"I was on the phone with somebody from New York trying to fix a server and they said they had to leave because a plane hit (the World Trade Center)," Huffman said, adding the client worked in a nearby building.
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The moment led her to re-evaluate her 25-year career in the computer industry.
"When 9/11 happened, I felt so helpless. So I pursued my dream. I became an EMT with Clayton EMS, and from there I applied to nursing school as an expensive midlife crisis. And I became an emergency room nurse. I wouldn't change a thing. I love it," said Huffman.
She is now an ER nurse with Duke Raleigh, responding to another emergency situation: the COVID-19 pandemic.
"I have been coordinating people coming in the door, getting them registered, and getting them ready to get the vaccine," said Huffman.
Huffman received the COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday, and is not feeling any side effects. She's aware that it will take several months until there is enough vaccine to distribute to the general public.
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"Wear your mask, wash your hands, use hand sanitizer, keep doing what we're doing. And don't go out in large groups without a mask on," Huffman said.
She believes the ER is busier now than at the peak this summer, an observation also shared by WakeMed Hospitals President and CEO Donald Gintzig during a roundtable Thursday morning.
Like in the immediate aftermath to the September 11t attacks, Huffman is hopeful that people will pitch in and aid each other now, when there are record-setting case numbers, hospitalizations, and deaths in several states including North Carolina.
"I've never experienced anything like this. I don't think any of us really have. 9/11 was in 2001, and a lot of people have kind of forgotten that we (came) together as a nation to just help each other," Huffman said.
On Friday, NCDHHS reported there were 8,444 new COVID-19 cases in the state, eclipsing the previous record, set a week ago, by about 900 cases.