12-Year-Old Delivers Baby Brother

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, and for Gaelan Edwards, a 12-year-old boy from Campbell River, British Columbia, last Saturday morning was one of those times. After Gaelan had snuck out of bed to watch TV, he entered a real-life version of something out of a made-for-TV movie, reports the Times Colonist: His mother called for help when she realized she was far into labor, and Gaelan leapt into action to help.

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Gaelan’s mom, Danielle, says she didn’t have any pains or any indication she needed to get to the hospital before she woke up at 2 a.m. with the baby crowning, so she called her 12-year-old and he quickly became one of the youngest birth assistants ever.

"'I said, 'Gaelan, when I push next, I need you to grab the baby by the shoulders and I need you to pull him out.' And he--just like by instinct, I couldn't even believe it--grabbed the baby by the shoulders, with the head on his wrist, and eased him out, kind of wriggled him from side to side, and pulled him onto the bed,'" she told the Times Colonist. After the baby was delivered, Gaelan clamped the cord with a plastic chip clip and helped his mom push out the placenta.

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“It was like he just knew [what to do],” said Danielle, who said that her son had picked up a few of her medical and pregnancy books. In fact, the last book he read was about midwives.

Plus: What’s Labor Really Like?

Do you have a crazy labor story? We want to hear it!