She’d sit quietly with it in her hands, tracing the outlines of the nurse’s face, the way those arms held her with such care. She imagined the warmth of that embrace, the soft voice that must have soothed her, the kind eyes that looked at her without flinching or turning away.
She spoke to that woman sometimes, like a child talks to an imaginary friend.
Over the years, those photos became more than a relic from a hospital stay. They were a lifeline—a quiet reminder that once, in one of her most vulnerable moments, someone had held her like she mattered.
As she grew older, Amanda began to wonder who that nurse really was.
What was her name? Did she remember that day? Did she know the baby she held had grown up, survived, and carried her image like a shield through some of the hardest years of her life?
For two decades, Amanda tried to find her.
She reached out, asked questions, tried to trace records. But hospital staff changed, records got archived, memories faded. Every lead fizzled out. It was like searching for a ghost in a city of strangers.
Still, she kept the photo.
In 2015, she sat down at her computer, scanned the photos, and posted them on Facebook with a simple plea.
She explained her story—the accident, the burns, the bullying, the comfort she found in that unknown nurse’s face. And she ended with a request that was both hopeful and fragile:
“I would love to know her name and possibly get a chance to talk to her and meet her. Please share, as you never know who it could reach.”
She hit “Post.”
And then the world did what it sometimes miraculously does: it listened.
Her story began to spread. Friends shared it, then strangers. The image of the young nurse and the bandaged baby traveled far beyond Amanda’s circle, crossing states and time zones. Comments poured in—messages of support, empathy, and curiosity.
By the next day, the thing she had dreamed of for almost her entire life began to materialize.
She had worked as a nurse at Albany Medical Center in 1977. The photo tugged at something in her memory, and after a moment of searching her mind, recognition clicked.
She didn’t know the baby. But she knew the nurse.
She contacted Amanda with the name she’d been waiting decades to hear: Susan Berger.
Susan had been only 21 years old at the time of that photo, fresh out of college, just starting her nursing career. Like Amanda, she, too, had never forgotten that baby.
She had also saved the photos.
When reporters later asked Susan if she remembered that day, her answer came easily.
“I remember her,” she said. “She was very peaceful. Usually when babies come out of surgery they’re sleeping or crying. She was just so
