Congratulations are in order, as Sophie Delezio has welcomed her first child!
Sophie and her partner, Joseph Salerno, shared a joint Instagram post celebrating the birth of their beautiful baby.
"Welcome to the world, Frankie," she wrote on Instagram. "Our hearts are so full."
We spoke with Sophie just 10 days ago, about her excitement ahead of the birth.
After years of complex surgeries after two horrific accidents in her childhood, the 23-year-old mother-to-be was excited to be spending time in a part of the hospital that's "filled with so much happiness".
Delezio suffered burns to 85 per cent of her body and was hospitalised for over a year in 2003 at just two-and-a-half, after a car crashed through her daycare centre. She lost both her legs below the knee, her right hand, and an ear.
Watch Sophie's story, in her own words. Post continues after video.
Then, when she was five, she was hit by a car as her nanny pushed her wheelchair across the road. She flew 18 metres in the air, suffering a broken jaw, broken ribs, fractured collarbone and a punctured lung, as well as bleeding on her brain and a heart attack.
Speaking to Mamamia, Sydney-based Delezio said she was keeping a lot of her pregnancy journey between herself and her fiancé, Joseph. But she did share an interesting observation, one she admits she resonates with.
"I've been told this by many friends in the disabled community... they all said they've known more able-bodied women struggling with fertility and pregnancy than people with disabilities," she shared.
She thinks it's perhaps because those living with disability have a better understanding of the medical world and how to navigate it.
But, "I've definitely had my normal pregnancy hardships," she assured. "As much as I am grateful for pregnancy, I'm ready not to be pregnant."
Watching the sea of 'parenting advice' offered up to prospective parents via the digital world, Delezio isn't afraid to block out all the noise. Throughout her pregnancy, she has focused on what she can control — a mantra that has got her through many of her life's challenges.
"I feel like it's just who I am to an extent... I don't know if I'm just so used to it, I guess people fear the unknown and uncertainty. For me, my worries and concerns in life, and for my child's life both during pregnancy and once he's here, are the things that I can control, not the things that I can't," she said.
Birth is another of those things she told us she wasn't too phased about. She said she felt calm and happy as she prepared for that experience, as uncontrollable as it is.
"I'm very fortunate to have this understanding of the medical world. So to me it's a little less daunting being able to communicate with doctors and whatnot if there are problems," she explained.
"It's all that accepting that you're not in control as much as you want to be. It's completely up to the baby and accepting that is a really hard thing, but they will choose to come out the way they want to come out when they want to come out," Delezio told Mamamia.
Things like sending her son to daycare in the future also don't warrant a second thought for Delezio, despite it being the scene of the accident that changed her life.
"There's a million kids in the world that get sent to daycare," she told Mamamia.
"[I don't focus on the] 'what ifs' in life, because what if everything goes wrong... but what if everything goes right? They're just as possible as each other."
What she's putting in her body while her son is in utero, however, is very controllable and getting all of her focus.
"My number one concern is what I'm consuming," she explained. "Conditions like Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), where I have the control to prevent that."
It's a condition that Delezio feels particularly strongly about raising awareness about, after meeting people through her hospital experiences living with the effects of FASD.
"I saw the struggles firsthand," she said of her decision to partner with DrinkWise, who advise women to stop drinking alcohol from the moment they start trying to conceive.
"It's having that mindset of... it's not a sacrifice, for me personally, cutting out all these little things. It's so insignificant to me, to do for the benefit of another human life."
It gets trickier when things aren't so black and white.
"Am I exercising too much? Am I sleeping enough? Am I hurting the baby by doing squats?" Delezio rattled off, as she explained her inner monologue to Mamamia.
But at the end of the day, Delezio is used to trusting the doctors. She has spent a lot of time in their presence and values their expertise above all else.
"You just need to be confident in the fact that by listening to your health professionals, they do know best. People on TikTok and Instagram and social media — they're not professionals."
Sophie Delezio at 36 weeks pregnant, excitedly anticipating the birth of her son. Image: Supplied.
With just a few weeks left of her pregnancy, Delezio had already ticked off her to-do list. Once again, it is something that she has control over and she didn't want to feel stressed or rushed if her son decided to show up early.
Instead of nesting, she and her fiancé spent their last few weeks as a duo "relaxing and spending time together".
She's already got her 'village' and support network ready to go — another thing that's well honed after her many experiences in the hospital and recovery.
"They all snap back into place [when I need them], which I'm very grateful for," Delezio told Mamamia.
"I think that's made this journey a whole lot easier."
This article was previously published on September 3 and has been updated with new information.
It's International FASD Awareness Day on September 9. For more information, visit DrinkWise.
Feature image: Instagram/@soph.delezio.
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