Mums often say that even after nine months there's nothing that can truly prepare you for parenthood.
However, one young woman certainly didn't have time for antenatal classes, yoga or shopping. Indeed, she says she had no idea she was even pregnant – until she gave birth on her upstairs toilet.
Teaching assistant Charlotte Bryant, 20, explains that she saw three GPs before her surprise new arrival – but none suspected she was pregnant.
"I sat on the toilet and I felt something really odd between my legs," Ms Bryant says of her incredible experience three weeks ago while in conversation with the South Wales Evening Post.
"It was like a poo but it felt like it was coming from the wrong place. I felt the urge to push and then as I looked down and I saw a face looking at me. It was absolutely surreal."
Her son, named Joshua, weighed in at 7lbs 4oz.
Thankfully, Charlotte's brother, Adam, 26, was also at their home in Cardiff in Wales when the birth occurred.
Charlotte continues: "I screamed for my brother and told him I'd had a baby.
"He told me to stop being stupid until he came downstairs and saw a baby in my arms."
Adam called an ambulance with six paramedics arriving through the door ten minutes later. Ms Bryant reveals. "One of them cut the umbilical cord and checked us over and then we were taken straight to hospital.
"Obviously I didn't have a thing for him – not even a packet of nappies."
The young woman soon sent a picture of her baby to her boyfriend of two years, Daniel Hughes, 25.
"He was in complete shock," she adds. "At first he thought I was playing a joke on him."
Charlotte says that both she and Daniel are now totally in love with their baby Joshua.
"I really had no idea I was expecting," she concludes. "I'd put on a few pounds but I thought I'd been eating too much cake."