Miss Canada opens up about being pregnant while competing in Miss Universe 2025
Miss Canada Jaime VandenBerg has revealed why she chose to hide her pregnancy while she competed in Miss Universe 2025 in Bangkok.
Earlier in March—months after the pageant—VandenBerg revealed that she was already 16 weeks pregnant during the grand coronation night.
The beauty queen, however, kept her wonderful news on the down low.
"We did not tell our family nor the Miss Universe Canada organization at the time, and chose to keep it to ourselves for quite some time," she told PEOPLE Magazine in an interview.
"I really loved that we did that because it made the pregnancy feel that much more intimate in an era of my life where everything was so in the public eye."
While the Miss Universe Organization has relaxed its rules on allowing pregnant contestants and mothers to compete, VandenBerg shared she didn't want it to pull focus from her work.
"I felt strongly that if I announced my pregnancy publicly, I risked becoming viewed primarily as the 'pregnant contestant,' rather than being evaluated for my advocacy work, my resilience, and the decade of dedication that led me there. I feared that no one would pay attention to my philanthropy anymore, and I would only be seen under the veil of my pregnancy," she said.
When she learned she was expecting, the beauty queen reconsidered pushing through with the competition. However, her partner, Aaron Hernandez, encouraged her to see the pageant through.
"He reminded me that he would support me through every challenge and that competing would allow me to close this chapter of my life without regret or wondering 'what if,'" she continued.
VandenBerg, who finished in the top 30, had her first ultrasound before she left for Thailand for the competition, which Mexico's Fatima Bosch won. The Canadian beauty gave birth to a daughter, named Charlotte, in May.
Apart from Miss Universe, VandenBerg competed in Miss World 2023 and Miss Earth 2018. The latter pageant was rocked by a scandal after the Canadian and two others came forward with sexual harassment allegations against a sponsor.
VandenBerg is also a survivor of an encounter with a gunman in 2021.
Miss Universe allowed mothers, pregnant women, wives, and divorced women to compete in the prestigious beauty pageant in 2022.
