A garbage man's act of kindness helps the bride to regain her family heirloom from trash

Heirlooms and beloved family possessions are special memories and kinship substances that help us stay connected to our family heritage and close ones. To lose one can be heart-wrenching. Brittany Thompson, a bride from Cape Coral in Florida, lost her only heirloom on the night of her wedding reception. When Thompson realized the bracelet on her wrist was missing, she started panicking. All her friends and family soon came to assist her and tried to help her recall every moment of the wedding reception night.

The bracelet belonged to her late grandmother—whom she never had a chance to meet—and was passed on to her as a family heirloom. Thompson's father, whom she just met two years ago through Ancestry.com, gifted her his mother's blue sapphire bracelet as something blue. "I was completely losing my mind," admitted the new bride, reports NBC2 News.

Thompson was wearing the bracelet for her wedding, which took place the day before she discovered it was missing. She called the wedding venue the next morning to check if they had received a bracelet from the event's premises. Thompson and her husband, together went to the venue, hoping to collect the lost bracelet but to their dismay, they had already cleaned the premises and emptied all the trash cans. But to their luck, the waste management workers were just leaving the premise. "As soon as we arrived, the garbage man had already dumped it into his truck," Thompson said. Her husband went to the truck, knocked on the door, and spoke to the driver. Thompson said the driver's name was Jeff.

Jeff then called his supervisor for permission to dig through the trash dump. Once he got the permission, he called the newlywed couple. "For him to do that — it’s not a shock for anybody that knows him," said Bill Jones, Divisional Vice President for Waste Pro. "Jeff did the right thing."

However, after digging through the trash for quite some time, Thompson almost claimed her defeat. But it was then that she found a ray of hope rising from the heap of trash. Thompson's eyes stuck on the hay sticking out of the trash. The hay was part of the wedding photo background, which was set in the venue premise. “And as I kept pulling stuff out of that bag, sure enough in one of the handfuls, there was the bracelet,” shared Thompson.

Thompson was extremely thankful to Waste Pro for helping and allowing them to search the trash piles. "I was like, ‘oh my goodness,’ I just freaked out and stuff and was like, ‘Can I give you a hug?" she said. Waste Pro was happy and proud to be a part of her story about this special discovery. "Our employees are from the communities that they serve and they all enjoy helping," said Jones.