Not the post I ever wanted to make...

Disclaimer: I'm writing this on my phone and in a really poor mental state. Please excuse any errors. And please forgive me if my thoughts are scattered. I am not myself.

This blog is, at its heart, about family. Family is something you're born into, something you create, and/or something you forge. You might have a nuclear family, an extended family, a chosen family, or any other definition. I'm fortunate enough to have all of it. But this is primarily about my nuclear family; my husband and my children. Let me tell you about the last two weeks and the changes those weeks had on my family.

Zach and I left to spend a week in Monterey on the 21st. We flew out, spent the afternoon learning a bit about the area, and enjoying the day. And then things got busy. We spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday in classes and panels, with evening events on Tuesday and Wednesday. We met some awesome new friends in our language cohort. Thursday I ducked out early because I had some errands to run and then I wanted plenty of time to get ready for the evening's business formal event.

It was 3 pm Pacific time and I was in the shower when my daughter, Emma called me and told me that my oldest daughter, Hannah, had been in a bad car accident. I won't detail the torturous next few hours, I will simply say that Zach and I fought to change flights from Saturday to Friday, and then spent Friday struggling to stay sane while we made it back to North Carolina as quickly as we could.

We got home at 6 pm Eastern on Friday and went straight to the hospital at UNC. We spent the next four days holding Hannah's hand, caring her, and trying to learn how to say goodbye.

Hannah and her boyfriend had been t-boned going home from dinner at my house. Hannah's head hit (and almost went through) the window in her door. She wasn't wearing her seat belt, and that would have prevented most of the facial and torso injuries, but it wouldn't have stopped the traumatic brain injury. And that's what killed her.

The doctors tell me that the damage to her brain stem was catastrophic, immediate, and irreversible. She would never wake up. She would never recover. Even before we flew home, we approved a DNR order because if she crashed, the damage to her ribcage meant that lifesaving efforts would have likely killed her anyway. They say it happened so quickly she didn't feel any pain, and it was unlikely her brain even had time to process an accident was happening. So she likely wouldn't have been afraid. Silver linings in the ebony abyss of my grief, I suppose.

Hannah stopped trying to breathe independently of the ventilator Friday morning. The next three and a half days were excruciating, and I won't get into every detail here on how we spent that time, other than to say we fought alongside the medical team in the SICU to make sure she would be a viable organ donor, something that happens for less than a half of a percent of the population.

On the night of Tuesday the 30th of January, 2024, at 9:15 pm, the medical team lined the halls to pay homage to my beautiful girl on her honor walk to the OR, where she would pass away and then undergo surgery to donate her organs, eyes, and tissues to recipients and to medical research.

Zach and I were allowed in the OR with her while we waited for her heart to stop. We thought it would be quick, because she had had no brain activity for days. But she kept on beating for about 15 minutes. I squeezed her fingertips the whole time and I felt her pulse slowly fade and stop. At 11:05 pm, my brave, crazy, infuriating, beautiful, incredible girl crossed the rainbow bridge.

She's been gone for five days as I write this. We had a flood of friends and family come in to celebrate her life with us yesterday. It was a hard day, but a good one, because I got to see and hear proof of how many people loved my baby.

She didn't really think she was loveable. She didn't see the impact she had on so many people. She never understood what a wretched hole her absence would tear into our lives.

I had the horrible experience of hearing over the phone that she had been in a wreck, that she wouldn't recover, that she wouldn't live. I had to experience seeing her laying in a hospital bed on a ventilator, full of tubes and wires and completely unresponsive. I had to decide to tell them not to save her life if her heart stopped beating. I had to tell my nine year old son and four year old daughter that their big sister, whom they both cherished and idolized, was dead and not coming home. I had to uphold her wishes to donate her organs, knowing what that surgery would do to her body. And I had to hold her hand while they declared my child, my precious girl, dead.

There are so many things I could say in memoriam about Hannah. I could use my words to paint a picture of the bipolar, animal-loving, plant-obsessed, artist she was. But there would never be enough words to fully describe her, and not nearly enough memories to fill the gaping wound her death cut through my soul.

To my friends and family who are parents, hold your babies a little tighter, even if they think they're too old for it.

For my students, text your mom when you get to wherever you're driving and let her know you made it there safe. It costs you nothing more than 10 seconds, and it means the world to her. I promise you.

To the other parents who have lost a living child, this club we are in together is fucking wretched, and my soul hurts for all of us.

And to her recipients, to those who will walk in this life with a living piece of my baby, I pray your bodies smoothly accept the gift she gave to each of you, and that you live a healthy and happy life.

Lastly, to Hannah. The flowers are for you. The love this weekend was for you. The cheeseburger toasts were for you. I'll find your smile in every sunset. Your laugh in all the waves. And you temper in every thunderstorm. You will never be far from me. I won't allow it, bug. I love you, endlessly.