When Allie LaForce became pregnant, she hoped her sister, Dr. AuBree LaForce, would be there to support her. With a little luck and some planning, the sisters were able to arrange it so that AuBree, a resident in family medicine, delivered her own nephew.
“Everything in our lives has led us down this path,” Allie, 34, tells TODAY.com of the birth on on Nov. 10, 2022. “There are a couple of things that fell into place.” Allie is a national sports reporter and her husband, Joe Smith, is a Major League Baseball pitcher. Over the past few years, the couple has moved — a lot.
“He’s played for nine different teams,” Allie says. “When we were going through IVF, we were in Houston, and then we got traded to Seattle … then he signed with Minnesota.”
The couple pursued IVF because Smith’s mother had Huntington disease and the couple wanted to make sure they wouldn’t pass it on to their children, Allie says. While Allie returned to Houston for her embryo transfer, she had established a relationship with a doctor in Minnesota. But then Smith was released from that team and they moved back to Ohio.
“I was a couple of months away from delivering and my doctor was in Minnesota,” Allie says. “I didn’t have a doctor that I was seeing regularly in Ohio. So AuBree came to the rescue.”
AuBree, who is a resident training in family medicine at The Cleveland Clinic Akron General, said she'd help her sister find a doctor.
AuBree had long wanted to be a doctor, ever since their cousin Blake developed acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) at 16. They spent a lot of time in a children’s hospital visiting him. Later, when AuBree worked as an almost “professional babysitter," she sat for a child, Ethan, who had ALL when he was 3. The experience inspired her.
“I went with him to doctor’s appointments and kind of guided him through that,” AuBree, 28, tells TODAY.com. “Luckily, he is a successful teenager now. He survived and is cancer free. But that’s really when I knew the medical field was for me.”
After helping Allie find a new doctor, the sisters had a thought: What if AuBree delivered the baby herself?
“She had just done her OB-GYN rotation,” Allie says. “She was delivering (babies) on a regular basis.”
AuBree approached her sister’s doctor, the head of the OB-GYN residency program, and they set up a plan, including a scheduled induction. They also created a framework for what would happen if Allie or the baby were in distress.
“When I first decided that I wanted to do this, I had a set of boundaries,” AuBree says. “We walked through when I would step away and an OB would take over.”
AuBree hoped that having these guidelines would help both her sister and nephew, and preserve the sisters’ relationship.
“I would do it as long as it was uncomplicated,” AuBree says.
When the induction day arrived, the sisters were ready.
“When she woke up, she was on, she was fired up like she was going to a competition or a basketball game or a track meet,” Allie says. “That intensity, I remember from high school.”
While AuBree admits she was “in full business mode,” she also knew that labor could last a long time and she had other patients to see. For most of the day, Allie was about 2 cm dilated. By evening, doctors used a Foley balloon to speed up labor. AuBree grabbed dinner with the rest of the family and tried to sleep as she prepared for Allie’s long night of labor.
“I knew I’d be up for most of the night,” AuBree says. “Once she hit 4 cm it was like she went from 4 to 10 really quick. She progressed like a champ.”
When Allie was at 10 cm, AuBree called their family staying at her place about 30 minutes away so they’d be there when Allie began pushing. That’s when their sisterly bond really helped.
As Allie pushed, AuBree could tell her sister needed a little extra motivation. So, she challenged her with a pushing technique where a nurse held one end of a sheet and Allie held the other. When Allie pushed, she “rolled over on her belly” while she yanked the sheet, which gave her more leverage for a deeper push.
“I knew she’s competitive like me. So, I changed up the pushing method where she had to have a tug-of-war with a nurse,” AuBree says. “That really helped her.”
Allie agrees.
“I really like to prove people wrong,” she says. “This method was perfect for what I needed."
Soon after, Allie gave birth.
“One thing led to another, and we met Jacob at around 2 or 3 a.m.,” AuBree says. “She was a rock star. It was awesome.”
The sisters, who say they are best friends, love that they were able to share such a meaningful experience.
“It was so exciting and exhilarating and it wasn’t scary,” Allie says. “It was like this great adventure that we were going to embark on together as sisters.”
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