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A frantic future father was forced to improvise a place for his partner to give birth at a picnic stop, in freezing temperatures, while traveling to a birthing unit in Central Otago.
Saskia Hulsbosch and her fiancé Daniel Hopper had to stop while traveling between Cromwell and Alexandra to have their first baby, stopping at 6 a.m. on August 29.
They were making the hour-long journey, followed by their midwife, from their home in Wānaka to Charlotte Jean, a primary delivery unit in Alexandra.
Jo McKenzie-McLean / Stuff
Saskia Hulsbosch and her fiancé Daniel Hopper, from Hāwea near Wānaka, were forced to stop at a picnic area in the gorge between Cromwell and Alexandra in freezing temperatures at 6 a.m. to have their baby.
“Water broke on the way, and I was like ‘holy … you’. When we got to Cromwell Gorge, I needed to push. I said to Dan, ‘stop, this baby is coming.’
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Hopper said he was “surprisingly calm” on the outside, but on the inside he was “spinning and freaking out.”
“He was just doing what he had to do, helping out in any way he could, trying to keep Saskia calm.”
Supplied
Saskia Hulsbosch, with her fiancé Daniel Hopper, gave birth to their son Lennix in their car on the side of the road halfway between Cromwell and Alexandra.
The couple stopped at the picnic area and Hopper tried knocking on the trailer doors to see if they could deliver in one of them, but no one responded.
“I think I called really fast and kept going to them, when they realized I had the baby, I was back in the car and she was pushing,” Hopper said.
Unable to get the car seat out of the backseat in time, with the help of their midwife Linda Baker, they used a blanket to create a makeshift tarp outside the open passenger door to keep out the cold.
Jo Mckenzie-Mclean / THINGS
The Wanaka community is pushing for a primary delivery facility in their growing city.
With Hulsbosch crouched in the passenger seat, Baker walked out the door and gave birth to the baby, whom the couple named Lennix.
“It just happened so fast… 12 minutes and he was out. The heater in the car was on full blast and Linda was out the door and I just pushed.
“If I hadn’t done a hypnopartum course, I think I would be traumatized. Those kinds of things can trigger postpartum depression.
“It’s such a crazy way to bring a baby into the world.
“Dan was a bit shocked. It was pretty bad for the baby. We had to watch him for the next 24 hours because he was born in the cold ”.
Jo McKenzie-McLean / Stuff
Linda Baker from Aspiring Midwives in Wānaka says the community has been waiting since 2003 for a primary maternity unit.
A primary birthing unit in Wānaka would have made a “100 percent difference,” he said.
“I know a lot of people who have had short jobs … I think it’s a safety issue.
“An hour is a long way to drive when you are in labor. It can get so bad, so fast. It would also have been very stressful for the midwife. “
Baker from Aspiring Midwives told the heads of the Southern District Health Board at a consultation meeting in Wānaka on Wednesday, if there had been a birthing unit in Wānaka, the experience of the new parents could have been beautiful, not traumatic.
“We qualified for a primary birthing unit in Wānaka in 2003, and we are still waiting to get it. At that time, babies were born in places where they should never have been: on the side of the road, between here and Alexandra. Fortunately, this was a good result, but at any time those events can become significantly different. “
The hidden cost of not having a primary unit in Wānaka, which resulted in traumatic births, was the emotional cost and the impact it had on parents, he said.
Jo McKenzie-McLean / Stuff
Saskia Hulsbosch, from Hāwea, with her newborn baby Lennix.
“It really takes a lot to recover and it affects your future motherhood, it affects your future decisions. It’s really quite big … That particular birth could have been a beautiful primary birth in Wānaka … we just ran out of time to communicate with Charlotte Jean. “
Hāwea Flat’s mother, Kristi James, whose baby was born on the floor of her midwife’s office last year, spoke about her experience at the meeting.
“It is so, so bad and so many women are suffering. They have had to have their babies in places that are not fit for their purpose and what is going to be needed? It is Russian roulette.
“How much longer are we going to let this happen? We have to do something. It is not good enough. It’s not fair and it’s not sustainable, so let’s make a change. It is up to you. You are the voice. Please speak up for us and don’t let anyone die. “
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Kristi James with her husband Michael Coonrod and their baby Makail James. Kristi gave birth on the floor of her midwife’s office last year.
SDHB has been consulting with the public on where to locate a new primary birth center and more than 500 submissions have been received.
Options included locating a single new facility in Cromwell or Dunstan Hospital in Clyde and dismantling the Alexandra unit; either locate a new primary delivery unit in Wānaka and maintain the facility in Alexandra or relocate it to Dunstan Hospital.
The board of health will announce its decision in November.
