Premature arrivals: ‘I didn’t know she was being born until a second beforehand’

Résumé détaillé

Carly Collins says ‘utter instinct’ saw her perform CPR while awaiting an ambulance after Bláthnaid’s unexpected arrival ...

Carly Collins was three months away from her due date in September 2025 when, in the middle of the night, she began to feel unwell.

“It was spontaneous labour,” the 33-year-old says. “I had no traditional warning signs that would have led me to go to hospital. I had a few pains but I was six months pregnant so I assumed that’s what the pain was.

“It all activated at 3am. Our baby girl Bláthnaid came within 20 minutes of me not feeling well.”

The period after that is a bit of a blur, Collins says, but her husband, Simon, was nearby and phoned for an ambulance and he encouraged her to pick their baby up.

“It was very sudden. I didn’t know she was being born until a second beforehand. I was in a shock because she was just there on a towel. I picked the baby up and I looked at her and I knew she wasn’t breathing properly.”

Bláthnaid had three gasps of air but “then she stopped”, says Collins, adding that “complete and utter instinct” then kicked in and she started performing CPR.

“She was so tiny, her body fit in the palm of my hand, with her limbs hanging over. I used my two fingers for CPR ... She had no signs of life. We thought she was a stillborn baby. I did CPR on her because I thought maybe there was a chance.”

The emergency services arrived, cut the umbilical cord and brought mother and baby to the Coombe hospital in Dublin.

“The nurse manager took her in a transport incubator from the door and they rushed off so we didn’t see what happened,” Collins says. “We were defeated; we felt a 90 per cent chance she hadn’t made it. We did not think she could survive.”

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