Woman shocked to discover she is pregnant after waking up from coma

An Arizona woman fighting for her life woke up from an induced coma – to discover she was 13 weeks pregnant with an “incredible” baby boy.

Last year, Sarita Cervantes, 30, was cooking up a storm in the kitchen for her and her husband Manuel, 32,’s family, including their two children Jojo, 3, and Noelle, 2.

The couple – who wed in 2022 – had previously struggled to convince, with Sarita having suffered 15 miscarriages in her lifetime due to PCOS and endometriosis.

Although they had given up hope, the pair later discovered they were pregnant again – but not before the mother was rushed to hospital with life-threatening injuries.

In January 2023, Sarita prepared a “special family recipe” for her family; fried chicken, mashed potatoes and homemade white sauce.

However, as she placed a large piece of lard into the pot, her arm grabbed the pan and some of the grease spat out onto the kitchen floor.

“All of a sudden I slipped,” she said. “As I landed on the kitchen floor, hot lard splattered all over my body.

“I was in agony and screamed the loudest. My skin melted all over the kitchen floor.

“Then everything went black.”

Manuel, who rushed to save his wife, was burned in the process and his family was forced to call an ambulance for the couple.

The two men were quickly airlifted to hospital, where Sarita was put into an induced coma after burning almost 50 percent of her body.

However, upon examining her and later operating on her 27 times, doctors discovered that she was pregnant.

Doctors informed Manuel – who was recovering from burns to his knee, chin and feet – that his wife was pregnant, but said there was a chance neither she nor the baby would survive.

But a month later, Sarita finally woke up from her coma and her husband finally explained everything to her.

“Opening my eyes, I turned around and saw Manuel lying on a hospital bed next to mine,” she said.

“He cried and explained everything. I couldn’t believe it. I kept telling myself that I was alive and everything was okay. I had been a paramedic for 10 years before that.

“I had seen how bad these things could get, so I knew how lucky I was. But then Manuel told me I was pregnant. I didn’t believe it at first.

“At one point, I was cooking family dinner. The next day, I woke up from a coma pregnant.

However, Sarita was “filled with dread” because she feared her baby wouldn’t make it.

During her recovery, doctors closely monitored her and her baby, especially during skin grafts and other operations.

Soon, she and her husband were transferred to rehabilitation centers, where the expectant mother felt her baby kicking.

“I realized the baby was really there and I cried. It was my little miracle,” she said. “If I was dead, the baby would be too. As I recovered each day, the nurses continued to monitor the baby.

“They were checking the heartbeat and constantly doing ultrasounds. Each time, I felt a pit in my stomach, but it was there, alive and moving.

In April 2023, Sarita was discharged from the hospital when she was five months pregnant.

Unfortunately, the rest of her pregnancy was not spent on a plane because she had an abnormal body temperature from her burns.

“I kept passing out everywhere and had extreme morning sickness,” she said. “I had also only been tube-fed in hospital, so the baby wasn’t getting enough nutrition.”

Despite complications, Sarita eventually gave birth to a baby boy named Ernesto, now 11 months old.

“Luckily he was a strong boy and fought hard. He had come this far and he wasn’t going to back down,” she said.

Months after Ernesto’s birth, Sarita is still trying to heal “physically and mentally” from a burn survivor.

“I had to relearn how to be a mother, even with my older children. I couldn’t brush their hair or clean their diapers,” she said. “I couldn’t even cut my own food and I had help with everything.”

The mother of three, who still struggles with her scars and self-image, believes her newborn son is destined for bright things.

“Now Ernesto is doing very well. He is 11 months old and I know he will do great things when he is older.”