MIRROR-IMAGE MOTHERS

HERITAGE HARBOUR — Olivia Macey and Nadia Wood and their husbands had joked they may have to carpool to the hospital when it came time to deliver their babies.

But with due dates a few weeks apart, the next-door neighbors never dreamed how close they would come to fulfilling it.

On Jan. 6, Olivia gave birth to Ava Marianne Macey at 3:06 p.m. at Lakewood Ranch Medical Center. Less than two hours later, Wood delivered her daughter Haven Makayla Wood into the world at Sarasota Memorial Hospital.

“I was shocked,” Olivia says. “It’s coincidental we both went (into labor) early and went on the same day. It was very surprising.”

Although the women will celebrate this Mother’s Day with their own families, this year, the occasion also is a reminder for both of a hope for a child come true and a friendship few moms experience.

NEW FRIENDS, NEW FAMILY
Olivia and Nadia have been friends since Olivia and her family moved in next door in July 2009. Together, Nadia and her husband, Sean, and Olivia and her husband, Rich, enjoyed barbecues and watching their older children — Hannah and Braden — swim in the pool. The women, along with another friend, even walked several miles together each morning until Olivia went back to work in November 2009.

“We were both a little busy,” Olivia says, noting the friends didn’t see each other much while she was working.

Olivia learned she was pregnant on Mother’s Day 2010, and Nadia discovered she also was carrying a child a few weeks later, just three days before her 40th birthday. Nadia’s pregnancy was considered high risk, so she kept quiet with the news until a few months later.

But eventually, Nadia divulged the news. With due dates just two weeks apart, the women quickly began comparing notes on their pregnancies.

“Everything I was feeling, Nadia would get it about two weeks later,” Olivia says.

EARLY DELIVERY
By the beginning of January, Olivia was exhausted and extremely uncomfortable. Following some advice that a long walk could help spur labor, she and her mother went on a walk the evening of Jan. 5. After her husband, a tennis professional at IMG Academy, had fallen asleep watching television, Olivia’s water broke.
The couple arrived at the hospital close to 10 p.m.

That same night, Nadia was extremely uncomfortable and had a sudden urge to make banana fritters, she says. The pain she was experiencing was intense, and she was having trouble breathing. After speaking with friends and a nurse by phone, Nadia decided to stay home and wait it out. The pain, they had told her, sounded like late labor discomfort.

“The pain wouldn’t go away,” Nadia say, noting she didn’t experience contractions with her first child.

Fortunately, Nadia already had an appointment with her doctor scheduled for the following morning. There, she learned she already was three centimeters dilated.

“I was in labor,” she says with a shrug.

Because the baby was frank breech, Nadia couldn’t go past four centimeters without risk to the baby.
Doctors insisted she go immediately to the hospital. With her husband out of town on a business trip, a friend picked Nadia up and took her to the hospital as her husband frantically attempted to get from Atlanta to Bradenton as quickly as possible.

At the hospital, doctors prepped Nadia for a Cesarean section, stalling until her husband arrived. And at 4:55 p.m., Haven was born by emergency C-section at 6 pounds, 12 ounces.

“I said to my friend, ‘How funny would it be if Olivia had her baby today?’” Nadia recalls, adding they tried to call and find out but were unsuccessful.

Neighbors delivered the news — and dessert — to Olivia when she returned home Jan. 7. Nadia had to stay a few more days in the hospital, and the same neighbors who delivered news and a pie to Olivia and Rich delivered the same news to Nadia and Sean.

PLAY DATES
Four months later, Olivia and Nadia sit on the living room floor, both breaking into grins as Ava and Haven smile and coo back at them.

The girls, now 4 months old, are bright-eyed and content. When their mothers face them toward each other, the babies take turns smiling, causing their moms to break into laughter.

Over the last few weeks, in particular, the girls have been getting acquainted, and the two busy moms expect their time together to increase, especially once the girls are old enough to be out in the sun.

“It’ll be fun to watch them grow up together,” Nadia says.

Contact Pam Eubanks at [email protected].