Maya Angelou famously told Oprah Winfrey: “You have no idea what your legacy will be. Your legacy is what you do every day. Your legacy is every life you’ve touched, every person whose life was either moved or not. It’s every person you’ve harmed or helped. That’s your legacy.” Angelou was right. But sometimes, life gives us a little peek, a nod, or a wink of the impact we’ve had on others.
One nurse and mother got this confirmation when one of the children she helped deliver grew up to play a significant role in her family’s life.
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Stacy Poll gave birth to a daughter 22 years ago.
Mary Ann West was the first person to touch Stacy’s daughter more than two decades ago. Mary Ann was a labor and delivery nurse at Lakeview Hospital in Bountiful, Utah, KSL.com reports. Little did she know that the girl she helped bring into the world would be her son’s future wife.
The families didn’t know each other beforehand and didn’t raise their children together over the years. That baby girl, Kelsey Poll, and the nurse’s son, Tyler West, would meet on their own.
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Kelsey and Tyler met decades later at the bank.
Kelsey and Tyler, who got married earlier this year, met at the bank where Kelsey was a teller. The two fell in love and eventually arranged for their parents to meet. During the sit-down, Mary Ann mentioned that she was a nurse at Lakeview in the summer of 2001.
Stacy said the revelation sparked a connection. “When Mary Ann said she worked at Lakeview, I really wondered if she was the nurse who delivered Kelsey,” Stacy said. “She looked familiar, but I wasn’t sure if it was her, or not.”
The two families learned of their connection by looking through old photos.
Later, when Tyler was looking through old photos at Stacy’s house, the connection was confirmed. “As he was looking through the pictures, I knew that there was one picture of the nurse inking Kelsey’s foot for the footprints. After a while, Tyler got to the first pages in the album, and there was that picture of the nurse, and I turned to him and said, ‘That looks like your mom. Is that your mom? I think that’s your mom.’ Then we looked at the certificate with the footprints and there was a signature. I asked Tyler if that was his mom’s handwriting, and he said that it was definitely his mom’s handwriting.”
Stacy says Mary Ann saved both hers and her daughter's lives.
The coincidence was a sign to Kelsey and Tyler that their marriage was “meant to be.” Stacy was also happy to be reunited with Mary Ann. She owed a lot to her. When Stacy gave birth to Kelsey, she had just had a child nine months prior. She was working full time and stressed about being a mother of three children under 3 years old.
“The nurse who was on duty said that it was going to be OK, and that she was a working mom of three kids. She said, ‘Hey, look, it’s going to be OK.’ She was very comforting, and I was so grateful for that,” she explained.
While Stacy was in labor, Mary Ann told Stacy about her own son, Tyler. But more than her encouraging words, she listened to Stacy. Her attentiveness likely saved both her and Kelsey’s life.
“When I was in labor, I told her that something didn’t feel right, so she checked me.” Stacy had a rare condition called velamentous cord insertion, marked by the insertion of the umbilical cord vessels in the amniotic sac instead of the placenta. The misplacement can cause blood loss for the mother and baby and is potentially fatal.
“It really has come full circle,” Stacy said. “When Kelsey was born, Mary Ann was the first one to say ‘welcome to the world.’ She touched Kelsey before I did. She put her on my stomach and let me see that she had 10 fingers and 10 toes.”
'She's been a gem through it all,' Stacy said about Mary Ann.
Stacy said she’s grateful for what Mary Ann did back then and who she is now. “She doesn’t know how worried I was from the get-go to have my third baby. I was not prepared for it. For her to come in and say, ‘You’ve got this, girl,’ and to hold my hand through it all … and now our kids are married. She’s been a gem through it all. For Kelsey to have both of her moms bond with her, is the most peaceful gift.”
