“This past week, I found out that a wife of a Marine at my husband’s shop had gone into labor and her husband was in San Diego for training to become a recruiter. I immediately asked her if she needed me there because I knew she was new to Yuma and didn’t have friends here and this was her first baby. She immediately said ‘yes’ and told me she was scared because her water had broken at 35 weeks, and because it was early and she was not progressing at all, they wanted to do an emergency C-section.
There was no time to wait for her husband to get here from San Diego, so myself, another marine from the shop and her husband’s best friend who is a Marine that works with him rushed to be with her.
When we got there, she was so emotional and scared. We reassured her that everything would be okay and rejoiced with her that she would be meeting her baby very soon, even though we also didn’t know what the outcome would be.
Everything happened so fast. The nurses came in and started prepping her for the C-section and told her that she needed to pick someone to be in the room with her during the C-section. She asked if we could both be with her because I was going to capture the birth for her husband, but she really wanted her husband’s best friend to cut the cord.
The nurse said they would only permit one and that she needed to pick one of us immediately. You could see the emotions weighing her down and that she couldn’t choose. So, I said, ‘I will just set my camera to the settings I think will work and give Sgt. Rod a crash course on how to take pictures, and then he can do both.’ Rod looked at me like I was crazy, and she looked relieved.
As they prepped her, I showed him examples of birth photos he could take and what to do. I showed him how to work my camera and how to adjust to the lighting in the operating room. HE DID AMAZING.
He captured the birth, cut the chord and then followed their baby to the NICU immediately.
Then, he came out and handed me my camera and I took over until dad walked in a while later.
I captured the baby in the NICU and dad seeing the baby for the first time.
Everything went so smoothly and they welcomed a beautiful 6-pound, 6-ounce baby boy into the world who is strong and healthy. It truly was amazing.
This story was submitted to Love What Matters by Kayla Mattox Photography in Yuma, Arizona. Submit your story here.
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