Earlier this week, Candy Carson, wife of former neurosurgeon and Zoloft “before” blob Ben Carson, released herself a book. And keeping with Carson tradition, some of Candy’s tales were a bit of a stretch—especially the one surrounding the bobby-pin-assisted bathroom birth of her third-born son. So we asked author and OB/GYN Dr. Jen Gunter to weigh in on Dr. Carson’s MacGyver-worthy delivery.

First, the fantastic labor tale in question. We open in Ben Carson’s bathroom:

Once awake, Ben went into doctor mode, though he didn’t yet realize how advanced my labor was. “Are you sure the baby’s coming? How close are the contractions? When did they start?” he called from the bedroom. Still trying to catch my breath, I couldn’t answer right away, but thank God for Lamaze! The breathing rehearsals from those classes kicked in and did their job! When I had breath enough to answer, I realized that not only was the baby coming, he was actually here!

“Honey, I think you better check,” I replied. And sure enough, little BJ was there. Ben dashed into the bathroom just in time to catch BJ before he fully emerged, holding the baby in one hand while he caught the afterbirth in the other. The emergency was not over yet, though, because the umbilical cord needed to be clamped. Ben literally had his hands full, so he told me to find something to clip off the placenta.

Considering I had just given birth, this might be considered a bit much to ask, but it had to be done, because the placenta contained the baby’s wastes, and it would be unhealthy for that to flow back to the baby. Fortunately, since the labor had taken less than an hour I was able to move around without too much difficulty. I ran up and down stairs looking for anything that might work, peering into drawers, checking on shelves, using my imagination to conjure up an answer to the problem as I searched the entire house, along with Ben’s mother, who was staying with us to help. Ben was calling out potential solutions, suggesting clothespins and other items—but I knew there weren’t any clothespins in the house, because we had a clothes dryer even back then.

Suddenly, rummaging through a drawer, I found a roller clip, the kind that is shaped like a bobby pin, only with straight shafts. I ran back up the stairs to where Ben had the baby, and he clipped off the umbilical, gave a sigh of relief, and must have cleaned the baby up.

So what does Dr. Gunter say about Carson’s bizarre (and apparently impeccably caught) birthing methods?

We’ll it’s quite a dramatic story.

In my whole career as an OB (I spent 5 years in residency and 10 years delivering babies afterwards, so 15 years of obstetrics) I think I’ve seen the placenta come out immediately after the baby once. I asked another Ob with about the same amount of experience and she has seen the placenta come out with the baby about once (in the scenario you describe, sometimes terrible things can cause that to happen, but that is not what is described). So it’s possible that a baby and then the placenta could come out immediately afterwards, but you know, rare.

Why would a doctor make his immediately postpartum wife who is likely bleeding and sore run around for a cord clamp? Why wouldn’t he have her lay down or hold the baby and he, the surgeon, go look for the surgical instrument?

Great questions! And ones that we’ve sent to the Carson campaign with a request for comment. We’ll update if and when we hear back, but until then we recommend not following in the good doctor’s example—in situations medical or otherwise.

Contact the author at ashley@gawker.com. Art by Sam Woolley.