A pregnant Fayette County woman was trying to get to the hospital Wednesday morning, but the stork wouldn't wait.
Rebecca Johnson, 24, of Mill Run, gave birth to a 5-pound, 15-ounce baby boy in the parking lot at Highlands Hospital in Connellsville.
Johnson said she started having contractions at 7 a.m. yesterday and asked her mother and sister to drive her to The Uniontown Hospital.
They did their best, but the icy roads were treacherous and the going was slow.
"I was having contractions on the way to Uniontown, but I told them to pull into Highlands or I was going to have the baby in the car," Johnson said.
Johnson barely got out of the car when the moment arrived. She started to stand up when her son, Mason Matthew Parkinson, was born at 8:55 a.m.
"It happened so fast," Johnson said. "I didn't know what happened until he was in my pant leg."
Dr. Liana Bittner, an emergency room physician at Highlands, cut the umbilical cord while Johnson and Matthew were still in the parking lot.
Matthew was then rushed inside and placed in an incubator until an ambulance arrived to take him and his mother to Uniontown Hospital, which has a maternity unit.
Physicians there gave mother and son a clean bill of health.
"I'm feeling good," said Johnson, now a mother of four.
Larger text
Smaller text
Print this article
E-mail this article
