SAVANNAH, Ga. (WSAV) — For parents Kristina and Henry Brower, the date of Sept. 19, 2019, will always be one to remember.
It was the day they welcomed their third child and first daughter, Katherine, into the world at Candler Hospital.
A new addition to the family would be enough to fill any parents’ hearts with joy. However, there was something extra special about baby Katherine’s arrival.
“She came at 39 weeks,” Katherine’s mother, Kristina, told News 3.
The baby’s original due date was Sept. 25, but Kristina says she normally goes into labor early.
She’s also the mother of 4-year-old Jackson and 2-year-old Tristan.
“I had a doctor’s appointment that day, so I went in and I told my doctor what was going on, and she said, ‘You’re going to have a baby today!’,” Kristina said.
Katherine’s birth certificate and birth announcement both state that she was born on Sept. 19, 2019, at 9:19 p.m. — and she measured at 19-and-a-half inches.
“They handed her to me, and I looked at the clock, then I looked at [my husband Henry] and I said, ‘Can you believe it’s 9:19 on 9/19?’,” Kristina told News 3.
“We had joked about it earlier with the nurse we’d had before, and we were like, ‘Yeah, that could never happen, that would be too crazy’,” Kristina said.
“And, lo and behold, it happened!”
Henry called his daughter’s unique birth date, time and length “amazing.”
“It’s something you don’t see every day,” Henry said. “It’s something you see on the news or you read about in the paper, and [for it] to actually happen to us is pretty cool.”
Kristina’s OB/GYN, Melanie Helmken MD, FACOG, had been with her for her previous two pregnancies, as well.
Helmken told News 3 that in addition to a history of early labor, Kristina had experienced rapid labor with her previous two children.
“But [this labor] just kind of dragged out through the day,” Helmken said.
“We tried to get things going, and nothing happened until then, and I didn’t even realize that it was the time until after delivery happened.”
Helmken, who pointed out that 9/19/19 and 9:19 are both palindromes, said it’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the Brower family.
“To have that be a special birthday, that’s really incredible,” she said.
At home, baby Katherine has been a big hit with her two older brothers. Jackson, Kristina said, even cried in the car on the way to the hospital.
“They are so overjoyed, and they love her so much already,” she said.
As for the significance of the numbers nine or 19, the couple says before that special day, the numbers didn’t hold any special meaning.
That has certainly changed.
“I guess it’s Katherine’s lucky number, so, we’ll go with that!” Kristina said.
