Second in a series
Re “Eight Months Pregnant – How About Flying Around the World?”
[img]2579|exact|||no_popup[/img]
Educator Jessica Jacobs with her family – Sage, 14, center, husband John and now 8-month-old Rai at left, and Kaien, 9, at right.
Speaking from her native Northern California where she and her family presently – temporarily? – are based, Jessica Jacobs related how, late last summer, at eight months pregnant, she moved two children and One Almost Baby to Italy for her husband’s sudden job.
Hired to work on the salvaging portion of a cruise ship that had sunk off the coast of Italy early last year, the arrangement was to last for a month.
“That meant John would be back in time for the (mid-September) birth,” said Ms. Jacobs, whose bid to open a charter school here in 2012 was rejected by the School Board. “But they offered John an extension. It was really, really good money.”
What followed will not surprise anyone who knows the pert, perky, independent, creative, charmingly unorthodox Ms. Jaciobs.
The extension was too tempting.
“And so I said, ‘You know what? We want to have the baby at home anyway. Why don’t we just come to Italy and do it there?’” Ms. Jacobs told to her around-the-world hubby.
With that, the eight-months pregnant Ms. Jacobs packed up her 14-year-old – doing college work — and 9-year-old sons, and the entire household.
Before departing for Italy, the diminutive Ms. Jacobs “wore a really big shirt so nobody could tell I was 8½ months pregnant” when moms-to-be are not supposed to be airborne.
“We arrived in Italy and made our way to the island of Giglio.”
Ms. Jacobs may move on the fly, but she is well organized. “I already had checked out where the Town Hall was so we could get a birth certificate, what the emergency medical personnel status was. Very limited, but we let them know we were going to do a home birth, and if there was an emergency, we would like them to be available.
“Then John’s boss said, ‘We have a medic on staff. Just use ours.’ Okay. And even though I already had secured a nice condo on the water for the month, John’s boss said ‘We have a free house for you, too. Just use it.’
“So this is great,” Ms. Jacobs exulted. “We are all set up with a doctor, a house. I have the birthing tub, and I am filling it up. We are ready to go.”
(To be continued)
