Nurse Holly Erickson was the ICU nurse with whom we had the most contact after my better half, W, had emergency surgery to repair an aortic dissection in late February. She was HUGELY important to his recovery. Her professionalism as a nurse was outstanding: she didn’t just make notes of W’s readings, she noticed when he was in afib and got medicine for him right away to address it.  She also saw that he had a lot of edema in his extremities and she massaged his hands and arms – and showed me how to massage his hands and arms – to reduce the swelling.  She encouraged W to walk and saw right away when he had an orthostatic BP drop -- and Nurse Holly was right there to catch him and help him sit down so he didn’t fall.  And she was an absolute wizard at removing W’s chest tubes without causing him any discomfort.  She was also kind enough to show us the pre-op scan of W’s dissection and teach us how to understand what we were looking at, which made us appreciate even more how lucky we were that the doctor and the entire surgical team got out of bed at 3 in the morning to save W’s life. But in addition to Nurse Holly’s exceptional medical and nursing skills, what made her even more special to us was how she encouraged W (and me) about his recovery. She helped us believe that, if he would do his part to get up and get moving (carefully), he could recover fully and get his normal life back. One day in particular after several days in the ICU, she saw that his spirits were flagging and she declared she was taking us on a “field trip!” With the help of another aide (I’m sorry I don’t remember the young woman’s name), she bundled W into a wheelchair and took us outside to the Prayer Garden. I cannot describe the wonderful impact that just being outside, breathing fresh air, and feeling the sun on his face had for W. It was better than any drug. We were only outside a few minutes, but W returned to his room with uplifted spirits and re-committed to his recovery. We are very blessed to have known Nurse Holly at such a critical and frightening time in our lives. I think NGHS-Gainesville is lucky to have her on its health team, and every patient she cares for is lucky to know her. I have a wonderful picture of Nurse Holly, W, and me in front of the sign in the NGPG Cardiovascular & Thoracic Surgery waiting room that says, “There will be miracles” That picture says it all, and we are very grateful that Nurse Holly was part of our miracle.