Raquel M. Stokes was an even-keeled coworker and friend, but she had a spark that people noticed. When she smiled, her colleagues would joke that she showed all 32 teeth in her joy. Stokes, a community health worker at Buffalo Prenatal Perinatal Network since 2022, passed out magnets every year printed with the Buffalo Bills game schedule, so her colleagues could stay updated on the team and her beloved Josh Allen.
Luz M. Feliciano worked at BPPN for about eight years and was a lead community health worker. She loved the work and the organization that had once helped her when she was pregnant. Even after she was diagnosed with breast cancer, colleagues said Feliciano always put her clients first. If she was in pain and didn’t feel well, she still fought to help pregnant women and families as best as she could.
It has been a difficult few months for the nonprofit BPPN, which calls the corner of Washington and East Tupper streets home.
Stokes, 41, died unexpectedly June 22 due to what colleagues say was an underlying medical condition. Feliciano, 48, died Aug. 1 after a battle with cancer.
“We are broken, and we are still here to do our job to the best of our ability,” said Mykia Gibson, a community health worker coordinator/supervisor who has been with BPPN for almost a decade. “To have an agency where it’s mostly women and for us to be as close-knit as we are, that’s a blessing, because women are women and for us to be such a sisterhood and rally behind each other through everything.”
BPPN, which focuses on improving maternal and infant health outcomes for high-need women and their families, employs more than 50 people, 20% of whom are former clients who are intimately familiar with the organization’s importance.
In the Community Health Worker Program, where Stokes and Feliciano worked, a team of around 14 employees helps clients navigate and access the services they need, acting as a complete case management service. Those on the tight-knit Community Health Worker Program team get to know each other personally. They know when a colleague walks in and is having an off day. They miss each other on vacation, and they feel as though they’re raising their kids together.
Each community health worker has a caseload in the program of about 25 clients, helping them to access health care, transportation and offering nutrition, breastfeeding and empowerment support groups clients can join.
For supervisors, as they grieved the loss of two workers, they also had to call Stokes’ and Feliciano’s clients, informing families that the person who they had built a relationship with and trusted would no longer be able to help them.
“As a supervisor, you have to carry that weight,” Gibson said. “I still have to stand strong, and there’s just no space to just really grieve in a situation like this.”
A memorable last day
The day before Stokes died, she had spent much of the day with her BPPN colleagues.
It started with another coworker’s bridal shower that had a “tea party” theme. Colleagues loved the pink dress Stokes wore to the event.
After the bridal shower, the group departed and rested before getting back together later that night at a restaurant.
“All of us really spent our own time with her the whole day,” said Danielle Girst, a lead community health worker who has been at BPPN for two years.
The group took their last photo with Stokes around 1 a.m. June 22. Stokes stood in the middle of the group, looking radiant. The group figured they would have a lot of memories to discuss and laugh about Monday morning when they returned to work.
The next day after the party, Girst was startled awake by a Facebook message from Stokes’ son, who told Girst that his mom had died. It felt like a dream, and Girst instantly hopped up and called Stokes’ son to confirm the news before she hurried out of the house.
Girst began contacting her coworkers to share the news. Gibson was at Six Flags Darien Lake to celebrate her daughter’s birthday, but left when she heard the news.
“Everybody in that moment stopped what they were doing,” Gibson said. “We needed to be together.”
At the funeral service June 27 in Buffalo, the church was packed with family and friends wearing pink – just like Stokes did at the tea party.
Buffalo Prenatal-Perinatal Network, a nonprofit that focuses on improving maternal and infant health outcomes for high-need women and their families, has found success in hiring former program clients.
‘I love my job’
The community health workers were able to find some peace knowing they spent considerable time with Stokes in her last day.
But that has been more difficult with Feliciano.
While colleagues knew Feliciano was battling cancer, they saw her continue to fight through to serve clients. Even when Feliciano struggled when she felt she wasn’t as strong as before, her colleagues saw only her perseverance and strength. They felt like they rode the wave with her as she fought cancer.
“Here, we never are alone, even in the storm, even when you’re going through stuff, we’re never alone here,” Gibson said. “You don’t have to do it alone. The clients don’t have to do it. So why should we?”
They said Feliciano had recently taken a trip to Puerto Rico, but she was in the office for the last time by mid-July. Colleagues now say they regret not being able to say more to her in her final days in the office, but the end happened so fast and unexpectedly.
“That was heartbreaking, because we all wanted to say our final goodbyes,” said Chevelle Wiggins, a supervisor who has been at BPPN for six years.
They will remember Feliciano as a selfless person who fought endlessly.
In an interview with The Buffalo News in October 2024, Feliciano recalled that BPPN showed up at her house in the agency’s aggressive efforts to recruit her and get another Spanish speaker on staff.
“They hunted me down,” Feliciano said, laughing.
Feliciano said she often worked with Hispanic clients and attended appointments with them, helping to ease the language barrier with providers.
Feliciano, who was pregnant with her first baby at 15, told The News that she used her own experiences to help the clients, calling it a “good feeling” to see the clients progress in their lives and get to where they need to go.
“I love my job,” she said. “I love helping the clients.”
‘What we need right now’
At the annual BPPN retreat at Beaver Hollow in late August, things felt different, but the gathering was needed.
Inside the conference center, Wiggins recalled there being empty tables, because many of the workers gravitated to one table, scooting over and pulling up extra chairs so they could all be together. It was a place to let loose and not be judged.
The Buffalo Prenatal Perinatal Network’s presentation focused less on the new digs and more on its referral-based programming and outreach. The agency’s mission revolves around trained case workers visiting the homes of expecting mothers and sharing resources.
“I feel like we needed it,” said Shayra Rivera, a two-year community health worker, “because we’ve been showing up to work, and we have to be strong. We didn’t literally have a time to let it all go.”
There are difficult moments. Sometimes each step at work feels heavy, filled with agony. It still feels like two puzzle pieces are missing from the Community Health Worker Program, friends and coworkers say.
“This is real-life trauma, like two siblings leaving you – one unexpectedly and one that fought and you didn’t get to say goodbye,” Gibson said.
When she arrives at work, Gibson says she finds herself checking to make sure she sees all of her colleague’s vehicles and that her coworkers are OK.
The reminders of Stokes and Feliciano are all around. In the parking lot, they smile at a mural painted in memory of Stokes.
With the Bills season underway, the team can picture Stokes with her Bills jersey, Bills purse and wearing her Bills socks. Meanwhile, October is breast cancer awareness month, and BPPN goes all out for Halloween – Feliciano’s favorite holiday.
January will be tough, too: Feliciano’s birthday was Jan. 6, while Stokes’ birthday was Jan. 13.
The workers are still grieving and processing and likely will be for some time, if not the rest of their lives. But they’ll have each other.
“I think that our presence with each other is what we need right now,” Wiggins said.
Jon Harris can be reached at 716-849-3482 or jharris@buffnews.com. Follow him on X at @ByJon
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