Victoya Venise: Woman delivers baby in Georgia hotel toilet after mistaking labor pain for stomach bug
Victoya Venise, of Louisiana, was 37 weeks pregnant when she went into labor last week while on business trip in Georgia. Venise went to the bathroom because she thought she had a stomach ailment, only to her own surprise, she ended up giving birth to her own child while on the toilet. She had been told by doctors that her due date was May 1.
Since it was too early for her to deliver when she began feeling stomach pains on April 1, she figured she had contracted the same stomach bug that her four-year-old daughter had and that is, until her son was born. Venise, who had intended to place the baby for adoption with another family, became so attached to him after the unusual delivery that she chose to keep him and name him Rocky after her grandfather.
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Venise is a graphic designer and social media manager, was staying in a hotel in Georgia while on business when she went into labor. "I had just came back from urgent care with my daughter. And she had a stomach bug," she told WXIA-TV, an NBC affiliate. "By the time I realized it was a baby and not poop, it was just too late."
Venise told FOX 5 Atlanta, "I turned around, and it was the baby, and I was like [gasp]. I hurried up, and I grabbed him out of the toilet. I found a towel and I wrapped him up. I was sitting on the toilet and I called my mom. I was like mom, I just had the baby. I was like he fell in the toilet. She was like, 'Call 911, call 911.'"
Rocky and Venise were brought to a local hospital, where he was given a special birth certificate. She told People, "[I'm] listed as the doctor, [and] his place of birth will say Extended Stay America," referencing to the hotel where she was staying.
Venise is a single working mother who had intended to give Rocky up for adoption, but she has fallen in love with him and is in the process of returning to Georgia to be closer to her own mother. "I feel like the experience made me connected to him and made me want to keep him. So I'm going to keep him," she declared. "It gave me more courage and made me believe I can do this. If I can do that, I must be able to do a lot."
"No, you're mine, I'm going to take care of you," Venise reassured the infant. "If I could literally bring you into the world by myself, I think I could take care of you," she remarked.