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When oncology nurse Tricia Seaman ‘s patient learned that her cancer had spread and she only had months to live, Seaman did her best to console her.

But that afternoon in March 2014, Trish Somers didn’t want to be consoled. The 45-year-old single mom’s life revolved around her then-8-year-old son Wesley. So she sat in her bed at UPMC Community Osteopathic Hospital in Harrisburg, PA, looked at the nurse whom she’d only met three weeks earlier, and pleaded, “I want you to take care of my son when I die.”

Seaman and her husband Dan fulfilled the request from a dying woman, who became family and forever changed their lives.

In honor of Thanksgiving, when we express our feelings of thankfulness, we are thrilled to name Tricia Seaman as our Nurse of the Week.

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Tricia Seaman and husband Dan, and children and son in law. Wesley is third from right. October 2020. Photo credit: Reflective Light by Nicole

The Seamans took Somers into their home, where she spent the final months of her life before dying in December 2014 from a rare vascular cancer — known as epithelioid hemangioendothelioma. Then added Wesley to their family, which already included four kids.

“It just became very clear, very fast that this is what we were meant to do,” Seaman recalls in PEOPLE. “We all just clicked. We just fell in love with them.”

Six years after Wesley began living with the family, the Seamans formally adopted him in July 2020.

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“I can’t even begin to describe how lucky and blessed I am,” says Wesley. “I’m grateful every day that they made the decision to take us in.”

Seaman says Wesley is growing up and moving on. “I’m just incredibly proud of him and eternally blessed to be a small part of his journey — and it’s something I’ll honor until I draw my last breath.”

Nominate a Nurse of the Week! Every Wednesday, DailyNurse.com features a nurse making a difference in the lives of their patients, students, and colleagues. We encourage you to nominate a nurse who has impacted your life as the next Nurse of the Week, and we’ll feature them online and in our weekly newsletter.

Renee Hewitt
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