Nurse learns daughter-in-law is baby she delivered 22 years ago
Mary Ann West said she was "shocked" when learned about the special connection.
A Utah nurse learned earlier this year that she helped deliver her daughter-in-law over two decades ago.
Mary Ann West, a longtime labor and delivery nurse at HCA Healthcare's Lakeview Hospital in Bountiful, Utah, told "Good Morning America" the coincidence was remarkable.
"We were shocked," she said. "I was like, this is meant to be. What are the odds that these two kids would find each other and end up getting married and starting their own little family?"
Mary Ann West first met the Poll family back in June 2001 when she helped deliver Stacy and Matthew Poll's third child.
"Her delivery was a little bit complicated so that's one reason why I remember it from 22 years ago. She had a complication with her placenta … it was very high risk because the cord attached to the baby and then the vessels were just in the amniotic membranes in the bag of water instead of attached with the cord, so it wasn't protected," she recalled, adding that this particular kind of complication was the only one she has encountered so far in her 29-year nursing career.
She also recalled assuring Stacy Poll when she expressed nervousness about having three kids under the age of three.
"I had just given birth to my third a year ago and was just letting her know, 'You got this girl. It's fine,'" Mary Ann West said she told Stacy Poll at the time. "'You can do this.' Kind of giving her tips of how to help the older siblings adjust to the new baby, and it was a great experience."
Little did she know that her own third child, a son named Tyler, would grow up and meet Stacy and Matthew's third child, a daughter named Kelsey.
According to Kelsey Poll West, she and Tyler West met in August 2021 when she was working at a bank, and he came in to deposit a check. The two eventually struck up a conversation.
"It was a really good conversation and he actually left. And I didn't see him for a while, [but] he came back and asked me for my number, and we started going on dates," Poll West said.
The couple got engaged this past February during a trip to Mexico. Ahead of their May wedding, they were flipping through Poll West's baby book when they noticed something striking.
"We were looking through my baby book to find some pictures for our wedding video … and we see this picture and it's Mary Ann there," Poll West said. "[Tyler was] like, 'That is my mom.' And it was undeniably Mary Ann."
Poll West said they also found a certificate her mom had received after her birth that featured Mary Ann West's handwriting.
"It was her handwriting. And so, [Tyler's] like, 'Oh, that was definitely my mom.' And so we just got really excited, started telling everybody, texting everybody that we could. It was so cool," she said.
Mary Ann West said she has since become closer friends with the Polls and now calls Stacy Poll her best friend.
"It's amazing. It was so fun to find this connection," she said.
Poll West added she's grateful for her mother-in-law and cherishes their relationship.
"She was able to help my mom during the time that she was really scared, and that means a lot, because my mom means the world to me," she said. "And just to be able to have both of my moms there with me when I was brought into the world is something that not everyone gets to say, and that's something that I'll be forever grateful for, that I have that connection with her and that she has that connection with my mom, too."
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