Amber and Kim have many things in common. They’re best friends, they met as registered nurses in the Emergency Department at Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center, and their husbands are firefighters.
They were pregnant together — and now their children share the same birthday. Amber brought her son Liam into the world at Sharp Chula Vista, and Kim delivered her son Carson just hours before at Sharp Mary Birch Hospital for Women & Newborns.
“I had told Amber over the last year and a half that someday we would be pregnant at the same time,” explains Kim. “So when our news came, my husband Chase and I decided to tell Amber and her husband, Dan, that we were pregnant during a camping trip we all went on together. To our surprise, Amber and Dan had planned on telling us they were pregnant during this trip, too!”
The nurses have been friends since 2014, when they met through their husbands. Kim has been with Sharp HealthCare since 2014 while Amber has been a Sharp nurse since 2010.
“I’ve known I wanted to be a nurse since I was 8 years old,” Amber says. “Working in the Emergency Department requires you to always be prepared for the unknown and ready to help others when they need it most. Our work can be trying, but I always wanted to help people, and it makes it that much more fulfilling doing so with my best friend at my side.”
“Amber helped me get my first job as a nurse,” says Kim. “We’ve gone through so much since then. I was a bridesmaid in her wedding, we work really long shifts together, and now we’re having babies together.”
Both women have shared that their friendship and meeting each other was fate — as though they were meant to meet each other — and emphasize the importance of a support system both at and away from work.
The two moms are currently enjoying maternity leave with their families, and get in touch with each other for play dates as often as they can before returning to work. They’ve even given each boy playful nicknames: Liam is “Bear” and Carson is “Squirrel.”
“It was such a fun experience having Kim there with me to go through all the ups and downs of pregnancy, and now, motherhood,” says Amber. “After all that we went through together, it seems like all was meant to be this way. I believe that everything happens for a reason — these boys and their story of arrival into this world was definitely meant to be.”
Updated in January 2020: Amber and Kim both now work for Sharp Rees-Stealy Urgent Care.
