Delivering Babies While Wearing Board Shorts
Aug 19, 2022
Sometimes life comes at you all at once.
August 18, 2005. It was a typical, busy Thursday of watersports in Duck, North Carolina. We got a call over the marine VHF radio from our jet-ski patrol about a situation on the water. I did not hear the original call but our staff responded quickly and they were on the water. When they arrived on the scene they quickly found the situation was extremely urgent. We immediately scrambled more people and called 911.
​It was easily the worst jet-ski accident I've been a part of.
An underage jet-ski renter from a competing operation drove over one of our jet-skis with two customers on it. The victim and his son, who had been sitting in front of the operator, were in the water and in medical distress. The father (a big man) had taken the blow from behind. The force of the other jet-ski had pushed him forward, crushing his son against the handlebars. The son was in the water having seizures while the father was conscious and floating with multiple injuries. With much assistance from first responders we were able to get them safely ashore.
​Soon thereafter, both victims were air-lifted out of Duck and sent to a hospital in Norfolk, Virginia where they stayed a week in ICU. They had a long rehab, but survived. The emergency responders we had on the water that day were outstanding.
​As I returned to shore there were several messages for me from my pregnant wife, Bonnie. I gathered myself and gave her a call. She was at the mall in Chesapeake, Virginia with our two kids, shopping for back-to-school things and, yadda, yadda, yadda, she thinks her water broke. My mind raced back to my second child who was born in the back of an ambulance on the side of the highway in Currituck County. I tell my wife to take this "sign" seriously. She agreed and headed to the hospital after calling a friend living in Chesapeake to swing by and take our two children.
​Meanwhile, I hopped in my truck and started racing up to Chesapeake an hour and a half away which gave me time to think, "Didn't we have a plan for this child to be born in the new Outer Banks Hospital? Didn't we have a plan for an epidural?!"
​I arrived at the hospital with 20 minutes to spare.
But there's one problem. Shouldn't there be a doctor present? I started scrubbing up in case I have to play catch with my wife. Bonnie gripped the stainless steel rail on her bed so tight she left permanent dents. Just when I thought I was going to deliver this baby by myself, in walked a doctor who looked old enough to be in a retirement home. He coolly walked over, caught the baby, pronounced everyone good, and left. I stood there wondering what I paid for. Nobody asked me how I was doing.
Afterword
Prior to her water breaking, Bonnie and the kids got a Polaroid with "Lady Luck" from the Virginia Lottery. In the photo Bonnie looks tan and happy. Totally oblivious to the event about to unfold.
Here's an old commercial with "Lady Luck". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbCLvqoZno4
Best wishes, John Van Lunen
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