Pregnant Aussie influencer Leah Jay's heart stopped for 80 minutes while undergoing life-saving surgery

Pregnant Aussie influencer Leah Jay has had a wild few weeks, starting with seeing doctors about her swollen leg and ending with open heart surgery that required her heart to be stopped for 80 minutes.

The Texas-based content creator posted about her health journey on Instagram, sharing with her fans that she initially went to the hospital to seek care for her "swollen, painful leg", which turned out to be a blood clot requiring emergency surgery to remove.

But it was what caused the blood clot that was more sinister, with doctors discovering an infection in her heart that had been inside her body for a year, causing inflammation, illness, and eventually, the clot.

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"I kept thinking it was just bad luck, pregnancy symptoms, or that I needed to push through it," she said in a post dated January 27.

"But my body was trying to tell me something much bigger."

Soon after, she and her husband Michael were told she needed to transfer to Austin's top heart surgery hospital, after doctors discovered a strep infection in her blood, which created a large bacterial growth on her mitral valve.

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The solution the doctors landed on was open heart surgery for the valve to be removed and replaced, which lasts four to six hours and would require the pregnant mother's heart to be stopped for 80 minutes.

In preparation, the parents saw their baby girl on the ultrasound screen, which Leah described as "the highlight of my week.

"The little heartbeat and tiny movements gave me the strength I needed."

The mum – who shares son Reeves, three, with her husband – has since undergone the surgery and is now in recovery.

Now two days after her surgery, the pregnant mum is "in an incredible amount of pain".

"Covered in tubes. I've never experienced pain like this before," she said/

She added she is unable to stand up and walk around to begin her physical recovery due to being unable to put pressure on the leg that received surgery to remove the blood clot last week. Doctors will be removing tubes from inside her chest that are draining excess blood.

She says she is "so exhausted", though she was able to view ultrasound pictures of her baby girl the day prior, which lifted her spirits.

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