A serious health scare with a happy ending has compelled a local couple to pay their good fortune back through their Clearwater business, one senior’s lunch at a time.
Hannah and Dean Clifford, owners of Higher Grounds Coffee Shop and Juice Bar, had a baby girl in April. What should have been a joyous day was instead a terrifying affair. Saoírse, their third daughter, almost didn’t make it.
“She was born all tied up in her umbilical cord,” Hannah said. “She had severe hypoxia because she didn’t breathe. Nobody expected her to live and definitely not live without any brain damage.”
That Saoírse survived and is now healthy and without any brain damage is an outcome the Cliffords call “miraculous.”
The family had spent a month in B.C. Children’s Hospital following Saoírse’s birth.
“They did amazing things,” Hannah said. “They let us stay in the room with her. We definitely got to know a lot of the staff and the doctors and to see what they do there. And these people, they are so skilled and they give so much care.”
“We were just so blown away by the level of service that we got, the level of care that our daughter got,” added Dean.
The couple was so inspired by the health care professionals at the Children’s Hospital, they decided to give back. Not for a day, but for a year.
In partnership with Clearwater Valley Resort, Higher Grounds is holding a year-long fundraiser for the B.C. Children’s Hospital Foundation. Every Sunday for the next year is Senior Sundays at the café, where seniors 65 and older can enjoy coffee or lunch by donation to the foundation. On top of that, 50 per cent of all sales from patrons of all ages each Sunday will be donated to the foundation.
The fundraiser started in the first week of November, and Dean said by that time next year, they hope to have raised upwards of $10,000.
The Cliffords don’t get any say in how the funds will be used by the foundation, but they hope some of the money will go towards the workers at the hospital who are dedicated to providing the best care to children like Saoírse.
“They get overworked and underpaid like everybody else,” Dean said.
Originally the Cliffords had intended to do a fundraiser for an incubator at Clearwater’s Dr. Helmcken Memorial Hospital, as that hospital didn’t have one when Saoírse needed one in the middle of the night. But happily, the ladies at the Clearwater Curiosity Thrift Shoppe beat them to it.
“They got enough money together to buy an incubator for the hospital. So now twice a week, we make sure we send down free sandwiches and free coffees for all the people that work at the secondhand store who donate their time,” Dean said.
Higher Grounds is located at 373 Clearwater Valley Rd.