The contractions started on the final day of what was meant to be a relaxing babymoon. Chantelle Ali, 33, had been enjoying a boat trip with her partner Ben Major when she began to feel pain. Assuming it was Braxton Hicks, she tried to ignore it – but the contractions grew stronger. She made her way down to the hotel reception and told the young Spanish lad behind the desk that she was having a baby.
An ambulance rushed her to Our Lady of Candelaria University Hospital. After a full day of labour, Chantelle gave birth to son Rico at 7.08pm on July 12 – five weeks premature. The baby had breathing difficulties and was placed in the ICU on oxygen, where he remains. Rico was supposed to be delivered by C-section back in England, but instead was born in Tenerife and now holds a Spanish birth certificate.
“Chantelle Ali, 33, gave birth five weeks early in Tenerife and is stuck unable to get a passport for her son.”
Nearly two weeks on, Chantelle and Rico are still stranded on the Spanish island. They cannot return home because the process of obtaining an emergency travel document for the newborn is lengthy. Ben, her partner, was forced to fly back to the UK the next day to arrange childcare for their two other children and leave the dog with a family member. Chantelle was left alone in a foreign hospital.
Since leaving the hospital, she has been living out of a carrier bag in a flat in Playa de las Américas. Her suitcase remains stuck at the airport after she fled the package holiday hotel a day before she was due to fly home. It will cost £150 to retrieve it. She has been wearing the same three dresses on repeat. The hospital stay is covered by insurance, but the family is funding the £400-a-week flat and transport themselves.
"It has been a highly emotional and mentally draining experience," Chantelle said. "Not just to have a baby prematurely but in a foreign country is very scary. Google Translate saves me basically. There are a few nurses who can speak English but there are obviously a lot that can't. It is always worrying because you don't know if you are getting all the correct information."
The hospital is an hour-long bus ride from where they get supplies. "We are out in the sticks basically, there is nothing English around here," she said. "I don't think I want to see Tenerife for a while."