Dara Crouch, a labor and delivery nurse, figured she pretty much knew what to expect when it came to her own pregnancy and giving birth.
Surprise! Dara Crouch’s astonished expression says it all as she gives birth to her family’s first boy in 50 years.
On the other hand, her surprised countenance, captured by photographer and family friend Neely Ker-Fox on April 25, 2017, is all sweetness and complete surprise.
Crouch, already a mother to 3-year-old daughter Neyland, had decided to leave her newborn’s gender a surprise. After all, on her mother’s side of the family, no one had given birth to a son in almost 50 years. Crouch, now a mom of two, said that she always thought she’d be having a girl.
So, after four hours in labor, when she met her newborn son, Liam, now 7 weeks old, she felt “shock more than anything.”
Ker-Fox has been a birth photographer for about eight years, snapping more than 100 births, but she said this one was perhaps the most special.
“Five minutes before it was time to start pushing, the couple again started thinking about the possibility of a boy,” said Ker-Fox, who noticed a “sweet, motherly apprehension” in Crouch.
The midwife announced it was a boy a few minutes later, at 1:31 p.m. “Oh my god!” Crouch exclaimed, according to Ker-Fox. “It’s a boy!” I exclaim, “I can’t believe it’s a boy!”
The newborn was born 7 pounds and 15 ounces of pure astonishment.
Crouch said: “I look kind of crazy in them, but I think they’re great,”.
She added: “We have something to look back on had we not have a photographer in the room we would’ve never seen that.”
“The last boy that we know was born on my side of the family is 50 years ago, but quite honestly it has little to do with the shock in the picture,” she added. “I honestly believed it was a female. We already had a daughter, so I guess I considered us to be ‘female parents.'”
Crouch, a birth room nurse, expressed gratitude for having the photos to show Liam when he is older.
“He’ll know how excited we were and how shocked I was,” she added.
