As Pregnancy Progressed, They Refused Doc’s Second Suggestion

During one appointment, the obstetrician told [Prince and Mayte] the ultrasound measurements were off and said, “It’s possible that we’re seeing a form of dwarfism.” Writes Garcia, “My husband and I looked at each other and shrugged. ‘And?’ he said. ‘I’m totally fine with that.’ I laughed. Of all the possible outcomes that had been offered to us, this was the first one that didn’t terrify me.”

Mayte wrote that their doc again warned them that there could possibly be genetic defects with their baby and recommended the amnio test again. Prince adamantly refused for a second time to risk their child’s life. But then…

Prince’s Happiness, Then Horror In Delivery Room

Mayte and Prince got the most painful shock of their lives in the delivery room when they saw their baby. Mayte described the scene that day:

Via People: On Oct. 16, 1996, Garcia delivered their son via c-section. At first, she writes, she and Prince were elated: “I don’t know how to describe the look on my husband’s face. Pure joy.”

“And then they held the baby up to those harsh lights,” she continues. “The elation on my husband’s face turned to pure terror.”

“Pfeiffer syndrome type 2 is a genetic disorder that causes skeletal and systematic abnormalities,” she writes. “The premature fusing of the bones in the skull, sometimes resulting in ‘cloverleaf skull,’ in which the eyes are outside the sockets. The fusion of bones in the hands and feet causing a webbed or pawlike appearance … I learned all of this later.”

They Pretended Son Was Still Living On Oprah’s Show

Six days after Mayte gave birth, their little ‘prince’ sadly passed away. Just one week later, Prince and Mayte appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show. When Oprah joyfully asked about their baby, they both pretended that Amiir was still alive. Mayte later revealed their reason for lying:

“We believed he [Amiir] was going to come back, that souls come back. We didn’t want to acknowledge he was gone, it was our way of grieving.”

The pain in both Prince’s and Mayte’s eyes is now clearly evident when we re-watch that Oprah interview today though. Check it out below. They talk about their son around the 4:54 mark.

After their son’s death, Mayte and Prince experienced a miscarriage early on in her second pregnancy that was heartbreaking for them as well. Their extreme grief took a toll on their marriage and they eventually divorced in 2000. Prince never had kids after that, and Mayte says he never got over losing two babies:

“I don’t think he ever got over it,” Garcia, now 43, tells PEOPLE of her ex-husband, who died last April from an accidental overdose. “I don’t know how anybody can get over it. I know I haven’t.”

Mayte has one adopted daughter now.