By Rachel Uda
Newsday
MOUNT SINAI, N.Y. — Jane and Mike Pappalardo were ready for their second baby to arrive.
On Monday evening, the Mount Sinai couple had its bags packed, prepared for a fast departure to the hospital. But baby Bryce was faster.
Jane Pappalardo, 30, started having painful contractions at 11:50 p.m. when her water broke. Mike Pappalardo began packing the car to go to the hospital when he heard his wife scream that it was too late. She was going into labor.
“We did a lot to prepare ourselves for this birth,” said Jane Pappalardo, who assumed her second child would be a few days late, like her first. “We thought we knew when to go to the hospital, but everything happened so quickly.”
She said her husband and mother, who was there to watch their 2-year-old daughter Anna during the delivery, were in disbelief.
“They didn’t believe me at first, but then I started to crown,” Jane Pappalardo said.
Mike Pappalardo, 38, a special-education teacher at Mount Sinai Middle School, called 911 and a dispatcher guided him through the delivery. He told his wife to lay on the kitchen floor and push. Bryce was born within minutes, early Tuesday morning.
But the delivery wasn’t without complication. Bryce was born with his umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. EMTs wouldn’t arrive for a few more minutes, so Mike Pappalardo had to follow the dispatcher’s instructions on how to remove it.
“Overall it was just a crazy experience,” said Mike Pappalardo, who is also a coach in the Mount Sinai school district. “My wife was just unbelievable.”
Bryce and his mother are both healthy and resting in the hospital. The newborn weighed 8 pounds, 7 ounces at birth.
“We’re just glad everything worked out and Bryce is healthy,” Jane Pappalardo said.
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