We arrived at the hospital early to visit Zach before his operation. He opened his eyes and smiled.

Karen cried. She trembled as I held her hand.

At 11:30 a.m. we made the longest walk of our lives; we left our newborn son in the third floor surgery at the University of Oklahoma Children's Hospital.

Once again, we were told "everything would be OK."

Surrounded by relatives and friends, we spent the next few hours in a waiting room just down the hall. Debbie, the bubbly, cheerful nurse assisting Dr. Marko Turina and Dr. Peter Pastuszko -- incredible surgeons with last names I still haven't figured out how to pronounce -- reassured us, even telling us that she, herself had the same surgery decades ago.

Debbie was a bright spot on an otherwise dark and gloomy day.

She doesn't know it, but I drew a great deal of strength from her during that time; her smile, her energy and her concern spilled over on all of us.

She kept us sane.

Before she took Zach, she promised to call us three times: when the surgery started, when they were about halfway through and once the surgery was over.

We left Zach in Debbie's care and sat numb in the surgery waiting room.

Time slowed to a crawl. Around me people made chit-chat and talked about everything but the reality of the situation. Finally, we gave up and went down to the first floor cafeteria to eat.

Debbie's first call came just as we started our meal.

"We've started and everything is going fine. Zach didn't even cry when he was prepped," she said.

I watched the tears roll down Karen's face. Neither of us wanted to imagine what was happening at that exact moment.

By the time we'd returned to the waiting room, Debbie called again -- the doctors were more than halfway through, she said. Again, she told us things were going well.