Teen Uses Skills From Health Class to Deliver Baby Cousin in Bathroom

When you think back to learning about childbirth in school, you probably have semi-blacked out memories of scenes from The Miracle of Life. Apparently, that’s not the case for all teens these days. Sixteen-year-old Morlie Hayes had just learned about labor and delivery in a child development class when circumstances forced her to put her knowledge to the test in real life.

Hayes was home alone last weekend when her 7-year-old cousin rang the doorbell in tears. The little girl’s mother—Hayes’s aunt—had gone into labor three weeks early while driving her kids to a friend’s house. Luckily, Hayes’s house was en route.

Hayes immediately called 911, and the dispatcher instructed her to grab towels, a shoelace and a safety pin just in case labor progressed before an ambulance could arrive. On cue, her aunt’s water broke.

Typically, you have a couple of hours after your water breaks—up to 24—before labor begins in earnest (if your water breaks at all, that is). In this case, however, baby Kayla arrived in a matter of minutes.

Hayes was able to use what she learned in class to make sure the umbilical cord wasn’t wrapped about the newborn’s neck and to assess whether her coloring was okay. By the time the ambulance arrived, Hayes was washing the infant off.

“We could have been in a dirty car with soccer gear and mud from the Scouts and everything else,” Laura Creager, the new mom, tells Utah’s Desert News. "We might not have been able to get a hold of an ambulance. Here, we had everything we needed.”

Please note: The Bump and the materials and information it contains are not intended to, and do not constitute, medical or other health advice or diagnosis and should not be used as such. You should always consult with a qualified physician or health professional about your specific circumstances.