Move over Doogie Howser, there's another medical prodigy in town.
While most 12-year-olds are out riding their bikes and soaking up the last lazy days of summer, not so for Gaelan Edwards, the eldest of five siblings, who now has a unique set of bragging rights for his back-to-school reunion.
He delivered his baby brother singlehandedly.
The Campbell River, B.C. resident had been up late watching TV when his mom, 30-year-old Danielle Edwards went into labour and cried out to him.
“Everything is going to be okay,” he told his mother, seeing the baby's head.
Gaelan went into action, pulling the baby out by the shoulders and even cutting the umbilical cord with a pair of scissors and a paper-bag clamp. It was only after he'd helped his mom deliver the placenta and wrapped his crying baby brother in a blanket that he called a friend of his mother’s, and washed up. The whole ordeal took 20 minutes.
Incredibly, the seventh grader wasn't squeamish, and insisted he'd learned what to do "from reading medical books, and watching hospital shows on TV". For someone who wants to be a doctor one day, it seems Gaelan already has a bit of a head start.
“You know, when a baby is born, they’re supposed to cry,” he said matter-of-factly. “It means they’re a healthy baby.”
His new brother, Caynan, is a healthy 7 pounds 9 ounces. There was no mention of a father or any other adult present at the time of delivery.
Gaelan now admits that the experience was “pretty gross. The room smelled funny and the baby was squishy. I washed my hands with an entire bar of soap.” Would he do it all over again if he had to? Of course, he said, although "next time, I’m wearing a plastic glove.”
Image Credit: The Globe and Mail
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