ZEELAND, Mich. — A Zeeland woman's labor took an unexpected turn when she delivered her baby breech on her driveway with assistance from her doula and a neighboring Ottawa County sheriff's deputy.
Kenzie Fiolek gave birth to daughter Eloise on Nov. 2 after experiencing what she initially thought were Braxton Hicks contractions throughout the day. The 3-month-old is now a healthy baby, but her entrance into the world was far from ordinary.
"I doubt there's anyone in the world that can say our story. So, I think it's really cool," Fiolek said.
The day started normally for the Fiolek family. Kenzie had been having contractions but dismissed them as false labor pains.
"I just kept ignoring them, ignoring them. And then as the day went on, things started to progress a little bit, but not anything that I thought really was true labor yet," she said.
Around 5:30 p.m., while her husband Ben was making dinner for their older son Theo, Kenzie's water broke.
"We weren't having other signs quite yet, until my water broke, and then I was like, this is real," Kenzie said.
The couple called their doula, Kenzy Vos, who came to help.
"I was getting the car packed, and Kenzy, our doula said, I think we need to go to the hospital now," Ben said. "I opened the passenger door to our car, and our doula Kenzy, said, Ben, call 911 and I called 911 and the response time was amazing."
Before getting into the car, Kenzie wanted to have one more contraction so Vos could provide hip support. During that contraction, everything changed.
"During that contraction, she yelled, Kenzy, catch my baby," Vos said. "Every hair on my body stood straight up."
Ottawa County sheriff's deputies arrived quickly. Among them was Deputy Evan Potter, who has paramedic experience and happens to be the Fioleks' neighbor.
"I got here and ran up the driveway and found, you know, Kenzie and the baby's feet were sticking out," Potter said. "My biggest concern was just getting ready to help with the with the delivery of the baby."
The baby was in a breech position, meaning she was coming out feet first instead of head first. Despite the unusual circumstances, Kenzie remained calm.
"I was just on all fours, and just kind of felt her coming out, and the next thing I heard was she's breech. And thankfully that didn't scare me at all," she said. "I just was like in the moment, focused on my body and trusting my body to just do what I had to do to get her out safely."
With Vos and Potter's assistance, Kenzie continued pushing to deliver her daughter.
"At this point, Eloise was born to her chest. So from her chest down was birthed, but chest up was still inside waiting to be born," Vos said. "We encouraged Kenzie to do some coached pushing to help Eloise descend the rest of the way."
"After a few, few minutes of pushing, the baby came out. And, you know, it was a pretty unique experience," Potter said. "Kenzie did all the hard work. I was just helping."
The birth became even more special because big brother Theo witnessed the entire event.
"I got Theo out of his car seat, and he was right next to me the whole time. And he also just played off of our energy, and was very calm too," Ben said. "It was a very cool moment that I got to cut the umbilical cord, and Theo was actually standing right next to me while I did it."
For Vos, who has attended many births as a doula, this delivery stood out.
"This was definitely the most unique birth I've been a part of. Driveway and breach presentation were both new to me," she said. "It's definitely my favorite birth story to tell. It was just amazing to witness Kenzie and her strength and just bringing baby Eloise into the world."
Potter, who has helped deliver babies before in his role as a deputy with paramedic training, found the experience meaningful because of his connection to the family as their neighbor.
"It's gonna be fun watching, you know, our daughters grow up together, and little Theo, he's an absolute riot to watch play around in the yard, waving, smiling to us," he said. "Women have been having babies for years without any kind of medical intervention. But you know, this one just happened to be a little extra special."
The Fiolek family looks back on the experience with gratitude rather than trauma.
"I absolutely love it. People are like, you must be traumatized, or poor you, or poor Theo for watching it. He thinks that's great. I think it's absolutely great," Kenzie said. "We just give a lot of credit to Kenzy, Officer Evan and our chiropractor. They helped me prep for labor as well. We're just grateful."
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
