“When I heard the baby cry, it was a surreal moment,” the dispatcher tells PEOPLE. “I couldn’t believe that I had just helped someone give birth”
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(jpeg)/david-sweatman-tout-071224-1a8ec88c552d4d84bed67fc632151329.jpg "David Sweatman")
Courtesy of April Sweatman
David Sweatman
It was around 4:30 a.m. on Father’s Day 2023 when Atlanta-area 911 dispatcher Stephanie Brito received a phone call from a QuikTrip gas station employee in Henry County, Georgia, informing her that a 28-year-old female at the store was going into labor.
“A lot of the times when people call in and they say someone’s in labor, their water broke and they’re just having contractions,” says Brito, 26. “You walk them through their contractions and wait for the ambulance to arrive. I didn’t really think I was going to deliver a baby.”
“That is, until the employee said she could see the baby’s head,” Brito recalls now. “Then I was like, ‘This is the real deal.’ ”
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Working together with the QuikTrip employee, Brito says she tried to comfort the expectant mother and suggested they find a quiet and private place at the gas station for her delivery.
“We were trying to get her to lay down, and the mom said she felt uncomfortable,” says Brito. “The mom said she didn’t feel comfortable in the bathroom, and then the employee just randomly was like, ‘Well, what about the QuickTrip cooler?’ So they went to the cooler.”
About 15 minutes later, the young woman gave birth to a 7-lb., 5-oz. healthy baby boy while standing up in the cooler. “She never did lay on the floor,” Brito tells PEOPLE. “When I heard the baby cry, it was a surreal moment. I couldn’t believe that I had just helped someone give birth.”
Minutes later, paramedics arrived and took mom and child to the hospital.
Courtesy of April Sweatman
David Sweatman
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Meanwhile, about 10 hours after the baby was born, Atlanta emergency room nurse April Sweatman received a phone call from her brother, David Dalrymple, 61, a lifelong bachelor, while celebrating Father’s Day with her family at a Thai restaurant.
“He told me that his girlfriend just had a baby and that the baby was his,” Sweatman remembers him saying. “He wanted to know if I would be willing to help raise the baby and bring the baby home with us. Neither one of them were able to take care of a baby.”
Without missing a beat, April says, she and her husband, Charles Sweatman, agreed to accept the baby and immediately drove with their now 9-year-old son, Kaleb, to the hospital. “It was a total shock,” says April, 49. “But we didn’t think twice about it.”
Related: Mom Remembers Giving Birth on Side of the Road as Paramedics Raced to Help: ‘No Way This Is Happening’
After the birth mother waived her parental rights, April and Charles, a retired Air Force staff sergeant, 52, immediately adopted the baby boy, David, now 13 months, and shared custody with the biological father until his death on Monday, July 8.
“It just makes little David’s story of life that [much] more poignant,” April says of her late brother.
Baby David, known by his family as “Peanut,” is the youngest of the Sweatmans’ 10 kids – four biological and six adopted ranging in age from 1 to 32.
“He is a ball of energy,” April says. “He probably has one of the best personalities of all the children we’ve ever raised. He likes to be the center of attention and wins you over with them big blue eyes. You just can’t help but fall in love.”
Related: Firefighter Helped Mom of 3 Deliver in Her Trunk During Worst Snowstorm of the Year
She finds herself gushing: “He’s so super smart,” she continues. “He said his first word at 6 months old and took his first steps at 10 months.”
And though David “started out with a tough start,” April says, “he’s conquered it all. I just truly believe this child is going to go places. I wouldn’t trade this little guy for the world. He’s absolutely amazing.”
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