Tracey Turnage

Tracey Lee Turnage, 62, passed peacefully from this world to her heavenly home December 13, 2025, suddenly after a brief illness.

Tracey was born August 26, 1963, in Wichita, Kansas. She was adopted in 1967, at the age of four years old to Loren and Cherry Turnage. Her parents were foreign missionaries and were living in Bogota, Columbia when they brought her home. She stayed in Colombia until 1971. Tracey lived and travelled all over the world including; Tulsa, Oklahoma, Phoenix, Arizona, Scotland, and Tehran, Iran. She attended Tehran American School, International School of Aberdeen, Harrison Chilhowee Baptist Academy, where she graduated high school in 1980.

Tracey moved to Greensboro, North Carolina where she attended Guilford Technical Community college. She graduated in 1995, with an associates degree, as a Registered Nurse. In 1999, she and her three daughters, moved to Norman, Oklahoma. She accepted a Director of Nursing position where her grandmother resided, so she could care for her, and to be closer to her parents who had retired in Norman. She mostly worked in geriatrics, but also found her passion when working as a psychiatric nurse for many years.

Tracey was deeply passionate about working with elderly and those struggling with mental health, both of which require significant empathy and compassion. Aside from nursing, she always loved cooking, baking, making all holidays incredibly special, the family getting together, gardening, and could revive any plant back to life, she truly had a green thumb! She also had a lifelong love of dancing and music, especially any chance to hear live music!

A profound moment in Tracey's spiritual life came when she was baptized in the Jordan River in Israel, an experience she often described as deeply meaningful and transformative. Guided through her faith, she also believed in the inherent dignity of every person and lived out that belief through compassion, inclusion, and respect for all.

Tracey is preceded in death by both her parents.

She leaves behind her daughters; Alicia Whitehead, Angela Cooper and husband Spencer Cooper, Amber Davis and husband Jason Davis, grandchildren; Caleb Clark, Abigail Swallow, Ava Meek, Amelia Davis, Nolan Davis, and Layne Cooper, brothers: John Turnage, David Turnage and Mark Turnage.