'Go Riders!': Sask. family shares 75 years of green & white pride
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Ethel "Nana" Mongovius' family has been cheering for the Saskatchewan Roughriders for decades.
The community is coming together to support a Saskatchewan family grieving the loss of a mother who died giving birth to her second child.
Mark Burnett, 32, and his wife Megan, 33, went to the Nipawin Hospital to welcome a new baby girl on Friday, Sept. 23.
Everything was going fine until Megan started having complications. Mark was rushed out of the delivery room.
Megan passed away that evening leaving behind her husband, daughter Brynlee and the newborn baby girl, Autumn Desiree, she didn’t get a chance to meet.
Autumn was airlifted to the Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, where she is now fighting for her life according to family friend Daniel Kasun.
“It’s day by day with the baby, but she’s doing well. By no means is she out of the woods yet…but she’s progressing. In terms of a prognosis, I don’t have one,” he said.
Mark changed the baby’s name from Autumn Rose to Autumn Desiree, to commemorate his wife’s middle name.
Family and friends have rallied together to support the family. Friend Jamie Angus set up a Go Fund Me page on Sunday.
So far, they’ve raised close to $65,000.
“We kind of put it up expecting support from immediate family and friends and it really took off. It’s been amazing to see,” said Angus. “Mark is so grateful, he feels so supported.”
Mark and Megan are both from North Battleford and started dating over 10 years ago. They were married in 2011 and had their first daughter in 2013.
Mark has been a member of the RCMP for eight years and had been recently transferred to Nipawan after being stationed in Loon Lake and Melfort.
The friends know the Go Fund Me page will bring some support to the grieving family.
“As you can imagine, they’re going through the process as best as possible. From my perspective [Mark’s] doing well considering everything. With the grieving he needs to go through with the passing of his wife and the hope with this baby who is in the neonatal intensive care unit, it’s a roller coaster for him,” Kasun said.