My husband and I recently lost our first child after he was born prematurely. He spent 25 hours in the NICU where he was mainly taken care of by a nurse named Garrett. Garrett was with us the most during our time in the NICU and was with us when our baby passed. Our entire experience with Garrett was the best we could’ve asked for. This loss has been the hardest thing my husband and I have had to go through, and Garrett truly made the biggest difference and impact in our lives. He made the experience very calm and peaceful. He was respectful, informative, patient, caring, and very understanding. He explained everything to us very clearly and left us with no questions. Knowing our son was in Garrett’s care gave us a great deal of peace. It is not easy to leave your child in the care of others, but Garrett made all our worries go away. He took extra time to make sure the three of us were always comfortable and taken care of. He never left the NICU without letting us know. Every time he handled our baby he was very careful and always took his time. He made sure that no one was let into our room without our permission and that they only stayed as long as we wanted them to.

Right before our baby’s passing, Garrett gave us time to change our baby’s diaper and touch him out of his isolette. Being able to do these things made a huge impact on us because before this we hadn’t been able to care for our baby in a normal way. After our baby passed, Garrett spent hours making sure that we had everything we wanted with our baby. He made foot and handprints for us and gave us as many keepsakes as he could think of. We were given as much time as we needed with our baby before saying our final goodbyes. During this time, Garrett made sure we were comfortable and left alone so we could have this time for ourselves. He made it known to us that our baby had made an impact on his life. He told us he would never forget us and our baby, saying that we were amazing parents and had done everything right. Hearing these things brought us an extreme amount of peace and a bit of positivity in this time of grief.

Garrett made our experience in the NICU the best it could have possibly been. We will never forget everything Garrett did for us, and the impact he had on our lives. We will forever be grateful for the experience he gave us, and we truly believe that he is more than qualified for this award!