Woman delivers her own baby overseas with help from Google, YouTube
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — The internet came in handy for a Nashville woman who delivered her own baby while in a hotel room in another country.
Tia Freeman, 22, didn’t know she was pregnant until she was seven months along. She hadn’t gained much weight and was in denial, waiting to tell her family and friends. A few weeks later, since she had already bought tickets to see a friend overseas, she boarded a plane. But the baby decided to make a surprise appearance during her layover in Istanbul.
“I started to get cramps, and I contributed that to maybe food poison,” Freeman said.
Freeman thought she was having cramps while on the plane, but it turned out to be contractions. She landed in Istanbul and during her two hours in customs lines, Freeman says her cramps got more severe.
“I’m holding on to the guardrail, and I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I better not pass out in this airport; there’s no way I’m going down on this airport floor.’”
Still not quite realizing she was in labor, Freeman took a cab to her hotel room.
“At that point I’m like, ‘No, this is labor; like I’m pretty sure this is what it is.’ So I Google it and I’m like, ‘How do you know if you’re in labor.’”
After determining she was in labor, she began preparing to give birth on her own.
“I go and look up YouTube videos, and I just literally type in ‘how to deliver a baby’ and the first video that popped up I was like, ‘OK, this is what we will use,’” she explained.
And in only a matter of minutes, with a couple of towels on hand and in a bathtub, Freeman gave birth.
“As soon as he came out, he just bobbled up to the top of the water, and I had no clue what the sex of the baby was yet, so I just lift him above my head reminiscing of the Lion King. I was like, ‘Whoop, it’s a boy!’”
A healthy baby boy, Xavier, was born, but her work wasn’t done.
“Then it’s time to cut the umbilical cord, and I’m like, ‘Dear God, I’m nervous now.’” So Freeman went to Google for advice.
“I didn’t have clamps on me. I was totally unprepared for this, so what I decided to use was my shoelaces. Each room has an electric kettle in it; I put water in it, it took about two minutes and I put my shoelaces in there and then I just waited for them to get sterilized. And I had a pocket knife on me, so I just threw that in there, too,” she explained.
Freeman successfully cut the cord, passed her placenta, cleaned up the bathroom and breastfed her baby before calling it a night.
“We just laid in bed. I went to sleep, and that was how I delivered my baby.”
Freeman says she would do it the same way if she had the opportunity again. Thougth, it is always advised that you get medical help, as you could put yourself and the baby at risk, Freeman says she didn’t because the few people she had encountered didn’t speak English and she didn’t know how her insurance would work overseas.
Freeman and her new baby did end up in the hospital, where they were checked on before flying home to La Vergne two weeks later.
Xavier, now 7 weeks old, got a Turkish middle name from the experience: Ata, which means forefather and gift.
Freeman says Xavier has an American citizenship and that he is able to hold Turkish citizenship as well, so he will have dual citizenship until he’s 18.