Stephanie was one of our primary nurses for the AM shift when our other primary nurse went on vacation and recommended her. Before we decided to add her as a primary, she came in and introduced herself, and just her bright attitude and happy demeanor really put us at ease, and we said ok right away to have her added to our list of primary nurses for our daughter in the NICU, who was born at 28 weeks.

Not only did we bond with Stephanie, our daughter, at 30-something weeks, but we also bonded with her as well by giving her the stink eye and also smiling when our daughter teased Stephanie. For example, when our original nurse came back from her vacation, Stephanie went on vacation and when she came back, Stephanie came to visit our baby to say hi. Our baby gave her the funniest stink eye as if to tell Stephanie, “thanks for ditching me to go to Hawaii”. There were also times when we would talk to my daughter, and Stephanie would say something, and our daughter would smile or smirk at the right time to let us know she understood what Stephanie was saying. These moments are what we cherished the most as we were seeing how our daughter was becoming more of a full term baby than a preemie in the NICU.

Back to the recognition, Stephanie would provide us with information based on her experience to make us feel at ease. She was very knowledgeable and would be patient with our every question and every request. When we didn’t understand something, she would research our baby’s medical history to explain the situation. It came to a point where we were able to compare stories of our kids and the bond she had with our baby in the NICU. I appreciate all that Stephanie has done for us and for our baby.