This is the amazing moment NSW mum Gerri Wolfe reached inside herself to deliver her own twin daughters via caesarean.
The 41-year-old delivered the twins, Matilda and Violet, at Newcastle’s John Hunter Hospital on December 22 with husband Robert by her side.
The special moment was captured by Simone from Simone’s Photography.
911 operator talks an ordinary woman through delivering her sister’s baby.
The girls are her 10th and 11th children, and it was the Central Coast woman’s fifth caesarean – but this birth was unlike anything she had experienced before.
She told Mamamia she was devastated when a complication ruled out a vaginal birth, and that a “maternal assisted caesarean” felt like the best alternative.
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While the procedure is the same as a normal caesarean and is attended by doctors, the patient reaches into her stomach and pulls the child out herself.
While it might not be everybody’s first choice, Mrs Wolfe said it was a way for her to “reclaim” her birth.
“Having a caesarean was absolutely not my first choice,” she said.
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“For me I just don’t think it is the optimal way to give birth. I’d had four already and some were okay, but some were distressing, and for me it just doesn’t feel right. I feel birth is a rite of passage and women should have choices.
“It (the maternal assisted caesarean) just felt natural. They’re my children, so I thought I should be the one to get them. It was the logical, right decision for me to make. It was lovely to have made it so personal. I had the choice to be able to participate in turning a surgical procedure into a birth.”
Initially, Mrs Wolfe’s obstetrician was “quite reluctant” but after talking it through together and deciding on procedures to follow to minimise risk, he came around and was very supportive.
On the day of the birth, Mrs Wolfe admitted to having a few nerves – but her main concern was the caesarean itself, and not her role in it.
She went to the hospital, scrubbed up, put on some gloves and had an epidural. Then, a completely normal caesarean took place, until the obstetrician told her it was time for her to pull out the babies.
They spent a week in hospital recovering and now both girls are doing well and are adored by the rest of the family.
Mrs Wolfe said she supported women making “informed, empowered choices about their birth”.
Top Comments
I'd say the gynae is the brave one, first for going along with a woman about to have her 5th or whatever it was C-section, very, very dangerous in and of itself, and second entertaining the idea of this sort of endeavour. It's all smiles, luckily, but had it gone wrong, even slightly and he'd have been pilloried from here to the middle of next week. Self-centred woman; I mean, seriously, how did she imagine she'd give birth after that many C-sections and with a twin pregnancy? She's lucky she found a gynae willing to oversee her pregnancy at all.
Why is she brave exactly?