About

Airiel Zaire hughes

1 in 9 babies is born premature. Each year 13 million babies start out life far different from their parent’s birth plan. Countless families deal with the emotional roller coaster of watching a child in the fight of their life for days, weeks, or months in a hospital. We are not the only family to deal with prematurity, but we certainly understand and empathize with every family that has been affected.

Airiel Zaire Hughes was delivered on Saturday, August 22nd at 1:40 pm after 25 weeks gestation weighing 1lb 11oz. Although it was preferred she continue baking in the maternal oven for 3 more months God had other plans. With her grand entrance secured, so began our journey!

Airiel lived in Arkansas Children’s Hospital for nine long months before she was able to make the trip home. During that nine months we saw good days and we saw not so good days, but God kept us every step of the way. We met families, nurses, physicians, and other hospital staff that became a part of our family. Without all of those people and the family and friends that came from near and far to visit us during Airiel’s hospital stay the journey would have been a lot harder. Airiel came home in May 2016 and we settled into our new normal. She began to hit her development milestones and really thrive and even start daycare. We were so excited with her progress and even more excited that we were on track to get her trach out before she turned 4. On March 27, 2019 Airiel passed away unexpectedly and our lives were forever changed as we lost our baby girl and the only sense of normalcy that we had over the 3.5 years we were blessed to share with her. 1,275 is the number of days that Airiel lived and was able to impact others through her strength, resilience, grace, and beauty.

Our little miracle was a fighter from the day she was born until the day she departed this world. Her spirit will live on and we will continue to advocate for her, other kids like her who were born too early, kids with trachs, and youth who’ve overcome adversities in life and persevere to achieve success just like Airiel did.