TTHENAAGO/NAHANNI BUTTE - Brooklyn Cazon-Martineau likes doing all the activities other three-year-old girls also enjoy.

Brooklyn Cazon-Martineau, right, sitting with her mother Leanna Cazon, is recovering from what is expected to be her final surgery to correct damage caused by burns that happened when she was 10 months old. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photo

She loves to colour, watch cartoons and take her dolls with her everywhere. Although she’s a picture of normality now, Cazon-Martineau’s path to this point was anything but usual.

On Jan. 5, 2009, Leanna Cazon of Fort Simpson was boiling water in an electric kettle for her 10-month-old daughter Brooklyn’s bottle. When the kettle, sitting on a countertop, started boiling, it tipped over. The water spilled over the counter and splashed onto Brooklyn, who happened to be sitting below it.

Brooklyn suffered burns ranging from first to third degree on 22 per cent of her body including her face, neck, arm, shoulder and back on the right side of her body. She was medevaced to the burn unit at the University of Alberta Hospital in Edmonton.

Doctors told Cazon Brooklyn is lucky to be alive. It’s unusual for a baby that young to survive such extensive burns, she said.

"She’s come a long ways," said Cazon.

Brooklyn has undergone three surgeries to deal with the effects of the burns. She had two skin grafts to her right shoulder, which suffered the most severe burns, soon after the accident.

More recently, Brooklyn returned to the University of Alberta Hospital on June 7 for a surgery to reduce the scarring on her face and neck that was raised and red.

During a three-and-a-half hour procedure, doctors removed the tissue that formed a Y-shape behind and in front of her ear and under her jawline. She now only has a small line of scarring left.

"It looks much better," said Cazon.

Throughout Brooklyn’s healing, Cazon said she and her family have felt the support of the community.

Immediately after the accident in 2008, members of Liidlii Kue First Nation came together to create the Baby Brooklyn Fund. Approximately $9,150 was donated to the fund.

Community support

The money was used to support Cazon and her family during the month Brooklyn spent in the hospital. Among other things, it paid for plane tickets to allow Cazon’s mother Jane Cazon to be with her and for hotels and meals for the family.

"It means a lot to have the support from the community. I’m glad that I live in such a small community that we can help each other out," she said. "When something happens everybody knows and everybody wants to help."

The community also assisted the family during the recent surgery. Cazon wrote to Liidlii Kue First Nation asking for support to bring her common-law partner and Brooklyn’s father, Jeremiah Martineau with them to Edmonton.

The First Nation responded by purchasing Martineau’s plane ticket using the Community Cultural Fund.

Cazon said she was glad to have Martineau with her for emotional support. Martineau carried Brooklyn in to be put under anesthetic before the surgery because Cazon was too emotional.

When the couple saw their daughter three and a half hours later in the recovery room she was propped up on a bed with a large bandage around her head, eating a Popsicle.

"She looked normal except for the big bandage," said Cazon.

Doctors have told Cazon that Brooklyn won’t need any more surgeries.

Her scars don’t impair her mobility and she doesn’t seem to mind them, Cazon said.

"She’s amazingly tough," said Cazon.

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