Our amazing story comes full circle

Isabelle was born at Winter Park Hospital, which is about 1.5 miles from our house. We had originally thought that it would be at the Winne Palmer Hospital in downtown Orlando. Coming to Winter Park Hospital was very emotional for us as this was where we were last June when we lost our son in the 18th week due to an amniotic membrane rupture.

During our stay we were treated by Elaine, who performed the delivery. Elaine is one of the nurse's in the labor and delivery unit. She specializes in high risk deliveries. We were both looking forward to seeing her and as luck would have it, she was on duty today. It is not possible to properly describe our feelings for the care that she showed to us during what was a devastating loss to us both. Even after the procedure, she shared in the experience with us. She was a part of our mourning and set the first wheels in motion for our healing when she referred us to the H.E.A.L (Helping to Endure InfAnt Loss) group.

This morning, one of the nurses brought her into the nursery where we sitting with Isabelle. She immediately recognized us, and after doing some quick math realized that something was not quite right. Here we were not even 6 months down the road holding a new baby. After a few seconds she realized what was going on and her eyes teared up just bit when she recognized that we were adoptive parents. The experience was made all that more special when she told us that she was the nurse assigned to Isabelle's delivery and was one of the first to welcome her into the world.

Elaine told Karen later that we had made her year. She will never know how much she has made our lives. Having watched her work and act so compassionately with us during our loss, there is no more fitting a realization that she ultimately did bring our daughter into the world.

We will never forget our first meeting with her, but we will always treasure this last one.