ResortHatch

Brianna is too humble to say it, so we’ll say it for her: This is a great time to be her. She’s still riding the wave of babymoon bliss that recently swept her up, up and away at Sandals Dunn’s River.

“I’m at 100 percent peace,” she keeps saying. The babymoon gave her a fresh outlook on being a mother. Oh, did we mention Brianna also came home a fiancée? 

“We went to Jamaica to relax,” says Brianna’s future husband, Deivid, “but in the back of my mind, I wanted to take an engagement ring and make the trip bigger.”

He succeeded. But let’s go back to how this blissful wave actually began, ironically, with Brianna making a proposal of her own to Deivid: “What do you think about getting away to the Caribbean, just the two of us, for a babymoon?”

“A babymoon,” Deivid said. “What’s a babymoon?”

It would be a clean break from a year that’s been in a perpetual spin cycle. Moving into a new place. Getting up to speed with new jobs. Organizing a nursery and preparing for the unknowns of parenthood.

“Once our son joins us, everything will change again,” Brianna told Deivid. “Before that happens, I need a moment to slow down.”

It took Deivid two seconds to wisely tell Brianna exactly what she hoped to hear: “Whatever you want.”

Specifically, this is what she wanted: To leave Miami and be in Jamaica 105 minutes later. To listen to the ocean lulling her to sleep at night and see it waking her up in the morning. To decompress on the beach and detox in Red Lane Spa. To enjoy gourmet meals just by showing up at one of 12 restaurants. She wanted no checklist and not a single responsibility.

A little pampering might be nice, too, because that always makes mothers happy.

“Yes, you need this,” Deivid said while secretly thinking of the babymoon as an opportunity to do something he’d been wanting to do for a long time, too.

No Thinking Required

It just so happens that Deivid had been mentally scrolling for the best way to propose to Brianna. He considered surprising her at the gender reveal or on a rooftop restaurant. None of the ideas were quite special enough.

Then the babymoon came up.

“We’d be on a tropical island with beaches and gardens,” Deivid says. “Brianna would be so free of concerns that she wouldn’t suspect anything. That’s hard to pull off because she’s always thinking.”

He had known this about Brianna since they met in high school, where their close friendship grew into a relationship.

“I was an athletic trainer when he was on the football team,” she says. “I’d tape his ankles and keep the coldest bottle of water next to me so he could have it.”

One character trait stood out to her.

“I saw how Deivid treated women,” she says. “He was always sweet to his mother, grandmother, and sister. That’s how I knew he’s the one.”

The Moon Landing

Once Deivid agreed to the babymoon, Brianna had to confront the questions pregnant women often ask themselves. Is it a good idea to travel? What about transfers, food, and the general stress of travel? Should we really do this?

When she researched destinations, only one gave her any sense of relief.

“Most places just put the word ‘babymoon’ on a general vacation. Sandals has an actual babymoon package. They promised to take care of everything from airport arrival to departure, which put my mind at ease.”

Deivid thought it sounded too easy to be true until the plane landed in Jamaica. A driver waited with a genuine smile and cold drinks. When they walked into the lobby at Sandals Dunn’s River, a team member handed them a list of babymoon oohs and aahs. A candlelight dinner. A couples massage. A baby bump photo shoot.

“There were little extras we didn’t expect, too,” Brianna says.

They’d come back to their suite and see fruit platters and mozzarella sticks. They’d find handwritten notes (“We’re so glad you’re home”) next to giant cookies frosted like éclairs.

“Oh, my goodness, the pregnancy pillow,” Brianna says. “I have one at home, but I loved the pregnancy pillow at Sandals.”

Deivid loved it, too. For him, the Babymoon turned into a Daddymoon. When Brianna ate breakfast in bed, so did he. Snacks for her were snacks for him. Turns out the pregnancy pillow was long enough for both of them to use. 

“And he had his first massage ever,” Brianna says.

A day into the babymoon, two thoughts occupied Deivid: “We should have more kids” and “There will never be a better time or place to ask her to marry me.”

This is All Real

For Brianna, any suspicions that arose back home when Deivid would not allow her to pack his bags (he tucked the ring into his carry-on) evaporated in the Caribbean breeze. She remained chill even when a Sandals team member asked if they were newlyweds.

“We aren’t married,” Deivid said, knowing he was going to propose three hours later.

“Like Beyoncé said,” the team member responded, “If you like it, put a ring on it.”

While Deivid mumbled, “Shhh!” Brianna didn’t give it a second thought.

“I was in that babymoon bliss mode,” she says.

An hour before their garden photo shoot, Deivid took his nervous pacing to the photo studio for some advice.

“Don’t worry,” the photographer assured. “I’ll give you a signal when it’s time to get down on your knee. You don’t have to think about it.”

People who see photos of the proposal are awed at the colors. Nothing, however, compares to Brianna’s awe when she saw Deivid looking up at her from his knee.

“At first, I thought, ‘This is fake, right?’” Brianna says.

She looked closer at the sparkling diamond. It’s real.

She looked at Deivid’s face. Those are not fake tears.

From that point on, the babymoon and Daddymoon pleasures took on the added thrill of a pre-wedding honeymoon. A weight had been lifted from Deivid’s shoulders. A commitment had been placed on Brianna’s finger. The positive vibes hang with them to this day.

“I feel like I’m still in a different world,” Brianna says. “I went to Sandals as a girlfriend and came back a fiancée. Our nerves about parenting have shifted to enthusiasm. It turns out we really did need that trip. And now we’re ready to enjoy the three of us.”