Bringing Up Bates star Josie Bates and husband Kelton Balka are expecting their third baby.
“Balka, Party of Five!! 🫶,” Bates, 24, captioned recent Instagram reel which showed her and Balka, 28, sharing ultrasound photos with their daughters, Willow, 4, and Hazel, 2. In a subsequent post, Bates announced that she is due in March 2024.
The Up TV personality, who appeared on Bringing Up Bates for 10 seasons along with her 18 siblings and parents Gil Bates and Kelly Jo Bates, has faced hardships during her motherhood journey. In September 2020, Josie revealed that she’d suffered a miscarriage during her second pregnancy.
“This has been a very difficult time for our little family,” she wrote via Instagram at the time, adding that she and Kelton’s “hearts have been completely broken.”
Josie continued: “I’ve never experienced the type of pain and loss that I’ve had these past weeks. There is an empty spot in our hearts and in our home. Even though we never got to see our baby face to face or hold its tiny hand, we know God has a purpose for its short life. In spite of our grieving, we have peace in knowing that our little baby is in heaven with Kelton’s sweet mom.”
The following June, Josie gave birth to Hazel, who spent time in the NICU as a newborn.
“Routine bloodwork in the first trimester revealed that Hazel’s pregnancy was complicated by an exceedingly rare blood condition, unlike anything the doctors had seen before,” Josie wrote via Instagram two days after Hazel was born. “She developed a type of jaundice unique to her situation, and we transported [her] to the Children’s Hospital NICU in the early hours of the morning, where she is being monitored by teams of highly skilled doctors and nurses.”
Later that month, Josie shared that her daughter was healthy enough to leave the hospital and go home.
“We are praising Jesus for so many answered prayers, and we’re so thankful to be taking a healthy baby home today!” she wrote via Instagram at the time. “We will forever be indebted to the incredible team of doctors who cared for our baby and the precious nurses who became friends. They truly are angels.”
Prior to starting a family, Josie and Balka began dating in 2017 after meeting several years prior. Their courtship played out on season 7 of Bringing Up Bates, which aired in 2018. The pair got engaged in June of that year and tied the knot less than four months later. Their wedding was featured during a season 8 episode of the reality series in February 2019.
Josie isn’t the only member of the Bates clan who is expanding her brood; her brother Zach Bates welcomed baby No. 5 with wife Whitney Bates on Tuesday, August 15.
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“Lily Jo Bates 💫,” Whitney, 29, wrote via Instagram on Wednesday, August 16, alongside photos of her little one. “We are so in love 💕.”
Zach, 34, and Whitney also share daughters Khloé, 3, and Kaci, 6, and sons Jadon, 2, and Bradley, 8.
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