Alexa PenaVega had an indescribable premonition before suffering a stillbirth with late daughter Indy.
“When I was 10 weeks pregnant and we were living on the boat … I had a vision? An experience? Heard a voice? I don’t know how to explain it,” Alexa, 38, wrote in her and husband Carlos PenaVega’s new memoir, Joy Isn’t Canceled: What Grief Taught Us About Pain, Peace and Purpose. “The message that had come to me had felt so clear, so vivid that I never doubted it was something real: ‘One of you is not going to make it out of this. It can only be one of you.’”
Alexa and Carlos, 37, announced in April 2024 that her pregnancy with their fourth child ended in a stillbirth. (The couple, who have been married since 2014, also share sons Ocean and Kingston, as well as daughter Rio.)
In Joy Isn’t Canceled, Alexa revealed that she had an “overwhelming feeling” that either she or her unborn baby would not make it.
“It sounds horrible, I know. That’s why I tried to push whatever it was away,” she wrote. “It was more than a thought, but not quite an audible voice.”
Alexa had been hospitalized throughout her pregnancy with multiple then-unknown complications, including blood loss.
“One day I was bleeding, the next I wasn’t. Did I mention I could barely walk at this point? Walking 10 feet had me in so much pain. It took all my effort to do anything,” she recalled in one passage. “As time progressed, I became weaker and weaker. So tired that walking became almost impossible.”
Alexa subsequently felt a strong conviction to give birth at home, which she did. After the Spy Kids actress’ delivery, the midwife informed Carlos that the baby wasn’t breathing. First responders ultimately pronounced Indy dead, before allowing the PenaVegas to say their goodbyes in a local hospital.
Alexa PenaVega got emotionally candid on Friday, June 21, when she opened up about the loss of her fourth child. “It hurt, it sucked and it was awful. But we’re okay,” Alexa, 35, said in a video via Instagram. The Spy Kids alum, 35, and her husband, Carlos PenaVega, tearily revealed this past April that […]
“I picked her up and I held her,” Alexa penned. “Her little head fit perfectly into the crook of my arm, and I baptized her with my tears. ‘Oh, Indy.’ Carlos couldn’t bring himself to hold her, and I don’t blame him. It was so, so difficult.”
Following Indy’s loss, Alexa and Carlos found solace in their faith for comfort.
“We lost her on a Saturday morning and Sunday, the next day, my husband’s like, ‘How are you doing?’ [He was] just trying to check in with me and be an amazing husband,” Alexa recalled on the “Dear Future Husband” podcast in August. “We’re both equally just hurting. [He] had his peace immediately. It’s a weird space to be in like, total peace but total pain. I’m like, ‘I really have to go to church.’”
According to Alexa, she and the Big Time Rush musician attended their local church that same day.
“We just begin to just cry uncontrollably uncontrollably. It wasn’t loud,” she noted. “It was like it was just us in our own little world, our hands are raised and we’re worshipping.”
Joy Isn’t Canceled: What Grief Taught Us About Pain, Peace and Purpose is out now.
