We’ve all heard our fair share of crazy birth stories and we’ve all hoped and prayed that nothing out of the ordinary would happen to us. Still, life has a funny way of turning out the exact opposite of how we expected it. So, as an organized person who knows just how she wants things to go, Deanne Bañares-Dimacali was definitely in for a surprise the morning she gave birth to her daughter in the guest bathroom of her apartment! But more than just seeing this experience as completely unusual and unlikely, both Deanne and her husband Raffy took the situation for the blessing in disguise that it truly was. Find out more about Deanne and Raffy’s story here!
While she was pregnant, Deanne had no complications whatsoever and both she and Raffy had planned, expected, and prayed for a smooth, problem-free birth–just like they had with their first child. Deanne explains, “If anything, all the signs pointed to an average birth…even my OB said [the delivery would be smooth] since this was already my second.”
So when the contractions woke and kept Deanne up at four in the morning last August 22, the couple believed they had time to spare. With his wife’s contractions still bearable and around ten minutes apart, Raffy was sure that he would have enough time to take Deanne to the hospital, drop off their two-year-old son Noah at school by nine, and then get back to Deanne to see his daughter Azelie’s birth at 11.
By six in the morning, Deanne’s contractions had gotten harder to work through and were now more painful than ever. She was also running back and forth to the bathroom, noting that she had just seen her mucus plug in the toilet.
Although Raffy took all this as signs to start heading to the hospital, Deanne thought twice and said they couldn’t wake Noah up or leave him alone in their apartment. “After our experience and recalling this,” Raffy says, “I realize how my wife, even during the painful contractions, still looked after the welfare of Noah, our firstborn.”
Finally, there was no fighting it anymore! The couple’s driver arrived, Noah had woken up, and Raffy was by the door, panicking yet ready to rush to the hospital with his laboring wife. But, after one more unbearable contraction, Deanne felt the sudden urge to use the bathroom again, where she saw the head of her baby girl crowning between her legs.
At this point, Deanne was going through a mix of emotions and feelings: Although she was exhausted from the pain of her contractions and delivery, Deanne found herself feeling relieved because that part was over and her daughter had already been born. At the same time, this new second-time mom recalls, “Seeing her on the floor and knowing that there were no medics around us, I instantly switched to worry.”
Mere seconds after hearing Deanne let out a loud scream, Raffy could only watch in shock, as both his wife and their new baby slid onto the bathroom floor. “Compared to Noah’s birth,” Raffy explains, “where I cried tears of joy as our doctor carried him to us, I had no tears this time. I was in panic mode; I felt so helpless. But, when I heard my baby’s cry for the first time, I got my act straight.”
Raffy wrapped his new baby girl in towels and called for an ambulance. But, he wasn’t the only witness to this amazing birth! Their son Noah had been standing by, watching his sister come into the world. In fact, he was the first person that Deanne saw as she lay resting on the bathroom floor. Much like his dad, Noah was stunned until he finally said “That’s my baby sister!”
Deanne notes that her son was so calm, even as the paramedics came to cut the umbilical cord and brought the family of four to the hospital: “To this day, he remembers what happened. He even copies the squatting position I was in when Azelie came out of me!”
Once at the hospital, Deanne’s OB-GYN remarked at how unbelievable this birth was! Deanne says, “More than 20 years in practice and this was her first ever emergency home birth.” But, their doctor also mentioned that Deanne being unable to sleep even during the mild contractions should have been their first signal to get to the hospital immediately (an important thing to remember for any expecting mom!).
Nonetheless, Deanne and Raffy still can’t help but think of this whole experience as a miracle. Despite the moments of disbelief when looking back at what happened, the couple is so grateful and happy that both Deanne and Azelie are safe, healthy, and now have an incredible story to tell! Raffy and Deanne even remember thinking during the ambulance ride that morning that Azelie had to be someone special to have come into the world this way.
Although life tends to send us through crazy twists and turns, it has an equally crazy way of letting everything fall into place. And this story of the birth of Deanne and Raffy’s second child can prove just how unexpected life’s greatest blessings truly are.
As a writer and now a mommy of two, Deanne put up a touching post about this experience on her blog Classy Musings a few days after giving birth. Check it out here!