A chance encounter Wednesday morning resulted in Emily Brewer, an English Ph.D. student, having a baby named in her honor.
While Brewer and her son were waiting at the Abernethy Hall bus stop, a Spanish-speaking woman approached them, pointing to her pregnant friend.
The pregnant woman, Elizabeth Aguilar-Lopez, was squatting in the bus shelter. Brewer said when she recognized that Lopez’s water broke, she called 911 — without a moment to spare.
“She holds her pants open, and the baby just drops,” she said. “It appeared to me that she simply exhaled and the baby dropped out.”
Brewer said the whole experience lasted for about 10-12 minutes, which left her no time to be scared.
After the baby was born, a 911 operator walked Brewer through what to do until paramedics arrived.
She cleaned the afterbirth around the baby’s nose and mouth with Lopez’s scarf and tied a shoelace around the umbilical chord to stop the flow of blood.
“Throughout all of this, she was amazingly calm—no screaming, no tears, no horror,” Brewer said.
“It is every pregnant woman’s tremendous fear that when the baby starts to come you’re going to be unprepared — you’re going to be away from help. And for the woman to face that situation with such grace is a great testament to her.”
