But not 19-year-old Sam Thomas. In the last weeks of her pregnancy, she became so terrified the British authorities were planning to take away her baby, she fled 262 miles from her Somerset home to Wexford in Ireland, where 7lb 5oz Ellie-Jay was born on September 30.

"She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life. She makes everything I've gone through worth it," says Sam.

Her troubles began at the age of 11, when she says she was sexually abused. A harrowing court case followed, but charges were dropped due to lack of evidence.

"I went off the rails after that," she admits. "I was being bullied at school and I began self-harming, cutting myself with razor blades and bits of glass. It sounds mad, but it seemed to take my pain away."

From then on, Sam's life went into freefall. "I was drinking, staying out all night and cruising around the town in cars with local lads. When I was 14, I fell pregnant, but miscarried weeks later," she says.

"Dad had left when I was a baby and Mum tried to cope on her own, but I was a handful. No matter what she said or did, I ignored her. I knew I was causing her pain, but I didn't care."

Sam was so out of control that her mum Carol, then an IT worker for the MoD, made the agonising decision to put her into care, terrified that her daughter would end up in serious trouble.

"I hated her for what she did, but I can see now that she was right," Sam says.

In care, the teenager received counselling. "Talking about my past made me realise why I'd been acting badly," she recalls. "I'd been hurt so much by the abuse and bullying. I took dangerous risks because it helped me block out the horrible things that had happened. But the counsellor helped me see I couldn't carry on like that because I was only hurting myself."

The real turning point came in 2004 when Sam was 15. Carol remarried and moved from their home in Gwent to Ilchester, 50 miles away.

"It made me realise how much Mum meant to me, and what I had put her through. I vowed to turn over a new leaf so we could be a family again, and six months later, I moved in with her and my stepdad."

Life calmed down for Sam, until she discovered she was pregnant this January. Although she soon split from the father, she was delighted to have conceived.

"When I was 16 I was told I had a blood-clotting problem that might make it hard for me to get pregnant," she says. "I knew this baby was a blessing. There was never any doubt that I would go through with the pregnancy. I'd settled down and was ready for the responsibility."

But her troubled past came back to haunt her when she was 29 weeks pregnant. Somerset Social Services wrote to Sam to say that they believed her relationship with her mum remained strained and she was still leading a chaotic lifestyle.

More worryingly, Sam claims the letter mentioned a child protection order – a legal move that allows social services to take a baby away and even have it adopted if they feel it's at risk.

"My legs buckled and I crumpled to the floor in tears," says Sam.

"Mum called social services to reassure them I wasn't back to my old ways and that we were now very close. When she asked what the child protection order was about, she was told it was a typing error. It didn't seem to make any sense."

But Sam's fears grew a week later when another letter arrived.

"It said I wouldn't be able to leave the hospital with my baby until social services had been notified," says Sam. "I thought they were going to take the baby away and declare me an unfit mother because of my past. I felt that no matter what I said, they would never trust me to be a good mum."

Sam and Carol had read about another young mum in similar circumstances. Former self-harmer Fran Lyons hit the headlines last year after fleeing her home to have her baby because social workers had said the child would be taken away minutes after birth.

After weeks of worrying, Carol contacted the MP who had helped Fran. He said their fears were justified, and advised Sam to head for Ireland, where it's harder for the authorities to remove children from their parents' care. So with her mother's help, Sam, then seven months pregnant, began frantically packing.

"I had to help her," says Carol, 45. "I felt it was my fault she was forced to go on the run. If I hadn't put Sam into care, she wouldn't be in this mess."

The pair drove under cover of darkness to catch the ferry to Ireland.

"I was paranoid we would be stopped," says Sam. "Even as we boarded the ferry, I worried that someone would make us go back. Just before the boat set off, my mum took my hand and asked: ‘Are you sure you want to do this?' But I was adamant."

Even when they arrived in Ireland without incident, Sam couldn't relax.

"There was so much to sort out – I knew no one and had nowhere to live," she explains. "Mum stayed a few days and settled me into a B&B. She didn't want to leave, but I insisted because I didn't want her to lose her job."

So Carol went home, promising to return for the baby's birth. Luckily for Sam, Irish social services backed her 100 per cent and told UK social services they had no concerns over her baby's welfare. They even found her a two-bedroom house to rent.

"It was a relief to know that someone believed I could be a good mother. But I was desperately lonely," says Sam.

Six weeks later, Sam give birth to baby Ellie-Jay at the Coombe Hospital in Dublin. Carol, who has split from her husband, has now quit her job and joined Sam in Ireland, where they will stay until they feel it's safe to return home.

Somerset County Council told Fabulous: "The initial letter we sent Sam did not refer to any child protection concerns we may have had. Child protection was mentioned as part of a checklist, but we did not tick the box to denote it a cause for concern.

"In hindsight, we have decided that this format is not user-friendly and we have changed our paperwork to ensure no one else can be confused by this.

"We feel that, in her anxiety, Sam did not understand there is a very long way between referral to a social worker and the separation of mother and baby by the courts. In Sam's case we are a million miles from adoption."

But Sam says she is still too scared to go home. "I'm worried that social services don't believe I've changed and will find a reason to take Ellie-Jay away from me," she says.

"I might have been a danger to myself when I was 15, but I haven't drunk or harmed myself for years. And I intend to look after Ellie-Jay properly – when she's a bit older, I'll look for a part-time job to support us. I'm a mum now and I'm going to keep my child safe."

Mums on the run

Last November, heavily pregnant Fran Lyons, 22, fled her home in Northumberland for a secret location in Europe. Four months earlier, social workers had warned that Fran's baby would be taken from her immediately after birth. Fran had a history of self-harming and eating disorders when she was 15, which resulted in her spending 13 months in a psychiatric hospital.

She gave birth to her daughter in January and still remains in hiding, even though social workers have now reversed their decision.

Did Sam do the right thing in running away? Do you think it was right for Sam to fear the worst or was she just paranoid? What impression does running away give to the authorities? Should social services change the way they handle cases like Sam’s?

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