Author: Nathaniel Reutter

If you haven’t read the previous article about Anna, I recommend reading that first.
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First of all, thank you so much for all your thoughts, prayers and little notes of encouragement. Whether they arrive on our blog, on facebook or by email, we are reading each one and God is greatly using them to comfort us. I never in my life imagined having to live through a day like yesterday, let alone go on living in the aftermath afterwards. We are parents without a child here on earth, and a big hole has been left in our hearts. Some of you know exactly what it feels like.

Since none of you will ever get a chance to meet Anna Rebecca outside heaven, I wanted to share with you some of the highlights from yesterday. And I wanted to share some photos with you, so you can see beautiful Anna Rebecca. I also wanted to share with you how we are experiencing God’s grace in the deepest ways. Also, it’s a chance for me to talk about the daughter I’m so proud of, who I never met alive outside of Ruth’s womb.

It’s with a very heavy heart that I tell you that Anna Rebecca Reutter skipped life on earth and went straight to heaven this morning around 8:00 (7 AM Eastern). We took Ruth into the hospital last night around 2 AM. She was having constant contractions. Everything looked good, Anna’s heart was beating well and everything was set. When Ruth never dilated, they decided it would be best to do a C-section, and so around 8:00 AM the performed the C-section.

Right before the procedure, everything looked good with Anna, in fact there were never any alarms with Anna. But when they brought her out, her lungs were full of fluid and her heart had stopped. I wasn’t in the operation room, by my mother-in-law Becky (a nurse) was in there, and said the amniotic fluid was thick and dark- as if the baby had had a bowel movement in the womb. The doctors worked diligently to try to save her, and we prayed and prayed and prayed and prayed for precious little Anna, but God had other plans, and decided Anna’s presence was needed in heaven.

I was able to hold her afterwards- and she was absolutely beautiful. I can’t describe all the emotions in me right now. I told her several times she was beautiful, I love her, and that I’m really looking forward to heaven even more now, for yet another great reason: to see her.

Ruth’s doing as well as can be expected. We’ve already had tons of visitors and praise God that my parents and Ruth’s parents are here. We can literally feel all the prayers going to heaven on our behalf, and now more than ever we covet all your prayers for us, our mourning, Ruth’s recovery, etc. I have absolute peace in God over this, but this is the biggest whole ever left in my heart. I know God is good and I will never stop declaring his glory or praising Him, no matter what happens in life, because He is our loving Father who gave us his only son Jesus that we might not suffer an eternal death, but enjoy His wonderful loving presence forever and ever. Thank you so much for your loving support.