The 19-year-old mother of the baby abandoned in a shoe box in a Cospicua alley on Sunday, was waiting for nightfall to smuggle him to the nuns in Zabbar, family sources told The Times.
However, the young woman, who had kept her pregnancy hidden from family or friends, had her plans foiled when her 37-year-old mother discovered the shoe box in the washroom.
Mistaking it for refuse, she took the box to Guliermu Street, just round the corner from her house, where residents regularly place their rubbish for collection.
According to her, the young woman gave birth alone at her house on Sunday at 10.30 a.m.
She wrapped the baby boy in a beach towel and placed him inside a shoe box, before driving off to pick up her mother from Hamrun barely two hours later.
It emerged that despite the fact that her own mum was a single mother, she was extremely scared of letting down her uncles and aunts who had helped bring her up, so she kept her pregnancy a secret, putting on weight to hide the growing bulge.
The family was also in mourning after her grandmother, whom she lived with together with her mother, passed away three weeks ago, which made it even harder for her to speak up.
Her plan, the sources said, was to wait for an opportune moment to take her son to the nuns, so they could care for him as she decided which direction her life should take.
All this changed when her mother took the box outside and her son was discovered by three teenagers, turning a difficult social situation into a national issue.
The young mother, who was released from hospital on Wednesday afternoon, now wants her baby back after Appogg issued an interim care order, placing the boy in the custody of the state.
Lawyers Deborah Delceppo and Roberto Montalto filed an objection on behalf of the natural mother against the interim care order on Thursday.
The mother is yearning to hold the baby in her hands, but the family sources said she was distraught after she was refused access when she tried to visit him in hospital on Thursday.
"She cried so much, poor girl. We cannot understand why she is being prevented from seeing her son, not even under supervision," the sources said.
The woman, who has been advised not to speak to anybody, is also upset that her son is being temporarily called Ryan Mark, when she clearly had other plans.
When contacted about this situation, Joe Gerada, chief executive of the Foundation for Social Welfare Services, yesterday insisted the mother had every right to name the baby herself.
"It seems somebody gave the baby a name in passing. I suspect that one of the many professionals who dealt with the case referred to him as Ryan Mark and it somehow stuck," he said.
"I have made it a point to insist that the mother has every night to name the child herself.
"The name is a very personal thing and from our end we want to safeguard her rights."
He added that the mother was being very cooperative and she clearly wanted the baby back, contending "that here and now she is capable of caring for him".
When asked why the mother was forbidden from seeing her son, Mr Gerada said they were adopting a very cautious approach.
"We have already spoken to the mother to explain the entire process and highlighted our intention that she takes over the responsibility of her child as early as possibly," he said.
"However, in spite of the fact that we want to see mother and baby reunited, our concern remains with the child and we want to be rest assured that everything is ok before he is returned.
"At the end of the day, the fact that the baby was abandoned in the street is a very serious issue and we cannot dismiss this and rush into a solution we may eventually regret, just because the situation is suddenly improving.
"I'm sure the social workers explained to her (the mother) at hospital that it's in everybody's interest at this point in time that she doesn't see him," he said.
In the meantime, a foster family has been identified to take care of the baby until the court decides whether the baby will remain in the custody of the state or is returned to his mother.