Simple Kisses to a Tiny Head. We had a long pregnancy rupturing at 18 weeks with an 80% chance our son "O" would be born that week and not survive. So we held on to the 20% chance. Then we endured bedrest until 31 weeks; the first 6 weeks at home and then 7 weeks in the hospital. O was born that week. We were told 18 weeks is a big week for lung development which was right when the rupture happened and O was left with just barely enough amniotic fluid. So there was a chance his lungs may not work when he was born. Once he was born his lungs were in really bad shape but they worked enough to be able to hook him up to machines to assist his breathing. After being put on the jet and nitric and almost having a chest tube placed Tammy came into our lives around the second week of his life if not a few days shy of that timeline. At this point, we were terrified to even touch our own child for fear we would make things worse. We told Tammy we had barely had a chance to touch him and definitely hadn’t kissed him. Tammy looked at us with so much fierce compassion and determination, that she said that we’re changing that right now. She educated and empowered us to know that we would not be hurting our son or his development. That in fact we would be helping him by making sure he is shown love and that we are here with him. Once she made sure we felt comfortable and that O was safe, she opened his isolette for us to give him a kiss on the head each and a hand hug between our hands. That’s the moment we were allowed to fall in love with our son. We had been unable to feel anything but stress and worry, knowing we loved our son but not being able to really do anything about it, in that moment we felt he was truly ours. Tammy gave us so much hope and love in the simple action of letting us kiss our son for the first time. From that day on she taught us how to care for our child and was there empowering us every step of the way. Then a few days later we were able to hold him for the first time. He was still intubated but once again with her guidance and supervision, we were able to give him the love and care he needed. O responded in amazing ways with this new form of treatment; the love of his parents. Tammy was able to turn down the oxygen percentage he needed every time we held him because of how well he responded to that. It was still a long 101-day journey but O was able to come home with no oxygen support and two parents feeling totally empowered with the knowledge taught from the best nurse we could have ever had. We truly feel that her being our primary leading the way was the reason we were so successful in our NICU journey. We knew the nurses would always take care of O from a clinical standpoint but we could never have anticipated how Tammy would take care of all of us as a family. We believe that without her our experience, O's progression, and our emotional/mental well-being would not have been so immensely successful. With simple kisses to a tiny head, Tammy gave us the hope we needed to keep going and gave us the ability to give O the love he needed to grow. We will never be able to thank her enough.