When you imagine the birth of your first child you don’t expect your baby girl to come 10 weeks early. You don’t expect to leave the hospital without your baby. You don’t expect for her to spend the first 30 days of life in the NICU. You don’t expect for her to spend even more time in the special care nursery. You expect to bring home your baby girl in the outfit you planned to take the announcement photos as planned and leave the hospital with her.

Instead, we were left with our 2lb baby in the hospital not being able to wear clothes and only being able to touch her during care times. With our family living in Maine, my husband and I relied on each other for support during these unknown times. It’s times like this when you look for support from the nurses who are spending more time with your baby than you.

We will never forget the night Tracey was put on to be our baby's nurse. Her vibrant energy and positive attitude shined a light on us during our darkest time. Her laughter and compassion toward our child will never be forgotten, my husband celebrated his birthday in the NICU, and we were thrilled when we saw Tracey take the time to teach us how to care for our child and took many family pictures for my husband’s birthday that we will forever cherish.

A couple of days later we walked into our child’s room and I instantly began smiling from ear to ear when I saw a picture collage that Tracey made for us with pictures she took of our child from the night before. The genuine compassion Tracey had was above and beyond.

I’m not sure if Tracey realized the tremendous impact she made on our family's lives but we will forever be grateful to her and will never forget the memories she gave us. Tracey was the light we needed in what seemed like our darkest times.