Marianna de la Cruz with her newborn children.Photo:Courtesy of HCA Florida Northwest Hospital
Courtesy of HCA Florida Northwest Hospital
Florida mom Marianna de la Cruz recently gave birth to her son Eden on Jan. 4, which also happens to be her birthday and her 8-year-old daughter’s!
“It does feel wild to me,” de la Cruz, 33, a resident of Pompano Beach, tells PEOPLE. “I think it’s pretty cool. And I’ve said it before, I know it’s happened, but it just hasn’t totally hit me. I guess once the first birthday comes up [next year] and I’m starting to plan a birthday party, then maybe it’ll hit me finally that I share a birthday with both of my kids.”
Ironically, the births of Jailyn, 8, and Eden came before their expected due dates. In 2016, Jailyn was supposed to arrive on Jan. 12. Instead, she came ahead of schedule on Jan. 4.
“I went to Benihana to have dinner to kind of start celebrating my birthday,” de la Cruz, a bookkeeper, recalls. “And I sat on the chair at Benihana and my water broke. So right after that, I went to the hospital and it just so happened that it was about 9:30 p.m. so it kind of rolled over to the next day and it was my birthday."
Marianna de la Cruz with her newborn.Courtesy of HCA Florida Northwest Hospital
Fast forward to Jan. 3 of this year, when a then-pregnant de la Cruz had an appointment with her doctor and was told to schedule an induction for Jan. 9. During the visit, de la Cruz expressed concern that she didn’t feel her son moving around as much as he usually did, so her physician recommended that de la Cruz go to a hospital to be evaluated.
After some tests at the hospital, de la Cruz was told that she was not being sent home. “You are being induced today,” she remembers being told. “And it just happened to be Jan. 3.”
One added complication? De La Cruz went to her doctor’s appointment that day while taking what she thought would only be a quick break from work. “I said, ‘I’ll be right back.’ It takes about 15, 20 minutes. All they do is check your belly and heartbeat and stuff,” she says. “And I never came back.”
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The mother of three adds, “But once 12:00 hit, my mom put on the ‘Happy Birthday’ song and I said, ‘That’s it. He’s not coming Jan. 3. He’ll be here Jan. 4 on my birthday.’ ”
Marianna de la Cruz with all three of her children.Courtesy of HCA Florida Northwest Hospital
When Jan. 4 rolled around in the past, de la Cruz says she always focused the occasion on her daughter. As for how she plans to do next year, she says she still has to figure that out.
“What I do with Jailyn is I always want to make it about her. So I do plan to keep the tradition going where it’s all about her and I do want to make Eden feel special on his day as well." she adds. “So maybe two birthday parties, three birthday parties? I’m not sure.”
While de la Cruz says that her relatives and friends already knew that she and Jailyn shared a birthday, it doesn’t take away from how special it is for all three of them. “It was some cool news eight years ago,” she says. “And now that they know about Eden, Jailyn and myself, they just think it’s so cool. It’s so rare.”
source: people.com
