Berniece Bernabe is nine months pregnant. Hurricane Ida flooded her apartment last week with sewage and water flowing from her toilet. Her husband Jared was getting ready for work on the night shift as an NYPD officer when the water came rushing in.

"He tried to open the door and the moment he opened the door, all the water came in and it's all black," she said.

The couple says within 20 minutes, the floodwater rose from their ankles to above their waists. They came back the next day to survey the damage. Bernabe says her first stop was her baby’s bedroom.

"The moment he opened it, all I see is muddy baby clothes. All I did was cry," she said. 

Bernabe says seeing everything destroyed in a matter of minutes was devastating.

"It's heartbreaking. This is insane. I prepared for it. All I'm thinking about is what's gonna happen to the stuff I've been preparing for seven months?"

The warm home they built in a rental to welcome Elijah into the world is gone to them now. So they decided to turn to an Instagram account geared to supporting Filipino Americans in Queens.

Someone they didn’t know set up an GoFundMe account and in one week raised more than $6,000. With that money, they’ve been able to find a new apartment and rebuild some of what they lost.

"We want the best for him because we waited for a long time," she said. "Without all of everyone's help, we wouldn’t have been able to get the furniture, the new mattress, everything."

The Bernabes have been hard at work creating a new bedroom for baby Elijah. And because of the storm and the generosity of strangers, they’ve been able to create a more secure space for their future son.

"Now we're so happy because we were so heartbroken and now, all of a sudden after two days, we find a better place, we made sure it's no longer basement."