Things I have learned from having Molly in our life.

This is what I shared for our “Family Reflection” at Molly’s Memorial Service on Sunday, May 4, 2008.

Bob, Sean and I want to thank you all for being here today, as we remember and honor our daughter and Sean’s sister Molly’s short but very special life. We know that Molly’s life touched so many people and your support has meant so much to us. I want to share with you a few things that I have learned from having Molly in our life…

Through having Molly in our life I learned to try to live in the moment more.

Living in the moment is something that I have struggled with throughout my life. Though I love my life, my family, my friends, my home and my neighborhood, I often have found myself thinking about “what’s next?” When I was single I would day dream about meeting my husband and being married someday, when Bob and I got married I would think about having a child, when we had Sean I wondered about our future children.

One thing our journey with Molly has taught me, in a more profound way than any other of my life experiences, is the value in truly being able to live in the moment and getting the most out of what is happening at any given time. During our pregnancy with Molly, Bob and I were forced to live our lives one week, one day and sometimes even one hour at a time. Since we didn’t know what might happen next, we tried to prepare for the worst and hope for the best. One of our saving graces over the past six months were the times when Bob and I were able to live in the moment and enjoy what we were experiencing, especially with our son Sean, without being so focused on what would happen next or how things might end with our daughter Molly.

This lesson of living in the moment was the greatest when we knew that the end of Molly’s life was near. It helped me to appreciate every kick or love tap she gave me, knowing that I wouldn’t be feeling her moving inside me for much longer. I so cherished that connection we had while it lasted. Bob and I feel that we were also better able to appreciate the little time we had with Molly after she was born, as we tried to approach that time with out expectations about how those moments with our daughter were “supposed to be.” We are grateful for every memory we have of our baby girl and find peace and comfort in the time we had with Molly.

Through having Molly in our life I also learned how one person’s life, no matter how brief, can touch and impact so many others.

As many of you know, my favorite movie is It’s a Wonderful Life. In the movie the main character, George Bailey, gets the chance to see how the lives of his loved ones would be different if he had never existed. I have always been inspired by that story and have been greatly touched by the impact that our journey with Molly and her short life seems to have had on others.

Soon after we learned about Molly’s diagnosis and prognosis one of my college friends, who counsels transplant patients at the Mayo Clinic, told us about a website called CarePages, designed to support people who are very sick or facing a terminal illness. I was hesitant at first to create one for Molly and our family, but once we got started it proved to be an awesome way for us to communicate with family, friends and others who found our CarePage, especially other “heart families” who had been through similar experiences to what we were going through with Molly. I found sharing updates on our CarePage to be very therapeutic and we were blown away by the heartfelt messages people wrote us and the emails they sent us after reading my posts about our journey with Molly.

We continue to be amazed by how our daughter Molly has touched so many people’s lives and hearts in many different ways. It helps us to feel that her short life has not been with out purpose or reason. We find comfort, peace and inspiration in that going forward and we hope that you can too. We believe that good has and will continue to come from her time here with us.

The day after we buried Molly, Sean said to my mom, “Grandma Jacquie, is Molly in your heart?” And she replied, “yes, and she always will be.” Sean learned this idea of Molly being in our hearts from a book that he was given called We Were Gonna Have a Baby, But We Had an Angel Instead. We have read the book together often since his baby sister died. Our daughter and Sean’s sister Molly is and will always be in our hearts. It broke our hearts when we found out that our daughter literally had a broken heart. However, we believe that Molly is resting in peace now and fully healed with God in Heaven and we find comfort in that knowledge.

Now we are beginning to heal ourselves and we are finding the strength to go on with our lives, believing that our Molly is now watching over us and that someday our family will be together again in Heaven. We can’t thank you all enough for the love and compassion you have shown our family. Feeling your prayers and having your support has helped us to stay strong and get through this time in our life. Thank you again for being here with us today in honor of our daughter Molly and may God continue to bless you and your loved ones.