When a pregnant teacher went into labor at school, her principal and coworker helped deliver the baby in a bathroom.
“It happened so fast that we didn’t have time to think about what to do — we just reacted,” Amy Simmons, the principal of Cunningham Elementary School in Wichita Falls, Texas, tells TODAY.com.
On Aug. 28, Simmons received a text message from a teacher informing her that Paige Lockstedt, a pregnant teacher’s aid, wasn’t feeling well, Simmons explained in a video posted to the Facebook page of Wichita Falls school district. Simmons then received a phone call from Lockstedt, who was in the bathroom: Her water had just broken.
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Simmons tells TODAY.com that she initiated an emergency drill that alerts staff and students to stay inside their classrooms. According to the video, special education teacher Ashley Strain and others helped Lockstedt into a wheelchair and pushed her toward the building entrance while the school nurse called 911.
“She said, ‘Oh! She’s coming!’ Strain recalled in the video. “And I went into the bathroom and I caught a baby in my hands.”
The three women clustered inside the bathroom for the delivery while Paige, who was 30 weeks pregnant, stood over the toilet, according to Strain.
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“I dove underneath her and caught the baby in my hands,” Strain tells TODAY.com.
Baby Isabella was born weighing two pounds, nine ounces. Simmons cranked paper towels out of the bathroom dispenser to wrap Isabella while Strain rubbed her chest and wiped her face off.
“She opened her beautiful little eyes and looked at us,” says Strain.
Initially, Isabella wasn’t crying, which concerned the women. “Once we saw her chest moving, we knew it would be OK,” says Strain.
Simmons tells TODAY.com that approximately ten minutes passed from when Lockstedt’s water broke and she was loaded into an ambulance.
Students didn’t know a teacher had given birth on campus until later that night, says Simmons.
While Isabella is still in the hospital until she gains more weight, says Simmons, a few days after the birth, Lockstedt returned to Cunningham Elementary School to eat lunch with her staff.
A sign labeled “Labor and Delivery” now hangs on the door of the bathroom where Lockstedt gave birth.
“We have four other staff members who are pregnant and one thought it would be funny to make the sign,” says Simmons. “She asked to reserve the room on her due date.”
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