Good Samaritan gives first-class plane seat to mother and her sick baby
A mother is encouraging people to pay it forward, after she was travelling with her 11-month-old daughter, and was left blown away by a kind act from a passenger on her flight.
Kelsey Rae Zwick, from Florida, and her daughter Lucy, boarded an American Airlines Flight from Orlando to Philadelphia on Thursday, where Lucy receives treatment for chronic lung disease at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
“Lucy is the happiest baby. She doesn’t cry, but she’s yelling and yakking away. I’m already like, ‘I used to fly for work a lot — oh man, I’m that person. Hopefully, she’s good,'” Kelsey told Yahoo Lifestyle.
But it was the kindness of a stranger in first class that changed Kelsey’s day. A flight attendant came over and told her that a man sitting in seat 2D wanted to switch places with her.
“We pre-boarded, so I didn’t see him,” Kelsey says.
“At first, it just kind of took a second because I was like, why do I need to switch seats? Then I realised what was happening, and I was so overwhelmed. It wasn’t just the seat; it was the culmination of everything we’ve been through the past two years.”
The past two years have been quite a journey for Kelsey, her husband, and their twin daughters Lucy and Eva. The girls were born at 29 weeks, and Eva weighed just 2 pounds, 5 ounces at birth, while Lucy was 2 pounds, 14 ounces.
“When Lucy came out, she was blue and she wasn’t breathing,” Kelsey says. “We almost lost her on the second day. We never knew if I’d get to take her home.”
Lucy had to be intubated, and the ventilation kept her alive that first week. But because intubation is so hard on the lungs, it left severe scarring that caused the chronic lung disease, which Lucy receives treatment for every three months.
”Eva spent 86 days in the NICU, and Lucy spent 100. They have chronic lung disease, and Lucy’s is considered severe. Her and her sister came home on oxygen 100 percent, so we had two alarms, two oxygen tanks; 50-foot cords everywhere,” Kelsey explains.
“They came home in April. Eva came off [oxygen] shortly after, and Lucy, because she was so sick, had other complications. Because her lungs were so bad, everything was harder for her. She was on oxygen and not really improving.”
It wasn’t until Lucy began treatment at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia that things really turned around.
“They have a whole program for this,” says Kelsey.
“The first time we went in September, she was still [on] 100 percent on oxygen; all day, all night. They checked her out, and within two weeks after seeing them, she came off a couple hours a day. Three months after seeing them, she’s off during the day completely. She’s on at night or if she flies, because of the pressure.”
Their new seat up front allowed extra room for Kelsey and Lucy, who has to travel with a large oxygen tank. And according to Kelsey, Lucy loved her introduction to first class.
“We did have extra room. Lucy enjoyed the cheese plate and the little luxuries,” she added, laughing. “Flying first class before her first birthday!”
After the flight landed, Kelsey tried to catch the good Samaritan at the gate, to no avail. It was only after she posted the story on Facebook that someone reached out to man in 2D, and Kelsey was put in touch with him.
“It was the best day,” Kelsey says. “He said it made him and his wife cry, and he said, ‘I am so glad we were on the same flight.’”
It’s that generosity that truly overwhelmed Kelsey, especially after the struggle of the last few years.
“Just trying to get pregnant, and it was just — you’re always doing stuff for your girls, of course; but I see you, I notice you, I can do this for you — let me do something kind for you,” she says of the man’s act of kindness.
“He’s thanking me for something that I’m thanking him for! There’s always good people in the world, and that’s why I felt compelled to share.”
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