Fat and Stupid or Stupid and Fat?

Journal Reporter

Amanda Brisendine had a simple response when asked about her very unexpected pregnancy.

"I don't know how I didn't know. I just didn't know," Brisendine said from her bed in Overlake's Birthing Center on Tuesday.

The 26-year-old was already a mother — she had her first child, Melody, 14 months ago — when she went to Overlake Medical Center in Bellevue on Saturday.

She thought she was simply having painful abdominal cramps.

"I'm glad I didn't wait any longer," she said. "I'd hate to have had him at work."

Admittedly, Brisendine had gained some weight over the past several months — she'd quit smoking, she said, and had been eating a lot of her grandmother's buttery, rich cooking.

But she said she didn't have any of the typical pregnancy symptoms, like a missed menstruation, morning sickness, fatigue or food cravings. "Everything was normal as far as I knew," she said.

So it was a shock when she learned Saturday she was almost nine months pregnant, and in just a few hours she'd have a new baby. She said she was nauseous when she got the diagnosis. "I had no time to prepare for this," she said. "We were incredibly unprepared."

Her boyfriend had a slightly different take on Brisendine's news.

"I thought she was lying," Jason Britt said.

Brisendine and Britt live in Renton. He's a forklift operator and she works in the deli at an Albertsons store.

Brisendine started having painful cramps Wednesday, but went to work anyway. She left work early Thursday because the cramps were so bad. She couldn't get into the clinic Friday, and had to wait until Saturday.

On Saturday, doctors ordered an emergency C-section, Brisendine said, because the 37-week-old baby wasn't moving as much as they wanted.

Sunday evening, Alexander Joseph Britt was delivered, weighing in at 7 pounds, 5 ounces. Brisendine and Britt were talking about names while she was on the operating table, Brisendine said.

Dr. Jim Haines, chief of obstetrics at Overlake Hospital, said it's unusual but not rare for women to go to the emergency room with abdominal cramps and not realize they're pregnant or in labor. He said he's seen surprise pregnancies as long as he's been a doctor, usually one every couple of years.

It usually occurs in what he described as a "perfect storm" situation: The women have irregular menstrual cycles and don't realize they're missing periods because they're pregnant. Many of the surprise-pregnancy patients also are overweight and don't notice the body changes associated with pregnancy.

Haines said Brisendine was lucky. Because she didn't realize she was pregnant, she didn't have any of the typical prenatal testing and check-ups to make sure the baby was developing properly.

But she and the baby were fine, and both were expected to be released from the hospital today. Mother and father still have Melody's crib, but they don't have other baby necessities that most new parents collect in the months preceding birth.

Still, there were benefits from the surprise.

"I don't have time to think about things that can go wrong. So many things could have gone wrong with him. I didn't have time to worry," Brisendine said. "And he's perfect."

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