor egg from a young woman instead of Sheila’s own, she was devastated. “I went through the stages of grief, which is quite common to go through when you become a ‘donor mum.’ I went through anger at the choices I made (when I was younger). I went through sadness and depression. Will I bond with this child? Will this child love me? Will the child look like me?”
Even when they made the decision to go with ‘Plan C’ and purchase an egg from the USA where it is legal, Sheila admits to feeling deeply insecure. “What if Tyson finds the egg donor more attractive than me?” she worried. But at the moment of implantation, something shifted. “This is going to work,” she thought. And in that moment, hope returned.
“I’ve truly transformed into the most empowered, strong woman and mother by becoming a donor mum,” Sheila says, tearing up. “And I get emotional talking about it because I had to fight for this child, you know? And I had to really do work and heal so many limiting beliefs around self-love and self-worth and boundaries to bring Tyson in.
“And I think it’s important that our path is visible and spoken about because so many women are scared. (They think), ‘What if I can’t have children?’ And I feel my journey was to learn to love in another way. Much like foster mothers and mothers that adopt children, (donor mums) have a different path.”
As for little Phoenix, Sheila says: “I couldn’t love this child anymore. He is my everything.
“I’ve had so many challenges as a woman,” she says, getting emotional again. “I’ve always felt like a late bloomer. I felt like I’ve always been a fighter. Things haven’t just come to me. And the universe says, ‘If you want this, you’re going to have to really work hard.’ And so when Phoenix came to me, I didn’t take a second of it for granted because we worked so hard to get him.”
She admits parenting is not perfect. Phoenix did not sleep more than two hours in a stretch for 10 months (‘It was a form of torture!’ Sheila admits), and as older parents, they craved rest. Now things have settled down, they are more energised than ever, and have bought a family home in Beacon Hill. “Tyson and I have the wisdom. We have an old head on our shoulders. We slow down over a morning coffee and we play with Phoenix before we drop him off at a daycare or start our days.
“And I think the version of me many years ago may not have stopped and played with him. I would’ve been annoyed that he was getting in the way of my career.
“I think being older has made my priorities a lot less around financial success and much more about deep relationships with family.”
She reveals they will try for another baby in November this year – when Sheila is 49 and Tyson 50 – as they have three embryos remaining from the original fertilisation with the donor eggs.
What if that is not successful? “I personally believe that if you want two, three, four kids, you’ve got to follow your dream. And I’ve often thought I would have two kids. If we don’t, life will take us to the next turn. But right now, that’s the vision I’m pursuing.”
Turning, or pivoting as Sheila calls it in the book, is the final part of the process. Sheila had been wanting to be a mother since her late twenties – and got there at 47 by letting go of the life she thought she would live. “Trust the process and that you’re being led to an alternative ending to the story of your life,” she urges.
“For me, it was in that final stage I realised I needed to become a donor mum. I let go of all my dreams of (motherhood) being done in a conventional way. I transformed the way I thought, and I pivoted, exploring what it meant to be a donor mum. I kept on taking little brave acts and I got there – and I’ll get there again!”
The Power of Little Steps is out 30 April at all good bookstores. You can watch the three seasons of Big Miracles on 9Now.