I would like to nominate Melissa Glaze for a DAISY Award, related to her unwavering compassion and commitment to excellence in the field of bereavement and their families at IU Health. 

Melissa is the L&D shift coordinator/bereavement coordinator and for years has served to support moms and dads through their grief as well as supporting and guiding others on how to do this within our team and also at IU White, Frankfort, and Arnett’s ED, ASC, an OR.  

Melissa has been working collaboratively with Child Life at Arnett for several years to ensure we are doing the best we can, for these grieving families. Together with other L&D team members, every effort is made to create mementos for these families to have of their babies. Molds of hands, feet, mom and dad's fingers with baby’s hand, locks of hair, photos that are thoughtful and meaningful, etc. This as she would say, is all in a days work, we all do this ( on L&D), its what matters so much to our patients. However, what we don’t all do is provide this opportunity for mementos for children who have passed unexpectedly. Our Child Life Specialists do this, and we are so grateful for them.

Recently, though, one of the Child Life Specialists reached out to Mel to see if she could assist with a young teen who had perished in a house fire. Mel did not hesitate. She was given a time frame for when to expect to be allowed to do this per the coroner – a window of time that is often announced last minute – and very short. Mel worked when the expected time would be, so she immediately asked her peers to cover a few hours of shift so that she could assist and show support to this grief-stricken family. Though Melissa is our bereavement coordinator, her role is within L&D, specifically for babies. This was a very different scenario, with its own extremely unique heartstrings. Melissa was able to attend the coroner’s office with the Child Life Specialist, and together, they worked swiftly and respectfully to gather hand molds from this young girl so that they could present these to her heartbroken family as one small piece of acknowledgment and respect for the life they loved but lost.

This is not Melissa's job. It is an experience that will, without doubt, generate strong emotion, sadness, and heartbreak – even when you don’t know that person. There is a burden of grief upon nurses and child life specialists for the sorrow and loss they witness and wish others would not have to experience. This also happened just before Christmas. Anytime is the wrong time to experience the loss of a child. But I think we can all understand the impact of losing anyone around the Christmas holiday, which can impact people differently. It makes you hug your family a lot tighter on Christmas morning.

I just wanted to acknowledge that both the Child Life Specialist and Mel are outstanding humans, and I’m grateful for them. I want to recognize that this was just one (huge) example of Melissa's compassionate heart, dedication to her profession, and ongoing responsibility to care for and respect the lives of every patient, and doing more than expected in order to honor the life of a young girl.