Military Families Cope With Deployments by Making Babies

Sept. 17, 2007 — -- Lt. Col. Diane Adams has had her hands full. Every day. Last month, the hospital department she oversees in Fort Campbell, Ky., was responsible for delivering 242 babies.

That was a record. And they're not finished yet.

"That's more than 100 over our usual monthly average, " she said.

Adams delivered a few of those babies herself. She chuckled thinking about it. "There are moments when you think is anyone on Fort Campbell not pregnant?"

Adams is the chief of Women's Health Services at Blanchfield Army Hospital, and she expects the hospital to break the baby-delivery record again this month, and possibly every month into the winter.

"We were surprised to see how sustained it is. And we're now predicting over 200 births per month all the way through March, and we're starting to see women who are due in April already."

It all began when Fort Campbell troops started returning home from Iraq last fall. Many were like Staff Sgt. Cory Yates and his wife, Suzy. They had decided, when they married, to wait to have children.

But after his second tour in Iraq, and knowing he'll face longer deployments in the future, they decided to get their family started now. "We decided that if we waited too long, it's never going to happen, " he said.

It did happen. Little Mason Yates was born in July. His dad is preparing to leave for Iraq again in a few months. Bittersweet, certainly, but Yates is simply glad he was home to see Mason born. "If I didn't believe in what I was doing, I wouldn't be doing it anymore. I think when he gets older, he'll understand."

His wife, Suzy, agrees with him. "We just try to do as much as we can while he's home and enjoy the time together that we have, " she said, adding that they have plenty of company as parents of a newborn on their military post. "You can't go into Wal-Mart without seeing or passing a pregnant person or someone with a newborn baby. They're everywhere!"