Deborah Faye Cohen

1950 - 2022

Deborah Faye Cohen
November 10, 1950 - June 3, 2022
Resident of Oakland, CA
Deborah "Debbie" Cohen was born in Laconia, New Hampshire to Pauline Sherman and Richard Sherman. She spent her early childhood in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, before moving to Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1958. She graduated from Fort Lauderdale High School in 1968 and attended Broward Community College nursing school immediately following. Debbie started her career at Hollywood Memorial Hospital, where she worked as a Labor and Delivery registered nurse and taught Childbirth Education classes. There, she met her husband, Kenneth Cohen. They were married August 3, 1975, and had three daughters, Kimberly(1977), Lauren(1979), and Meredith(1984).
In 1985, the family moved to Riverside, California where Debbie worked as a Labor and Delivery nurse at Parkview Community Hospital for eighteen years. Debbie was a devoted mother and was very involved with her children's activities, including board positions for Riverside Children's Theatre, Temple Beth El Nursery school, and National Charity League.
In 2002, the family moved to Oakland, California where Debbie lived for twenty- two years. She worked as a Labor and Delivery nurse for Sutter Eden Medical Center for eighteen years, where she made many lifelong friends and was a well loved and respected nurse. She retired at the age of sixty-nine years old in March of 2020 following the Covid pandemic. She always joked that she would never retire. She loved her work as much as her patients and coworkers loved her and by the end of her career had helped to bring over ten thousand beautiful babies into this world.
Everyone who knows Debbie knows how much she loved her friends and family. She was a loyal and thoughtful friend, with a great sense of humor and kind and generous heart. She was the heart and anchor of the family, and her daughters and husband are truly blessed to have had such a warm, loving, and supportive mother and wife. Debbie was also known as "Gigi" to her greatest of joys, her granddaughters, Whitney, Hayden, and Blair. Everyone wanted a "Gigi" because she was the best at spoiling, listening, giving hugs, and being a constant presence in their everyday lives. In addition, Debbie loved traveling, reading, shopping, planning parties and events and had a soft spot for French Bulldogs.
To know Debbie was a gift. Everyone she had contact with felt her warmth, generous spirit, grace, humility, and strength. She leaves these qualities behind in her family, who will forever honor her legacy by living life as beautifully as Debbie did.
She is survived by her husband of almost forty-seven years, Kenneth Cohen; her daughters Kimberly Cohen Conway, Lauren Cohen, Meredith Cohen Bader; son-in laws Scott Conway and Travis Bader; granddaughters Whitney Conway, Hayden Conway, and Blair Bader; her sister Brenda Henz and brother Richard Sherman.
A Celebration of Life will be held in the upcoming months.


View the online memorial for Deborah Faye Cohen