‘I DELIVERED MY OWN GRANDCHILD IN THE BACK OF MY CAR’
AMAN accidentally ended up with a brilliant story to tell his granddaughter when she grows up – he delivered her himself in the back of his car. Tom Evans, 51, from Pontypridd, was driving his daughter Rhiannon to hospital when he realised he needed to take matters into his own hands.
Rhiannon, 29, had been sent home from hospital twice already on March 2 as her contractions were not close together enough.
But at about midnight, she phoned her father saying the contractions were getting worse and it was time to try the hospital again.
On their way from Pontypridd to Prince Charles Hospital in Merthyr Tydfil, with Rhiannon’s partner Chris and their eldest daughter Ava, Rhiannon realised her baby was already on the way.
She said: “It was like a TV show... I said she was coming out and my dad was like ‘no, no, she’s not, you’re just imagining it’.
“I felt her head come out and I said ‘she’s out’, and my father said ‘no, she’s not, she’s not.’
“He pulled over the car and the head was already out.
“My partner rang 999 and my father came round, opened the door and caught the baby’s head as she came out.
“It’s just a bizarre story really. You see things on TV and that, and you think those things don’t really happen that often. When it happens to you, you’re like: ‘Amazing, but what the hell!’
“I just remember thinking ‘I hope she’s all right’ and trying not to sit on her because I could feel her underneath me.
“As soon as my father put her on me, and she cried a little bit and was breathing fine, I just felt the relief of knowing she was all right.
“It will be an amazing story to tell her one day: Bampi delivered her!”
Rhiannon and Chris’ baby daughter Arya Lily Lowbridge-Evans was born weighing 7lb 11oz shortly after midnight on March 3.
Tom, who somehow kept his cool throughout the drama, said: “The adrenaline was going.
“My daughter was panicking more than me and I was like ‘no, it will be fine’.
“Instinct took over and I just didn’t think twice.
“After the baby was born I made sure she was fine, she was breathing and the cord wasn’t wrapped around her neck or anything.
“Then I handed her to her mother and went into the back of the car, found a blanket and we wrapped the baby up in it.”
With Chris already phoning for an ambulance, Tom decided it would be quicker to drive them the rest of the way to hospital himself.
When they arrived, Chris ran in to alert the midwives and Rhiannon and Tom shared an emotional moment.
“Me and my daughter just looked at each other and laughed,” Tom said.
“It was just a big relief. The adrenaline and the stress in the situation just went then – that was something I’ll really remember.”
Within an hour of arriving at the hospital, midwives told Rhiannon she was already well enough to return home, thanks in part to her father’s quick thinking.
“I felt really proud then,” said Tom. Arya’s older sister Ava was “the calmest of the lot”, he added.
“She’s only two, but she was aware of it and knew what was going on – that Mam was going into hospital for a baby.”
Tom added: “I’ve been telling everyone in work because I was so excited, and they said it should be in the papers.
“You hear so many sad stories; this is a bit of good news.”