story8727.xml

story8727.xml

born-digital

story

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2002-12-09

For our family, 9/11 is a day we will never forget, but for a completely different reason than the rest of the world. You see, 9/11 was the day we feared before it ever got here. It was the day our 9-month-old son, Colin Clouse, was scheduled for reconstructive open-heart surgery to correct a rare combination of Pentalogy of Fallot with pulmonary artresia and a common AV valve. There was no guarantee that when we handed him to the doctors at 8:30 EST that we would ever see him alive again.

While the rest of world was in their routine, ours was as rare of a day as we will ever experience. 15 minutes after we handed him to the doctors, the first plane hit the WTC. For the next 6 hours, while our son lay on an operating table on a heart-lung machine and a wonderful surgeon performing an incredible feat, we watched in horror as thousands of people lost their lives and their family's lives changed forever.

When it was all over, thousands who had started the day in routine fashion had their lives suddenly taken from them in a most horrible way. But for us, the son we did not expect to see again was handed back to us with a full repair and a chance to live a normal life.

We do not understand why so many innocent people lost their lives that day and why Colin was spared. We can only pray for the victims and hope that they were as prepared to meet God as we were to send our son to Him.