‘I didn’t know I was pregnant’: Mum unexpectedly gives birth in the middle of family camping trip

An unsuspecting mum gave birth in the middle of her family camping holiday. Photo / 123RF

A family set out on a holiday to bond, not knowing that by dawn, their unit would grow by one.

On the last week of July, Zoe Doyle, along with her husband Stuart Doyle and their two children, drove to a UK campsite in Hayling Island, Hampshire to enjoy some quality family time.

At first, it was just a regular camping holiday for the Doyle family, but little did they know their whānau was about to expand.

Everything was perfect - that is, until Doyle woke up at the crack of dawn on August 1 due to excruciating stomach cramps.

Initially, she blamed the pain on a dodgy chicken curry eaten the night before.

She couldn’t get to the campsite’s main toilet block, so she stayed in the little portaloo toilet in their tent.

But as the pain worsened, Doyle began to think she was having a miscarriage. In a post-birth interview, Doyle told Berkshire Live, “I thought it was just tummy pains, but it kept getting worse and worse. I knew something wasn’t right. There was so much blood, I thought I was having a miscarriage.”

Panicked, she asked her husband for help. Stuart quickly came to her aid, and Doyle told him she felt the overwhelming need to push.

Instinctually, the mother leaned on all fours, and that’s when her husband saw a head sticking out of her.

“He had to help deliver her in the tent and cut her umbilical cord in the tent and wrap her up with what we had. I did it all on my own. I felt like Mother Mary giving birth outdoors. It was just so bizarre,” Doyle shared in a different interview with the Daily Mail.

Zoe Doyle's husband, Stuart Doyle, saw the head of their baby girl, Hayley Doyle, coming out of Zoe and proceeded to help her give birth. Photo / 123RF

After the successful birth, her husband rushed her to the hospital, where she and her baby girl were taken care of.

The healthy baby girl has since been named Hayley Doyle, inspired by their campsite and birthplace, the Hayling Island. The baby girl weighed 8lbs and 14oz (4kg) and was born without complications.

Zoe Doyle shared with the Daily Mail that after realising she had a hidden pregnancy, she couldn’t help but think, “What just happened? I was thinking, ‘How did I not know?’ Everything I shouldn’t have done, I did.”

She recalls having no symptoms, no morning sickness, and though she gained a little bit of weight, she just blamed it on her regular evening snacks.

“I had no cravings or anything. I’d gained a bit of weight, but I just put it down to having a few more snacks in the evening. I didn’t have a noticeable bump, and no one mentioned anything,” the mum-of-three shared with the Mail. “‘There was no morning sickness, there was no nausea, there was nothing. It really was a hidden pregnancy.”

Doyle remembers having a light period every month, but nothing to alert her of a growing pregnancy.

Doyle shared she hoped for a third child after their baby boy, but since the youngest hasn’t reached 2 yet, the couple decided they’re done with having babies.

The couple’s chances of having another one were also slim, since Stuart was diabetic and Doyle was on and off the pill.

Which is why Zoe Doyle is amazed by how her daughter Hayley came to life.

“When she came, I thought, ‘How on earth is she here?’ She fought against all the odds to be here,” she told the Daily Mail.