'At 35 weeks pregnant, I was preparing for new life. Then I was forced to grieve another.'

At 35 weeks pregnant, Katie Lolas was pottering around her house on a random summer Tuesday when her phone rang. It was her husband, Scott Grant, just wondering if she was home.

Not long later, he walked through the door.

The moment Katie saw his face, her stomach lurched.

"He looked like he'd been crying. My heart sank," she told Mamamia.

"I remember thinking, 'Oh God, something's happened to his parents.'"

Then he told her to sit down.

"I'm really sorry," he said. "Nadia's passed away."

It was Katie's younger sister.

"I just remember hearing the words and thinking there's been a mistake. She's not dead," Katie said.

Watch a snippet of a tribute to Nadia. Post continues below.

She instantly launched into denial. Scott must have misheard… if she just went to her parents' house, everything would be alright.

But arriving at her family home only cemented the nightmare.

"The house was a crime scene," she said. "The police had to come to see what went on. It's quite unusual for a 31-year-old to just die at home."

Full-body chills took over as Katie sat on the couch, while extended family continued to arrive.

"I was just shaking in the living room, my teeth were chattering," she said.

"I wasn't talking to mum and dad. I felt angry thinking, 'What has happened?'"

Katie and Nadia. Image: Supplied.

All she wanted was to see her sister. But now, it's a moment Katie wishes never happened.

"I went upstairs by myself and saw her lying there… that's when it really hit me," she said.

"I wish I hadn't seen her. It was really hard. I don't want to remember her like that.

"For a long time, I couldn't get those images out of my head."

There was a coronial inquest into Nadia's sudden death, but it found she died of unexplained natural causes.

Today, Katie chooses to remember Nadia as she lived: bubbly, funny, artistic and quirky.

"We were really close," she reflected.

Nadia, who lived with autism and a moderate intellectual disability, shared a special bond with her older sister.

"I was like her second mum," Katie said.

"She's fun, an incredible artist, intelligent, cuddly, warm."

Katie during her first pregnancy. Image: Facebook/ladylolas.

When Katie told her sister she was pregnant, Nadia was elated.

"We'd been married for quite a few years and had been trying, but it had been a challenge," Katie said.

"I was so excited. It was a really good pregnancy."

Nadia's death changed everything. Suddenly, a pregnancy filled with so much light and love became a source of overwhelming guilt.

"When I felt so happy I had this pregnancy that I desperately wanted and my baby was progressing, I felt very guilty about not grieving my sister," Katie said.

"She was one of the loves of my life, she was my first child.

"When I was grieving her, I felt guilty about what impact it might have on my child."

Then, when she was grieving Nadia, she felt guilty about what the stress might do to her baby.

Nadia was excited about becoming an auntie. Image: Supplied.

Around her, people told Katie to focus on the baby.

"How do you do that?" she asked. "I lived with [Nadia] until well into my late 20s… she was such an important part of my life."

Katie welcomed her daughter Harper via a planned C-section — a way to gain control during such a turbulent time in her life.

"It was the best thing for my mental health," she said. "That was really beautiful and special."

But early motherhood brought its own challenges.

"Harper wanted to be held all the time, she cried all the time," Katie said. "I wasn't sleeping. I had trouble breastfeeding. I kept thinking, 'God, I'm really bad at this.'"

"I waded through those first three months not sleeping well… oscillating between two extreme emotions and this overarching guilt that enveloped everything in the day-to-day."

Katie ended up seeing a grief counsellor and spent a week at the early parenting not-for-profit, Tresillian, where nurses helped her care for Harper.

"Having that support was really helpful," Katie said.

Over the next year, Katie regularly saw a psychologist, who helped her navigate the challenges of new motherhood and grief.

"I had to learn to have fun again, to figure out who I was going to be after my first child," she said.

"You get so wrapped up in keeping this beautiful baby alive, you forget who you are in the world outside of that."

Katie struggled with balancing guilt and grief. Image: Supplied.

While Katie keeps Nadia's memory alive for her two children, she still wishes they could have known her sister.

"I still grieve the fact they'll never be able to feel her love," Katie said.

The heaviness of grief never quite goes away, she says, but we can learn to live with it.

"I look back on that time of my life and it feels really sad," Katie said.

"It was a very lonely, dark period… You don't have to carry that weight of grief on your own.

"It's important to have a village around you. No one can do it alone."

Feature image: Facebook/ladylolas.