Mom, 19, Loses 2 Babies, Likely to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, in Less Than a Year: ‘I’ll Never Get Over It’

“I couldn’t believe this was happening again. I was numb,” said Amber Garland

NEED TO KNOW

• Amber Garland, a 19-year-old woman from Yorkshire, England, lost two babies within less than a year of each other
• The newborns, both boys, likely died due to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, or SIDS
• “I wouldn’t wish this upon my worst enemy,” the grieving mother said in an interview with Kennedy News

A U.K. woman is sharing her story after she lost two newborns — likely to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) — within less than a year of each other.

Amber Garland, 19, said she and her partner, Harley Treece, first learned they were expecting a child when she was 17 years old, according to Kennedy News.

She gave birth to her first child, a son named Hugo, in April 2024.

"When I first got pregnant with Hugo, it wasn't planned but he was wanted,” Garland, a bakery worker, said while speaking to the outlet. "I didn't have a second thought about it, I knew I'd be the best mom.”

She ultimately gave birth to Hugo via an emergency C-section at 29 weeks (six months and three weeks), and he remained in the hospital for seven additional weeks. Garland said things seemed to be going well when she and her partner were finally able to bring Hugo home.

“He passed all his milestones. He was always putting weight on. Everyone adored him,” Garland recalled, adding that she loved being a mom.

"I never thought I'd find motherhood as natural as I did. I couldn't have wished for anything more — he was my entire world. He never gave us any reason that something bad was going to happen,” she added.

Garland said that the night Hugo died seemed like every other day — he fell asleep at his normal time and woke up in the middle of the night for his usual feeding. However, she said he didn’t wake up before 7 a.m., which was his routine.

When she went to check on him, she saw that “his face was turning blue.”

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Garland called an ambulance, but Hugo was pronounced dead when emergency services arrived. His official cause of death was listed as SIDS, which typically occurs while infants are sleeping.

Hugo was just 3 months old.

"I felt like I was in a nightmare. How can you go from having everything to having nothing in a matter of minutes?” Garland said while recalling the days surrounding Hugo’s death.

"I never thought I'd have to do life without him,” she added.

However, Garland was forced to look forward — she had found out she was pregnant with a second child just two weeks before Hugo died.

She gave birth to her second child, a boy named Hudson, in January 2025 — just five months after losing Hugo.

Hudson was also born prematurely at 29 weeks.

"Bringing Hudson home was such an anxious time,” Garland said of the experience. “Me and my partner never slept. I was sheltering him,” she said.

“A week before Hudson passed, I took [him] to the hospital because he was having [a] runny nose and a cough. They discharged him and told me I was just paranoid after what happened to Hugo,” she added.

Garland said she and her partner “put Hudson to bed like any normal day” the evening of May 13, 2025.

But her life was soon shattered yet again.

Garland said she checked on Hudson at about 5 a.m. the following morning, and found that he was not breathing. He was rushed to the hospital but could not be revived.

Garland and her partner are currently awaiting the official autopsy results for Hudson, but she has been told his death was also likely due to SIDS.

"I couldn't believe this was happening again. I was numb. I was just in a nightmare,” she told the outlet.

“I wouldn't wish this upon my worst enemy. I'll never get over it. Hopefully I'll just learn to eventually cope with it,” she added.

Garland told the outlet that she now attempts to cope with what happened to her by being there for others.

"Instead of making my grief anger, I want to turn it into …  something positive. I do charity events. If I can help anyone else in the same situation, I will,” she said.

It is currently unknown what causes SIDS, but researchers believe it may be linked to “problems in the area of an infant's brain that controls breathing and waking up from sleep,” according to the Mayo Clinic.

Premature birth and recent respiratory infections are also physical factors associated with the condition, per the Mayo Clinic.

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