--- title: Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth description: A Massachusetts woman was surprised when she found out she was pregnant, an hour before giving birth. canonical: https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-11-09T12:36:26.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:42:16.916Z article:section: Health og:title: Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth og:description: A Massachusetts woman was surprised when she found out she was pregnant, an hour before giving birth. og:url: https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth twitter:description: A Massachusetts woman was surprised when she found out she was pregnant, an hour before giving birth. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth > Sponsored content. 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Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Nov 9, 2015 12:36 PM UTC by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Nov 9, 2015 12:36 PM UTC A Massachusetts woman was surprised to found out she was pregnant, just about an hour before giving birth to a healthy baby girl. Judy Brown, 47, went to Beverly Hospital in Beverly, Massachusetts on Wednesday with severe abdominal pain. To her surprise, Brown’s health providers discovered that she was pregnant and in labor. Around an hour later, Brown gave birth to a healthy 8lb baby. She and her husband of 22 years named her Carolyn Rose, [_ABC News_ reports](http://abcnews.go.com/Health/massachusetts-woman-finds-shes-labor-hospital-abdominal-pain/story?id=35022012). Brown told ABC News, “It was a little bit scary getting into the hospital thinking something was really bad was going on. To understand and take in that was I pregnant and was about to go into labor … it was very overwhelming.” Dr. Kimberly Gecsi, an obstetrician and gynecologist at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland told ABC News that it is possible for women to not realize they are pregnant until close to giving birth. “People don’t know sometimes or they’re in denial about it and denial can be pretty strong,” she said. Women in their 40s can still get pregnant if they have not gone through menopause. The Office of Women’s Health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services [says](http://www.womenshealth.gov/menopause/menopause-basics/) if women are still having periods, even if they are not regular, they can get pregnant. Even though her body had been undergoing changes, ABC reports that Brown did not consider she might be pregnant, due to her age. \[[_ABC News\]_](http://abcnews.go.com/Health/massachusetts-woman-finds-shes-labor-hospital-abdominal-pain/story?id=35022012) ### See the Funniest and Weirdest Baby Photos  Shot for TIME, 2015 Evan Kafka for TIME  Shot for TIME, 2015 Photo-illustration by Evan Kafka for TIME  Shot for TIME, 2015 Photo-illustration by Evan Kafka for TIME  Shot for TIME, 2015 Photo-illustration by Evan Kafka for TIME  Personal work, 2009 Evan Kafka—Getty Images  Shot for Huggies, 2011 Evan Kafka  Personal work, 2009 Evan Kafka  Personal work, 2009 Evan Kafka—Getty Images  Personal work, 2009 Photo-illustration by Evan Kafka—Getty Images  Personal work, 2011 Evan Kafka—Getty Images  Personal work, 2009 Evan Kafka—Getty Images  Personal work, 2009 Evan Kafka—Getty Images  ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/"},"headline":"Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth","datePublished":"2015-11-09T12:36:26.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:42:16.916Z","description":"Judy Brown was 47 when she gave birth to a girl she didn't know she was having","url":"https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/","keywords":["Pregnancy","Living","Labor","U.S.","baby","Pregnant"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alexandra Sifferlin","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/pregnancy/","name":"Pregnancy"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4104557/judy-brown-pregnant-woman-hour/","name":"Woman Finds Out She's Pregnant an Hour Before Giving Birth"}}]}] ```