Journey Richardson was in the bathtub after a hellish shift at work when the stomach pain she was feeling earlier that day suddenly started to make sense.
The Alaska teenager, who was 17 at the time, looked down at the water between her legs and, to her surprise, saw the top of a baby’s head.
Despite having no idea she was pregnant until that very moment, she realized she was giving birth.
Alone in the bathtub and frantically Googling advice between contractions, Richardson gave birth to her daughter and, in the absence of sterile medical equipment, had to bite the umbilical cord herself and tie it with a hair tie.
The traumatic experience turned into a nightmare when Richardson saw that her newborn was purple and not breathing.
She was forced to administer life-saving CPR until baby Finnley took his first breath.
Journey is shown holding her daughter Finnley, who was born unexpectedly. Journey did not gain weight or experience any telltale signs of pregnancy, and had no idea she was pregnant until the time of delivery. (Photo courtesy of Journey’s Instagram)
Although Journey has not received prenatal care or standard screenings, including regular visits to an obstetrician, Finnley is overall healthy, with the exception of seven fused vertebrae. Photo courtesy of Journey’s Instagram.
One in 2,500 women carries a baby to term without even knowing she is pregnant, making a cryptic pregnancy about three times more common than the chance of having triplets.
For starters, one petite person, Ms. Richardson of Anchorage, never showed any signs of pregnancy.
He did not gain weight or experience symptoms that could not be explained by anything else.
Ms Richardson has a retroverted uterus, meaning her uterus tilts backwards towards her spine rather than towards her abdomen, so her belly did not grow.
A doctor falsely attributed her light, irregular periods and cramps to an ovarian cyst.
Because her pregnancy was never recognized, she never underwent the usual checks and scans to detect birth defects.
As a result, Finnley was born with Klippel-Feil syndrome, a condition in which two or more of the seven cervical vertebrae in the neck are abnormally fused.
In Finnley’s case, all seven vertebrae are fused, restricting any movement of the neck and causing serious complications to the spine and back tissue.
While it cannot be prevented, the condition can usually be detected by ultrasound before birth.
Finnley faces a long road of surgeries to strengthen and support his spine. Doctors may also have to remove parts of your vertebrae to make room for the spinal cord and nerves to prevent neurological changes. (Photo courtesy of GoFundMe)
Mrs. Richardson saying Her cramps started on a Saturday night in March 2023: ‘I had dinner with my family for my mom’s birthday on Saturday night and I went back to the house where I was dog-sitting, took some ibuprofen and thought, “it’s going to happen.” go away, it’s okay, it’s just menstrual cramps.
Her periods had never come on a regular schedule for much of her life and she thought her next period was causing the abdominal pain.
Women who experience cryptic pregnancies may still have irregular bleeding that is different from a menstrual period, but is often mistaken for one.
Because pregnancy usually stops a woman’s period, she is less likely to suspect pregnancy if she is still bleeding for part of the month.
Mrs Richardson continued: “Then I wake up at about 4am on Sunday morning with these cramps, they get worse and then they go away.”
‘I worked from 7 to 10 am that morning and that shift was hell. It was so bad. I thought my ovarian cyst had ruptured, so I went home and took some Epsom salts to bathe and relieve the pain.’
When he entered the bathroom, it was approximately noon on Sunday.
She said: “It keeps getting worse and worse, and I was like, this is bad.” It is at that moment that I am hallucinating from the pain. I’m screaming from the pain.
‘In the end I end up feeling, to see if I can feel that something is wrong, and I feel his head. And that was the moment I realized what was happening when I felt her hair.
He didn’t call 911 right away and attributed it to shock.
When Finnley was born, his skin was purple and he was not breathing. Mrs. Richardson, whose father is an emergency medical technician (EMT) and teaches life-saving CPR classes, knew how to get her baby’s heart pumping.
But that was just the beginning of his potentially deadly ordeal. The placenta, a temporary organ that forms in the uterus and connects the mother and fetus, did not leave the uterus naturally after the baby was born, causing heavy bleeding.
Even in a state of shock and delirium, Mrs. Richardson knew that “this is not safe.”
She said: “I was bleeding a lot more than the internet said was cool because, oh yeah, I was doing my Google searches between contractions to figure out what the hell I was supposed to be doing.”
She knew she had to cut the umbilical cord connecting her to Finnley, but she didn’t have access to a sterile device.
“I had no choice, so in the end I had to bite him and tie him with a hair tie, so I did the best I could under the circumstances I had,” she said.
When Finnley was born, Journey did not immediately call emergency medical assistance despite losing a lot of blood. She was nervous that her father, a paramedic, would find out about the birth. Photo courtesy of Journey’s Instagram.
She called a friend to help her after Finnley was born, but she didn’t want to call 911. Her father would find out, she said, still in his confused state of shock.
However, her friend eventually called the emergency services and the paramedics who arrived recognized her immediately.
Despite being nervous about her father’s reaction, Ms Richardson said her family has been very supportive of her and Finnley, who was born with a birth defect.
Finnley faces a long road of surgeries to strengthen and support his spine. Doctors may also have to remove parts of your vertebrae to make room for the spinal cord and nerves to prevent neurological changes.
Cryptic pregnancies can be dangerous. A woman who does not know she is pregnant will not receive standard prenatal care, such as blood tests, ultrasounds, and nutritional counseling.
You may also not know how to make necessary lifestyle changes, such as abstaining from alcohol and drugs, which can be deadly for both mother and baby.
While the way Finnley came into the world wasn’t ideal, Richardson said he wouldn’t change any of it.
She said: “I love Finn more than I’ve ever loved anything in my life, and I’m so grateful I had her the way I did because I didn’t plan on ever having kids and I don’t think so.” I would have gotten to experience this love if I didn’t have her the way I did.