47-Year-Old Woman Gives Birth One Hour After Learning She Is Pregnant

Today in Extremely Bizarre Turn Of Events: 47-year-old Judy Brown of Beverly, Massachusetts recently gave birth to a healthy, eight pound baby girl — a baby girl she was not expecting until one hour prior to her delivery.

According to ABC News, Brown “went to Beverly Hospital…with severe abdominal pain…While she initially thought the pain might have been caused by a blockage or a gall stone, medical staff quickly figured out she was actually in labor.”

Brown expressed her astonishment to ABC News: “To understand and take in that was I pregnant and was about to go into labor…it was very overwhelming.”

Well shit. I would think so!

Brown and her husband Jason were doubly astounded because, in 22 years of marriage, they had never had a child. According to WCVB “their approach to children has always been: ‘If it happens, it happens.’”

But for over two decades it didn’t happen, and Brown, well into middle age, was not expecting any fruit of the womb now. This is not to say, however, that she did not perceive bodily changes in the months prior to giving birth. The Washington Post reports, “a bulge had appeared around her midsection in recent months…but she attributed the sudden weight gain to aging.”

It’s rare for women in their forties to conceive, but Dr. Kimberley Gesci, an obstetrician and gynecologist from Cleveland’s University Hospitals Case Medical Center emphasizes that it certainly can happen. And it is possible, she tells ABC News, to not “realize [you are] pregnant until shortly before giving birth.”

What Gesci stresses most is the necessity for “physicians who see women in their 40s” to “[counsel] them on [contraception].” She admonishes, ABC News reports, that “women in their late-40s should not think they can’t get pregnant and use contraception until they talk to their doctor about stopping because of menopause.”

The Browns learned this lesson in the form of wee Carolyn Rose – though in their case it’s hardly a bitter pill to swallow. The Washington Post reports that “the new addition to their family was a welcome one.” Once they acquire all the various necessities—they had to borrow a car seat to leave the hospital—they’ll settle into parenthood.

Though, I can’t help but wonder: did they buy a pack of condoms on the way home?