When clinical nurse consultant Jess Foord arrived at work at Mackay Base Hospital this morning, she heard the sound of a woman in labour.
“I thought ‘oh I know that sound’,” Jess, who is a mum of four, said.
“So I just headed in that direction.”
She was not the first on scene as Birth Centre midwife Jaclyn was already expecting an arrival.
Jessica Hamelink, who is from Benholme near Mirani, had phoned ahead to tell her that she was on her way to town.
“It’s a 45-minute drive and I just didn’t expect things to progress like that,” Jess H said.
“My waters broke at about 2am and nothing happened for an hour and a half, and then they were really sporadic.
“But then they just went to two minutes apart and I knew we had to go.”
Contractions continued throughout the drive and by the time Jess and her husband Ryan arrived at the entrance to Mackay Base Hospital their baby was ready to make his entry into the world.
“Ryan pulled into the maternity car park at the front of the hospital, right near the main entrance,” Jess H said.
Some tense moments followed as their baby boy was born in the car at 6.50am, but he was blue and not breathing.
“The midwife was yelling ‘paeds, paeds’ and someone else just ran with the baby into the hospital,” nurse Jess Ford said.
“I stayed with mum to help her and dad went with the baby.”
Mum Jess H admitted she was in shock for a while after the events of the morning but her baby boy Remy Jhett Hamelink was doing well after six hours of monitoring in the Special Care Nursery.
“I was in a lot of shock this morning I think, with the drive and then him being rushed off,” Jess H said last week.
“I saw my baby go blue and then get rushed inside.
“In my head, I was thinking ‘what just happened’.
“Seeing him hooked up to machines and crying was a bit sad.”
Remy, who is 3840 grams (8lb 4oz) spent the night in hospital with mum for some further monitoring before heading home on Saturday.
Congratulations to all on the safe arrival of Remy and thank you to our nursing teams on the amazing work you do as we celebrated International Nurses Day.
