Utah Twins Born On Side Of Interstate To Mother Lynette Hales, Expected To Stay In Intensive Care
J.J. and A.J. Hales will have interesting stories for their first day of show and tell. Once they learn to talk, that is.
Lynette Hales, 39, gave birth to the two boys - Jeffrey Jr. and Andrew James - on the side of Interstate 80 early Sunday morning. Racing down the highway in a green minivan, she and a family friend, Jim Gerber, were on their way to Salt Lake City when Hales when into labor. Her husband, Jeff, was at home when the incident occurred.
Hales was only 30 weeks into her pregnancy, seven weeks away from full gestation and, as she'd anticipated, weeks from the delivery.
Hales woke up Sunday morning in her hotel room in Wendover, Nev. - a small gambling town - with unexpected contractions. She and some friends had planned on celebrating her final days free from crying babies and messy diapers. But as the contractions intensified, Hales knew she needed a hospital. Unfortunately, the nearest one was nearly 100 miles away.
Gerber called 9-1-1 to alert highway patrol of his impending presence.
"If you see a green smear pass your car, it's probably me," he said he told 9-1-1. "And don't pull me over because I have a situation."
The police instructed Gerber to pull over until help could arrive. Once Hales began going into labor, he ultimately pulled over.
The first boy was delivered before the ambulances showed on the scene. Grayish-blue in color and not breathing, as Hales described, her premature newborn gave her immediate cause for concern.
"I was so scared that he wasn't going to make it," Hales said choked up Monday, at a news conference, "And that my choice of being out there was going to cause my babies not to live."
The excitement quieted slightly once Utah State Trooper Nathan Powell arrived and was able to provide the newborn with oxygen. As young Jeffrey Jr. was being resuscitated back to health, Hales went into labor with her second child.
She delivered Andrew James in a breeched birth - feet first - with the help of Powell and his partner, while Gerber and a Toelle County sheriff stayed with J.J.
Powell said A.J. let out a "big squawk," and that he was breathing "much easier than the first one."
Because of their early delivery, both babies weighed only 3 lbs. Doctors said they will have to remain in intensive care until they achieve a healthy weight, a timeline that puts their release date around mid-August.
Premature births do not have one single cause. However, women pregnant with twins or triplets face a greater risk of delivering those children before the full-gestation period. Roughly 57 percent of women carrying more than one child will go into labor before 37 weeks have passed. And according to a 2012 survey, 46 percent of mothers who had twins required special care for one or both of their children after delivery.
Other factors include having a previous premature birth, conceiving through in vitro fertilization, smoking cigarettes or consuming other drugs, poor nutrition, being underweight, physical injury, and stress.
Experts also concede that premature births often occur to women with no known risk factors. They can happen to anyone.
"It was hard, it was scary," Lynette Hales said. "It was a moment like no other."