We'll be okay.

We're struggling. I'll be honest. This last week and a half has been the hardest 10 days of our whole lives, and it is purely by the grace of God that we are still standing. I'm exhausted tonight, so it's probably better that I don't let my feels get going or we could be here all night, but I did want to post some pictures of the kids and tell you all that we are SO, SO grateful for you support, prayers, and encouragement. We continue to be blown away by the outpouring of love we've received. In addition to just missing him so much that my body literally aches, one of my greatest fears is that Oliver will be forgotten and that Amos, Mavis, and Lena will be denied a part of their identity as quads. He will always be a huge part of their story and of our family and to know that you all love him so much gives me hope that our precious baby will not be forgotten. The love you've shown us and the condolences you've offered have been so comforting and reassuring and we are so grateful.

Many of you have asked, and Nick and I are still working on a meaningful way to honor Oliver's life in the way of a memorial, but as soon as we nail it down, we will let you know. In the meantime, we plan to celebrate our beautiful boy with a graveside service for our immediate family this weekend. We have been working with Houser Millard Funeral Home and they have been nothing short of amazing. Oliver's obituary ran in the Jefferson City paper today, and you can read it here on the Millard website.

In other news, the other three babies are doing remarkably well for how teeny they are. Lena finally reached one pound today! We are so excited for her!! She continues to show us what a brave little fighter she is - the big babies (you know, the almost two pound ones!) do something one day and she does it the next. The doctors tell us it might be a while before she is able to do this or that, and she turns around and proves them wrong. She's such a feisty little thing. :) Really all three of them are. We are so very proud to be their mommy and daddy. Every day we look at each other and say, "these babies are ours. God gave them to us. How did we get so lucky?!" I won't bog you down with the medical details, but I'll hit the highlights - they are all three off the big ventilator and are getting their oxygen through a much smaller nasal cannula, they are all on at least a few milliliters of breast milk (I pump and then they get it through a feeding tube directly into their tiny bellies...they are no where close to nursing, but maybe someday!), and they've all opened their eyes! The biggest concern we have with all three of them is that their heart rates drop several times a day for a short period of time. They call them "brady events" and they are very typical for preemies. Their nurses and doctors assure us that as scary as it is to watch happen, it is very common for tiny babes, and they will eventually outgrow it. We completely trust these amazing, amazing humans who are caring for our babies, but given what Nick watched happen to Oliver, we are both incredibly nervous about them. Please pray for us that we don't freak out every time it happens or wear on our incredibly patient, kind, and compassionate medical team. More importantly, please pray that the babies would outgrow this soon. I weep every time it happens at this point, and I know it's the pain of losing Oliver that is still so fresh and raw that is contributing to my paranoia, but right now I just can't help it. And I'm okay with that. Healing will come. But in the meantime, it's terrifying.

So many of you have been so sweet to remember big brother these last 10 days, and we are so grateful. Jeremiah is doing as well as can be expected. He took the news of Oliver's passing about how we anticipated he would - he was sad and confused but also very matter of fact about it. He loves the other babies but really struggles to be in the NICU. The alarms and machines are just too much for him (they are almost too much for Nick and I too...it's constant. One of the babies is always being naughty and setting off their alarms so there is never a quiet moment in our little neck of the NICU woods.), and every time one of them has a machine dinging at us, he assumes another baby is going to die. It's been really hard to watch, but we continue to make him come visit once every few days for short periods of time because we know it's important for him to learn to trust that the babies are safe and in good hands.

So, I just realized how tired I am and this entire post may be completely incoherent, so I'd better sign off before I fall asleep on my keyboard!! :)  But, maybe you'll forgive me if I leave you with cute pictures of my teeny tiny baby humans?!?

Teeny Leeny

Mavey Baby

Famous Amos

And of course, a very proud, sweet, handsome big brother

Thank you for being patient with us as we adjust to our new life as a NICU family as well as plan a funeral for our baby. It's been completely overwhelming and all encompassing, but we know we'll settle into a routine eventually. In the meantime, thank you for loving us and our kids and continuing to be such faithful prayer warriors. We've got three itty bitty babies who still desperately need your prayers, a big brother who is trying to make sense of it all, and two parents who are grieving but filled with hope as we know that Oliver is safe in the hands of the One who made him and we will see him again. We still have four amazing children to raise on this side of heaven and we don't want to take one minute with them for granted. They are precious treasures to us.