5:55 a.m.

When you get woken up at 5:00 in the morning by the sound of your cellphone ringing, rarely is that a good thing. Either it's someone calling you from the other side of the world and completely forgetting about the time difference, or there's some sort of emergency.

This morning, I got the latter.

At about 5:55 this morning, I was fast asleep in my hotel room. I remember I was dreaming about something. I don't remember anything about my dream, but I do distinctly remember hearing the word, "cellphone" in my dream, at which point I woke up and heard my phone ringing.

I bolted out of bed immediately knowing that it was Linda. In my groggy state I had a hard time coordinating turning on the lights and finding my cellphone and all that I needed to do to connect with my wife. By the time the I got the light on, my phone had stopped ringing, which kind of sucked, cause I couldn't remember where I had put my phone.

After a few minutes of searching, I found my phone and as I had guessed, there was a missed call from Linda.

Fearing the worst, I called her back and when Linda got on the phone I knew right away something was up. And I don't know whether it's out of fear, or exhaustion or not wanting to shock me too badly, my wife didn't get to the point right away. It was like she was trying to break the news to me gently, but this morning, I just couldn't take it. I was like, "You woke me up at 5:00 in the morning, what's wrong, please just tell me!"

So she did. Apparently last night, around midnight, Linda went to get Alicia for a bath, she noticed Alicia's skin color was off, and that she was kind of stiff. So as per our hospital training, Linda picked Alicia up and started talking to her and calling her name. No response. So Linda called 119 (our emergency number) right away and got an ambulance to our house. While she was talking to the emergency personnel, at the same time she was working on reviving Alicia. After a few pats on the back some milk came out of Alicia's mouth and nose and thankfully she started breathing again and her color came back. As a precaution they still went to the hospital for the doctor to look Alicia over.

I'm a little hazy on the details since I wasn't there, but the doctors are guessing that some milk had gotten caught in Alicia's throat causing her to stop breathing. The doctor said that this happens sometimes to even full-term babies, so it has nothing to do with prematurity. They said that things look OK now and so they sent Linda and Alicia home. They told Linda to just make sure to keep a close watch on Alicia and make sure she doesn't have any fever over the next few days. A fever would be a sign of infection, which could mean that some milk has gotten into Alicia's lungs.

Anyway, things are OK now. Alicia and Linda are at home. It's just so hard for me to be away at a time like this. I just want to rush home and be with them, but I can't. Right now we're working on trying to see if someone can take my place on this job assignment I'm on, but we'll see.

My wife has been an amazing trouper this week taking care of Alicia on her own 24 hours a day. She did get a little help this week during the day, but for the most part it was just her. And it hasn't been easy. And then to add a trip to the emergency room as an icing on the cake, needless to say, my wife is ready for me to go home.

I'm thankful our friend Heather was able to go with Linda and Alicia to the hospital and just to be by my wife's side while I couldn't.

In case you've been following my story closely and noticed that there was a five-hour gap between the time the incident happened and when Linda called me, that's not a typo. My sweet darling wife, not wanting to wake me up waited until a "decent" hour to call me. I practically lost it on her. I'm like, "You call me! Who cares what time it is! 1:00 in the morning 2:00 in the morning, you wake me up for something like this."

She says, well, there's nothing you could have done. Sigh. Why is it that these things only happen when I'm away?

Last time I was on a trip like this and I got a phone call at 5:00 in the morning, it was Linda at the hospital telling me that she was having contractions.

Amazingly, I feel rather calm. I was sitting there after hanging up with Linda this morning, and my first thoughts weren't, "Oh, I hope Alicia's OK. I hope she's going to make it." My thoughts were, "How can I get home to my wife as soon as possible?" "Is there anyway we can get a replacement?" "What do we do?"

Anyway, God is good. Not sure why this happened at this time in this way. But God is in control. Please pray for Linda, she's exhausted and hasn't slept all night. And she doesn't want to sleep without anyone watching Alicia, in case Alicia has another episode. Thankfully, my aunt will come over soon and watch Alicia for awhile so Linda can sleep.

Later, Linda's going to take Alicia over to see our pediatrician just to get a checkup and make sure everything is all right.

Please pray for strength and renewed energy for my wife. And pray that God would get me home soon!