09/11/2026
September 11, 2001. 🇺🇸
I don’t think I will ever forget that morning.
Brandon was 20 and I was 21. I was in the hospital with our newborn son, Jacob, who had been born just the day before on September 10th. Our oldest son was six years old and at kindergarten, and our one-year-old was with a family member.
I remember Brandon calling me and telling me to turn on the TV. I turned it on and watched as the second plane hit the World Trade Center.
With the first plane, we didn’t really understand what was happening. We thought maybe it had been some horrible accident. But when that second plane hit, everything changed. We knew it was intentional.
I sat in that hospital room holding my newborn baby, watching something I could barely comprehend. The planes. The towers. The smoke. The people running through the streets. And the images that I will never forget—the people who were so desperate that they jumped from those buildings.
Meanwhile, Brandon was trying to get gas. Cars were lined up everywhere because people were scared there would be a shortage. Nobody knew what was coming next or if there would be another attack.
It was terrifying.
And for our little family, the months that followed became incredibly difficult too. Brandon lost his job because there simply wasn't enough work. Eventually, we lost our home. We had three very young children, including a brand-new baby, and suddenly our lives looked completely different.
It was one of the darkest times our family had ever experienced, while our entire country was grieving and trying to make sense of what had happened.
But there is something else I will always remember about the days after September 11th.
We came together.
People prayed. Churches filled. American flags were everywhere. Neighbors helped neighbors. For a little while, so many of the things that normally divided us didn't seem to matter.
We were Americans.
We were hurting together, praying together, and standing together as one nation under God.
Twenty-five years later, I can still picture that young 21-year-old mother sitting in a hospital room with her newborn baby, staring at that television and wondering what kind of world her children were going to grow up in.
Today, that newborn baby just celebrated his 25th birthday, and the memories of that day are still incredibly vivid.
So today I remember the nearly 3,000 lives that were taken, the families whose loved ones never came home, the first responders who ran toward danger while everyone else was trying to escape, and all those whose lives were forever changed.
And I pray that our country never forgets—not only what happened that day, but how we came together afterward.
We remember. We honor. We will never forget. 🇺🇸
September 11, 2001