Mission’s Kayla Brown wasn’t sure she’d make it to the hospital to give birth to her son.
Without the help of first responders in Mission, Brown has no idea where they’d be right now.
“It was chaos,” Brown said.
In late March, Brown was struck by extreme pain and knew she’d have to get to Abbotsford Regional Hospital.
“When my pain threshold gets really high, I know that it’s really bad because I have a high tolerance for pain,” Brown said.
She arrived at the hospital but the doctor sent her home when contractions were between two and three minutes apart, Brown says.
“I was at home for about five hours and then right around midnight, I got a contraction that just wouldn’t stop,” she said.
Brown knew something was wrong and the delivery would be fast and painful. With her husband at work, she hopped in the bathtub and called 911.
“I was scared out of my mind,” Brown said.
Both Mission Fire Rescue Service and BC Emergency Health Services were there within two minutes.
She wasn’t able to stand when first responders arrived and standing also could have been dangerous. Firefighters carried her out of the bathtub, down the stairs and into the ambulance.
They also helped to calm both Brown and her two children, while maintaining her dignity.
“It was it was extremely scary for [my kids]. Seeing me in that kind of pain and the way I was screaming terrified them. One of the firefighters actually sat with my children and were talking to them about school and trying to keep their mind off of everything,” Brown said.
Over the last decade, Brown and her husband have been trying for another baby. However, the recent pregnancies have proved difficult for her. She has suffered five losses and two life-threatening haemorrhages.
Doctors told her the past troubles made it unlikely she would be able to get pregnant again with potential difficulties if she did.
“There was a discussion between me and my husband of not even continuing with the pregnancy because our last two losses became very dangerous,” Brown said.
The past losses made Brown’s second trip to Abbotsford Hospital that much more terrifying for her.
“It took me and my husband five losses in 10 years to have our son and at that point I was terrified. I was feeling like we would lose him,” she said.
After Brown got into the ambulance, they almost had to stop several times.
“We were not sure that we were going to make it,” Brown said. “I remember one of the paramedics continuously asking for a time estimation and saying we might have to pull over and deliver the baby because the baby was crowning.”
Brown had to try not to push, which she said was nearly impossible, but the paramedics reassured her.
“They were amazing. The pain was like nothing I ever felt,” Brown said.
Minutes after arriving at the hospital, Finlee Brown was born.
“The moment he arrived safely and was in my arms, a lot of the trauma from those losses — it’s like it just disappeared. They’re still in my heart, obviously, but the pain — that unruly pain that you just can’t get rid of — just kind of melted away,” she said.
She later thanked the firefighters because she saw complaints about the sirens waking the neighbourhood on social media.
“I wanted to reach out to them and make sure that they knew that I can’t make everybody else appreciate it, but I can at least tell them how much it meant that they protected us,” she said.
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