14 DAY TRIAL // 22-year-old Chilean Olympic weightlifter Elizabeth Poblete had the surprise of her life earlier this week when, during training, she gave birth to a child she did not even know she was carrying, That’s Fit informs. The child was three months premature and did not survive, with reports saying it passed away in the hospital days later.
A week before giving birth, Poblete had participated in a national competition, without having as much as a clue that she was with child. She then went into labor as she was doing her routine of training and delivered on the spot, reports say. The baby was taken to an intensive care unit at a Brazilian hospital, where it died. The weightlifter, who came out 12th in the Beijing Olympics, maintains that she had no idea that she was pregnant.
While this might come as a shock even considering that skipped periods and weight oscillations are not uncommon with female athletes, pregnancies that go unnoticed do happen, That’s Fit says citing Discovery Health. In such cases, the baby fails to cause any “commotion” or, if does kick and move, its movements are interpreted as something else, mostly as signs of a bad digestion.
“Believe it or not, sometimes babies just don’t make a lot of commotion in utero. In addition, some women’s babies rest naturally toward the back of the womb, so that motion and kicking aren’t easily detected from outside the mother’s body. Many women believe that fetal movements are just irregular or strong digestive activity!” Discovery Health says, as cited by That’s Fit.
One of the judges on the panel of the competition Poblete took part in a week ahead of the surprise birth told the media that all he noticed at the time was that she was a “big” and strong girl. Her larger frame could also explain why the pregnancy went by unnoticed, while her intense training would account for her skipped periods, which she must have mistaken for irregular menstruation.