College student finishes final exam from hospital bed while in labor

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (WSVN) — A college student says she wanted to finish her final exams on time, even if it meant doing so while in labor.

Nayzia Thomas is a sophomore attending Johnson County Community College in Kansas City, Missouri. When she went into labor slightly ahead of her due date, Thomas said she still wanted to finish her final exams if she could help it.

“It wasn’t due until the end of the week,” Thomas told Yahoo! Lifestyle. “But my goal was to try to have everything done before. [I thought] before all this gets crazy, let me hurry up and finish this final.”

Rather than putting off the last exam and getting an “incomplete” grade, Thomas was determined to finish the assignment from her hospital bed.

Her mother snapped a photo of her in the hospital room, showing her laptop in front of her and textbook by her side.

“School is so important to me,” she said. “I didn’t want [the pregnancy] to be in the way. That’s what people expect. You’re a teen mom, you’re a young mother. That’s why my mom took that picture. It shows follow through.”

About 12 hours after the photo was taken, Thomas said she gave birth to her son Anthony.

As she recovered post-birth, her tweet with the photo went viral, receiving over 28,000 retweets and over 133,000 likes.

Thomas later posted a follow-up tweet, saying that although she suffered major blood loss after the delivery, the baby’s father was by her side to help.

“We are blessed!” she wrote. “AND I’m finishing the semester with a 3.5 GPA!”

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