Sacha Bailey, 30, announced Sunday that he and his girlfriend, Lucy Brown, have welcomed a son, Wolfgang Robert Bailey.
Bailey posted an image on Instagram hours after the birth showing the newborn wrapped in a white blanket in a hospital cot with the caption "Who dis?" Brown has been described in news reports as a former assistant to political activist Tommy Robinson.
The arrival of Wolfgang comes about three years after Bailey publicly revealed he had considered a gender transition. In interviews around the time of the birth and in his recently published memoir, Try to Hit the Pool, Bailey described a period of severe depression during his marriage to Japanese lawyer Mimi Nishikawa, saying he at one point convinced himself he was transgender and sought hormone replacement therapy after a brief private consultation. He told the Daily Mail he stopped the process before making irreversible changes.
"I felt totally lost. I didn't want to be alive," Bailey said in accounts published by the Daily Mail. "I convinced myself I must be transgender — that I was living the wrong life in the wrong body. It felt like the only way out." He said he obtained a prescription for female hormones but ultimately "pulled back" and reassessed the source of his distress.
Bailey credited Brown and his father, photographer David Bailey, with helping him through that period. "Lucy saved my life," he said, according to the Daily Mail. "She helped me feel grounded again. Like I wasn't broken." David Bailey, noted for his work documenting the Swinging Sixties, has been publicly supportive, the younger Bailey said.
Bailey's divorce from Nishikawa has been drawn out and contentious, he said, with disputes over finances, property and unpaid utility bills. He told reporters the divorce was in its final stage and described the months since as among the "worst years" of his life.
Try to Hit the Pool, published earlier this year, recounts his struggle with suicidal thoughts, the aborted transition, his fraught marriage and subsequent recovery. Bailey said the book was a way to bring closure to a difficult chapter.
He has also become a vocal critic of what he described as a "rushed" approach to gender treatment, particularly for young people. Bailey said he has been contacted by dozens of people who have detransitioned and who regret their decisions. In interviews he argued that those people are often ignored by health systems and policymakers.
Asked how he would respond if his son one day asked about gender identity, Bailey said he would oppose medical interventions for children. "You can't get a tattoo. You can't change your gender. It's really as simple as that. Kids have no control over their life. So we have to look after them," he told the Daily Mail.
Despite the turbulence of recent years, Bailey said he is hopeful about the future with Brown, telling reporters in June that he sees marriage "in our future" and that he had "never felt happier." The couple has not announced further plans publicly.
The birth adds a new chapter to a family often in the public eye: Sacha Bailey is the son of David Bailey and model Catherine Dyer. The younger Bailey has pursued modeling and published writing alongside his recent public reflections on mental health and gender identity.