When you’re starting a little DIY project and need some guidance, you can count on the Internet to teach you how to tile a shower or remove wallpaper. And it turns out, you can also learn how to deliver your own baby, which came in handy for 22-year-old first-time mom Tia Freedman last month.
Freedman has one of the most insane birth stories ever and it started with her not knowing she was pregnant until the third trimester. And while in that final trimester, she had already planned a trip to Germany to visit a friend, so she decided to still go and figures she had plenty of time to get back home before the baby’s birth. But she was wrong.
While on the 14-hour flight, she started having cramps, but blew it off because she’s a vegetarian and she had eaten salmon on the plane. But by the time she landed in Istanbul, Turkey for her 17-hour layover, she was in so much pain she just wanted to get to her hotel room and sleep, so once she cleared customs – which took FOREVER – she thought she might be in labor, and she was right!
Freedman got to her hotel room and realized that baby was coming NOW, so “in true millennial form” she looked up how to deliver a baby on YouTube. She ran a bath and had a water birth for her son. She even delivered her placenta and looked up how to cut the umbilical cord without tools (sterilized shoelaces, BTW!)
There was a little confusion when Freedman showed back up at the airport with a fresh baby for her flight to Germany the next morning, but after they realized she wasn’t trying to smuggle a baby, Turkish Airlines sent mama and baby to the hospital to be checked out. Then the airline treated them to a two-week stay at a hotel in Turkey until they could fly home safely. So this new mom is pretty much our new hero!