Another celebrity custody battle. Another tussle over a tiny baby.

Another celebrity custody battle.

Another tussle over a tiny baby.

Another story of heartache and desperation.

But this custody case has one big difference from the thousands of others that play out every day – this one has caught the attention of women’s groups across the world.

And the key issue that raised concern was whether this battle could set a precedent for pregnant women to be legally obliged to live near their unborn children’s fathers.

The basic facts have been played out in the US and UK media for months.

Ex-Marine, model and firefighter (now studying law), Sara McKenna falls pregnant to champion US Olympian skier Bode Miller.

They met through an exclusive online dating service in San Diego.

They briefly dated before he moved on, and met and then married his now wife (also a US athlete superstar, Morgan Beck).

But McKenna had fallen pregnant to Miller, and she decided to keep the baby.

The custody battle over their now 13-month old son has been bitter and drawn out. This week McKenna has written about it for US Cosmopolitan magazine’s website.

McKenna has written of how Bode Miller told her initially he did not want anything to do with their child.

McKenna decided she could not bring up a baby as a fire-fighter in San Diego and decided to relocate to Columbia University in New York to study.

She says she told Bode Miller she was moving but did not hear back from him.

Unbeknownst to her, he had somewhere along the line changed his mind about the baby and filed for custody before she gave birth.

McKenna writes of her difficult birth in New York. She had previously had a daughter, born prematurely, who died after living only two days – and says she was a wreck.

When her son, Sam, was three days old she filed for custody.

However it turned out she was too late.

“Bode had me “served” with paternity papers to my home address in San Diego, knowing I did not live there. Since I never responded to the paperwork, they used default custody as a tactic.

We went to New York Family Court that May. There, Bode’s lawyers accused me “unjustifiable conduct” for moving while pregnant.”

The case was sent back to California and she was ordered to hand the baby over to his father.

“The day before Bode came for Sam, I wanted to stop time. I remember seeing the car pull up — and Bode getting out. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to say, “Please don’t take him! Let’s try to figure something out!” But I knew no matter what I said, Bode was going to take Sam. My heart felt like it was being ripped out as I watched Sam being taken away.”

McKenna said that she then heard Bode Miller had changed their son’s name.

He and his now-wife Morgan Miller were calling him Nate.

“I would look for photos of Sam on Instagram and Twitter and saw that Bode was calling him Nathaniel. That was really heartbreaking. Our son’s name is Samuel Bode Miller-McKenna. Calling him anything else is just confusing. There were also tons of photos of Bode’s wife holding Sam like he was her baby. That was very hard to bear.”

In a heartbreaking twist Bode’s wife, Morgan Miller, had suffered a very public miscarriage just days before McKenna gave birth.

Things then got nasty when according to Slate’s Emily Bazelon, “the wife had the bad taste to reportedly put up a blog post, since deleted, in which she said that she and Miller provided a “loving and balanced family,” unlike McKenna, who she said often used child care.”

Women’s rights groups were alarmed by the court’s actions.

Sonia Ossorio, president of the New York chapter of the National Organisation for Women, told The Washington Post the original family court ruling had set a “dangerous” precedent for pregnant women who need to move.

“It was unprecedented,” Ossorio said. “Basically the judge accused Sara McKenna of running off with her foetus. This was a dangerous road because the Constitution grants adults, including pregnant ones, basic liberties and freedoms.”

At this point the the National Advocates for Pregnant Women, the New York Civil Liberties Union, the NYU School of Reproductive Justice Clinic, and other women’s rights organisations filed a brief in support of McKenna.

A five-judge appeals court in New York then reversed the initial New York ruling, declaring, “Putative fathers have neither the right nor the ability to restrict a pregnant woman from her constitutionally protected liberty.”

Sarah McKenna writes:

My life stopped the moment they took Sam out of my arms, and it didn’t begin again until Bode handed him back to me on November 25. I was sitting in court when I heard Sam’s sweet little voice down the hall. As soon as I saw him, I reached out and said, “I missed you!” He put his arms out for me and said, “Mama!”…. I was whole. The next day was my birthday. I woke up next to Sam, and he started giggling — that was the best present I’ve ever received in my life

Samuel is now 13-months-old and, sadly for all, the battle continues. Just this week the parents again feuding in a New York court over child support payments.

The Manhattan Family Court judge said that they must work out an interim custody schedule by next week or they will be back in court next Monday for a hearing.

In the meantime Sam lives with his mother. Sara McKenna says all she wants is the best Sam.

“My hope is that Bode and I can work together to finally give Sam a stable life. That’s all I want for our son.”