we had to say goodbye to Raef this morning. we lost him at about 8:30 this morning to some sort of bacterial infection that overtook his tiny immune system very suddenly. this has all happened so quickly that i'm sure i'm not fully processing the situation. i know that my son is now with our Heavenly Father, but i don't think i comprehend that we can't see him tomorrow in the NICU.

we got a call at 7:00 this morning from Raef's neonatologist saying that around 5:00 AM, he suddenly didn't look like himself. he'd lost some of his color, was not as alert, and seemed to be in distress. she told us to come to the hospital. luckily, my very good friends Laura and Joe were staying with us, and they quickly got up and started driving us to Peoria. on the way to the hospital, we got two more calls. one from a nurse asking how quickly we could get there, and another from our doctor telling us that they were performing CPR on Raef, and that we needed to be there as soon as possible.

when we got to the hospital, Reid and i ran to the NICU, our doctor was walking in at the same time, crying, bringing us to the bedside. she was right. Raef didn't look like himself. he didn't look like the colorful, alert boy i left last night. they took him off of the ventilator, and put him in my arms where he took his last couple of breaths before leaving us. we both got to hold him for quite some time.

family and friends began arriving not long after he passed. we were able to take him into a room where we could be alone with him, away from the chaos of the NICU's beeps and alarms. we gave everyone a chance (or two) to hold him, to kiss him, to spend some time with him.

we took our own time after all of this to be with our son. we sat with him, prayed, cried, and told him how much we loved him. we told him how much he was loved by everyone in the NICU. we told him how many lives he's touched already and how he's changed our lives forever. we know that he's in God's hands now. 

Reid and i walked him back to his isolette, and laid him down to rest. his nurse put his footprints on his birth certificate for us, and gave us a memory box, and his belongings from the NICU.

we've been home now for a while, and everyone has left for the night. we're anxiously awaiting a call from Reid's parents who are coming from St. Louis so that we can see them. we don't know what to do next, we're not sure how we're feeling or how to go about our lives just yet, and we're very tired.

we thank everyone for their prayers of support, healing, and love for our precious son. we love you, and don't know where we'd be without you.