This year, I was nominated, chosen and nationally honored for the work I do. The Thank You Nurses campaign was created by Pampers and AWHONN to honor three nurses for making babies’ lives better. I am one of the three. During the campaign, nominations came in from across America for Labor and Delivery nurses, Nursery and NICU nurses, and for Nurse Midwives.

During the several month process, I was nominated, voted on, interviewed, filmed and voted on again. It was a surprise to be nominated. It was thrilling to be declared a winner. It was humbling to be honored in this way. The love and support that I received from all of you during this journey was overwhelming. Thank YOU!

This week, in the mail, I received a beautiful, engraved crystal award. This award was to be presented to me at the annual AWHONN convention June 15th. While I received an incredibly generous travel package from AWHONN to attend the convention, I was unable to go: I had clients scheduled long before the award was announced. Fittingly, I was catching babies in NY on both June 14th, and 16th on either side of the Closing Ceremony in Grapevine, Texas.

Many times in this whole process, I have stopped and worked to let the honor settle, to let myself feel the weight and bigness of this whole thing. Frankly, I only really ‘get it’ for a brief moment and then I move on to my next project. There is a lot to do! Good midwifery care doesn’t just happen by itself. Midwives, women, babies and communities all work together to create a better, a healthy world. It is a lot of work. Heck, we ALL deserve an award!

The short video made to honor my work can be seen here:

Michelle
May all babies be born into loving hands