Married couples with children often describe either the birthday of their newborn or their wedding the best day of their life, but for one Texas couple, the celebrations were one in the same.
Stephanie Tallent and Jason Nece recently had an impromptu wedding at Texas Children’s Hospital after learning that Tallent was 5 centimeters dilated at 36 weeks pregnant during a routine growth ultrasound.
“We had talked about how it was important to us to get married before she was born, and we just happened to get the marriage license yesterday morning,” Tallent said in an interview with the hospital.
The marriage license, as well as a white sundress Tallent planned to take to the dry cleaners, happened to be in the couple’s car when they learned of their preterm birth. So Nece raced to the vehicle to grab the license and dress, and then they called the hospital’s chaplain to marry them.
Thirty minutes later, hospital staff organized a ceremony with flowers and an acapella serenade. Tallent and Nece exchanged vows after Dr. Karla Wagner, OB-GYN and maternal fetal medicine specialist at Baylor Obstetrics and Gynecology at Texas Children's Pavilion for Women, walked Tallent down the aisle of the clinic to the assessment room, where the couple wed.
A few hours after the ceremony, Tallent was admitted to the preoperative area of the hospital’s labor and delivery unit. Her baby was breech, so she needed a cesarean section.
Their daughter, Sophia, was born healthy weighing 6 pounds, 3 ounces.
“We cannot be any happier than we are now,” Tallent said. “And just to think, when I woke up this morning I never thought that I would be getting married and having a baby today.”