Amanda Prentice prayed for years that she and her husband would become pregnant, but she never got to enjoy that excitement of seeing two lines appear on a pregnancy test or seeing her growing baby on an ultrasound. Instead, after struggling for four years with what she thought was infertility, one day she woke up, and there was her baby girl -- the one she had unknowingly delivered -- waiting for her.
According to WSMV-TV, Prentice became pregnant without knowing it and carried the baby nearly nine months with no hint that anything was different. It wasn't until she started having seizures and her husband took her to the hospital that they had any idea they were going to be parents ... and soon.
After a dangerous spike in blood pressure, Amanda fell unconscious, and her family learned why. It was due to pregnancy complications (which sound much like preeclampsia), and doctors delivered her baby five hours later. When she awoke two days later, doctors delivered the news to her.
She told the station: "The doctor came in and said, 'I've got good news and bad news.' He said, 'Your blood pressure has skyrocketed here in the last few days, but you've got a baby.'" And that's when she met her beautiful, perfectly healthy, little girl, who she named Allie McKinley Rose.
A beautiful and touching story for sure, but not drastically different from others we've heard over the years about women who give birth without ever knowing they're pregnant. In fact, TLC has a whole series titled I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant. Still, each of these stories amazes me and really makes me wonder how on earth this could happen.
More from The Stir: Mother Delivers Twins 6 Weeks After Being Declared Dead (VIDEO)
Is it because these women had incredibly easy pregnancies that didn't involve the sheer and utter exhaustion, the nausea, backaches, and other oh-so-telling symptoms that both of mine did? Or is it because much of what we attribute to pregnancy is really in our minds ... or at least amplified by the way we think we're supposed to feel. I would have tried to harm you severely had you suggested it was all in my head while it was happening, but looking back, I do wonder. Have we become so accustomed to thinking pregnancy is full of aches and pains that to some degree we bring at least some of them on ourselves?
I don't know the answer, and it would be pretty cruel to do any sort of placebo test to try and get a scientific conclusion. But each of these cases does always make me wonder how much better I might have felt during my pregnancies if I didn't know I was pregnant?
Do you feel like just knowing you're pregnant can make symptoms worse? Can you ever imagine carrying a baby to term, not knowing you were pregnant?
Image via WSMV-TV
Kim and Kanye's Baby Name Predictions!
Moms Love Birthday Parties, Too!
Father Knows Best - Happy Father's Day!
Are Cheaters Entitled to Privacy? - A...
Comments 124
It is always amazing how women that had been diagnosed as infertile do become pregnant, and I think it is very possible not to know they were.
My cousin has a 4 year old appendicitis!!!! she went in with terrible abdominal pain and a precious baby was there waiting to surprise everyone. She had been diagnosed with endometriosis. What a blessing.
i had symptoms of pregnancy and a missed period before i got a positive test. i couldn't imagine going nine months without knowing.
I knew with all 5 of mine but every woman is different. My ex-mother-in-law didn't know she was pregnant until she was 8 months along. She had been going to the doctor for an ulcer and they finally did an xray and there was a baby. She was heavier but she didn't show at all until about 2 weeks after she found out and then all of a sudden she popped out. It can happen. Especially if you don't think you can get pregnant. You would attribute all of your symptoms to something else.
Would someone go and support that baby's head? Good grief.
Wow what a story I am glad to know I was pregnant and all ... but I am also glad she is a parent now
This kind of thing happened very recently in my town! She was told she could never have children, went to the doctor because she was exahusted all the time and was told she was pregnant, with a due date only a few weeks away. 5 days later she had the baby!
I was throwing up before knowing I was pregnant when I had my son, so the nausea definitely preceeded the knowledge in that case! I do think, though, that I could easily write off nausea if I had no other pregnancy signs. My mom didn't find out she was pregnant with me until she was in her second trimester- she had been told she could not have children and continued having bleeding that mistook for her period.
I didn't know I was pregnant until I was about 4 1/2 months in. My husband noticed it first. I've never been a picky eater but he noticed that for about 4 months my eating habits had drastically changed, and I was more moodier and emotional than ever. I think its when I blew up at him for breaking another wine glass, he threw out the "What the hell is wrong with you? Are you pregnant or something?", which then proceeded to infuriate me and I sent him out to buy a pregnancy test just to prove him wrong and shut him up. Needless to say, he still holds that moment over my head lol. But as soon as I confirmed it with the doctor, I swear I felt all the usual pregnancy symptoms and I got a bump overnight, because about 3 weeks later, I definitely started looking pregnant.