By Belinda Nolan
PATIENCE may be a virtue, but it’s one Sam Crisapulli has yet to learn.
The tiny newborn was so eager to make his grand entrance into the world, he could not wait for doctors or nurses.
Instead, father Dean was forced to roll up his sleeves.
The Keilor East resident was sleeping peacefully in the early hours of 28 May when he was awakened by his wife Jacqui, who was having unexpected contractions.
“Her water had broken and she was lying on the bed unable to move, so I called the ambulance,” Dean said.
“The operator asked me how far apart her contractions were and when I told him they were about a minute apart, he told me the ambulance probably wouldn’t arrive there in time.
“That’s when I realised that I would have to deliver the baby myself.”
Needless to say, Dean had never been called on to step into a doctor’s shoes before.
“I’m a real estate agent,” the 32-year-old chuckled.
“I get sick to the stomach even watching medical shows on TV.
“I certainly never expected that I would one day be delivering my own baby.”
Despite a few “nervous moments”, Dean sprang into action as the emergency operator relayed instructions over the phone.
Baby Sam was born a few minutes later, weighing a healthy six pounds and two ounces, none the worse for his unusual arrival.
For Dean, the reality of his experience has only begun to sink in.
“I wasn’t really thinking about what I was doing at the time, I was just so focused on the job at hand,” Dean said.
“It was only later that I started to think about it.
“I suppose it’s given me an appreciation of how lucky it was that everything was OK because God knows what we would have done if something had gone wrong.”
But despite his success, Dean insisted that a career change was not on the cards.
“I won’t be giving up my day job, no,” he said.
“Not on your life.”
