A Christian couple who were told they would not be able to have children are crediting prayers for their miracle baby.
Claire Hailwood, who works with her husband Jez at Freedom Church, Worcester, didn't even realize she was pregnant until 13 weeks before her due date, Worcester News reports.
She initially put the weight gain down to an underactive thyroid, a condition that runs in her family, and had never considered the possibility that she might be pregnant after doctors had previously told her she wouldn't be able to conceive.
The shocking truth emerged when she decided to see a doctor and took a pregnancy test before her appointment on the assumption that they would ask her if she had done one.
'I nearly fell on the floor – because it was positive,' she told the newspaper.
'Twenty years ago I found out I would not be able to conceive. I never use contraception....We were delighted – looking back now we think 'how did we miss this'.'
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Baby boy Kit was born at 37 weeks on May 22 by emergency caesarian. He had to be delivered early as Claire developed pre-eclampsia, a potentially life-threatening complication in pregnancy.
Claire and Jez are already parents to three adopted children, two girls aged 11 and nine, and a boy aged five.
They had been praying for a baby up until they adopted their children. They now believe the arrival of Kit is an answer to the prayers they said all those years ago.
'We believe it was our prayers we made a decade ago were being answered. We had stopped praying after we had our brilliant kids,' she said.
She also paid a special thanks to the midwives at Worcester Royal, where Kit was born, after they helped her through her difficult delivery.
'They were incredibly caring, attentive, highly professional and talked me through and walked me through these days which could potentially have been full of trauma and were definitely at one of the most vulnerable times of my life,' she said.
'Every midwife on every shift was above and beyond what we had dared to hope for.'
