PAULA Roberson of Bodalla had almost four weeks to go until her baby was full term.
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So she thought nothing of the niggling little pains she had been suffering throughout the day.
After all there had been a number of problems throughout the pregnancy.
What Paula wasn’t expecting, was to be woken up by a huge pain at 5.30am on Monday morning October 22, which heralded a baby definitely on the way.
“Although I had had pains all day, I just thought it was too early for the baby to arrive,” Paula said.
“After the first pain that woke me, I knew I didn’t have long so I woke Darren up and told him we needed to get to the hospital.”
Darren and Paula packed five-year-old Tahlia in the car so they could drop her at her grandfathers, Graham Roberson’s home in Bodalla.
“We were backing out of dad’s drive when I had another contraction and thought to myself I’m not going to make it,” Paula said.
But they needed to get to the hospital and rather than calling an ambulance, they thought they would just “go for it”.
“It was really quite difficult,” dad Darren Mezzino said.
“I wanted to go fast, but I had to be careful, there’s so much of wildlife.”
Next everything happened very quickly.
After freeing her clothing, Paula laid the seat down in the car as they were just starting to cross the Tuross River Bridge.
“Next thing my water broke and the baby came along straight after,” she said.
“The baby had arrived before we crossed the bridge.”
Darren stopped the car long enough to pop the baby on Paula’s tummy, skin to skin and they then continued straight to hospital.
“We had no torch and only the dashboard lights, there was a towel on the floor of the car that we used to cover the baby,” Darren said.
Darren and Paula named their new little girl Patience, a name that they had decided on during the pregnancy.
Patience weighed in at four pounds nine ounces with the whole delivery taking just 45 minutes.
She spent nine days in hospital before she could go home and is doing well.
Patience’s big sister Tahlia is thrilled with her little sister.
“She’s really good and I like playing with babies,” she said.