Mum gives birth to a baby girl while in a coma
A young mum has given birth to a baby girl while in a coma.
Caitlin Stubbs, 25, from Queensland, Australia, was 32 weeks pregnant when she suffered a major brain haemorrhage and fell into a coma.
Her baby girl, Quinn, was born prematurely via an emergency C-section in July this year while her mother was unconscious.
Quinn spent the first three weeks of her life in NICU whilst Caitlin fought for her own life in ICU.
The new mum has a condition known as AVM (Arteriovenous Malformation), which according to the NHS means she has some blood vessels which haven't developed properly and sometimes cause bleeding.
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On July 23 Caitlin complained of having a headache down the back of her neck.
She was taken to hospital but had fallen into a coma before she arrived.
Fearing she wouldn’t survive the night, doctors performed an emergency C-section to deliver her baby.
“They said they didn’t think she’d make it through the night, and everything was pretty negative but I knew she would make it,” Caitlin’s fiance, Jonathon Welsh told Nine News.
“Then they said she’d be brain dead, but she’s definitely not.”
Baby Quinn was discharged from hospital on Monday, but her mother is facing an ongoing recovery.
“The reality for Caitlin and Jonathon and their baby Quinn is a future filled with uncertainty over a very long recovery,” a GoFundMe page set up to help with the new mum’s ongoing medical treatment explains.
“She will need extensive rehabilitation plus future surgeries not limited to but including the removal of the AVM from her brain.”
Caitlin will also need intensive Physiotherapy and Speech Therapy among other remedial therapies.
READ MORE: Woman who didn't know she was pregnant delivers baby alone on bathroom floor
Though she is slowly regaining consciousness, Caitlin’s memory has been affected by the bleed and her fiance says she sometimes forgets she has had a baby.
“I bring the baby to the hospital every day and sometimes she whispers to me that she wants Quinn, and sometimes she asks whose baby it is,” he told Nine News.
The family has started a Facebook page, which provides updates on Caitlin’s recovery.
"Took Quinn home on Monday night, sad not to be able to stay with Caitlin every night but good to get her home," Jonathon wrote in one recent post.
"One girl home one to go!"
Caitlin isn’t the only mother to give birth while in a coma. Earlier this year a teenager woke up from a four-day coma to find that she had given birth to a baby despite not knowing that she was pregnant.
Ebony Stevenson, 18, went to bed on December 2, 2018 after suffering from a headache.
Later, and unbeknown to the college student, she was rushed to hospital and placed in an induced coma before waking up three days later having given birth to a baby girl.