Jill's Hope: Birth of 1st Grand baby; News of Andy's Accident

Last Friday I got a phone call that Alyssa was having consistent contractions that were 10-15 minutes apart. I caught Larry on his way to Pocatello where he was going to his scheduled hyperbarics treatment (since his cancer diagnosis he has been doing both vitamin C infusions with Dr. West and the hyperbarics chamber).

By mid morning we were in the car making the three hour trek to Provo, where Dallin and Alyssa live, anxious to be there for the birth of our first grand baby. On our way out of town we stopped at Grandma Ward's house to drop off the kids. We were pleasantly surprised to be greeted at the door by our nephew, Andy. This was very unusual to see him there as his family lives in the Logan area which is 45 minutes away. He is the cutest five year old boy you will ever meet and he had come to spend a few days with Grandpa and Grandma Ward in anticipation for the big Ward family reunion that was going to be on Saturday.

A couple of years ago Andy and his sisters came to stay with us for a few days when his baby brother was born. We had so much fun and Andy and I had developed the following fun little interaction:

I would say: "How's my honey?"

Andy would reply, "I'm not your honey!"

I would then say: "Yes you are!" I would then give him a big hug and kiss and we would just laugh.

Even though we were in a hurry to get to Provo this day, I am so glad that I took the time to greet him in this manner and I am so grateful that my kids were able to spend the day with him at Grandma's and the next day with him at the reunion. None of us could have ever foreseen that this would be the last time that we would every see him alive.😓

Larry and I arrived in Provo around lunchtime and stopped to get everyone something to eat at Jamba Juice (yum!) on our way into town. We enjoyed a pleasant visit with Dallin and Alyssa and then I spent a couple of hours shopping while Dallin and Larry took a tour of the BYU campus and Alyssa kept walking and trying different exercises to try and get the baby to come, but to no avail.

By nighttime we were all so exhausted and crashed very hard. Later that evening we learned that one of our nephews, whom we had not seen in several years, had come into town to the reunion because he had heard about Larry's terminal cancer diagnosis. We also realized that there were several other people that were very anxious to see Larry and visit with him at the reunion. The next morning I was frantically searching for ways to get him back to Provo because I did not want to leave and risk not being there for the birth of our granddaughter. Miraculously, we were able to get in touch with one of his cousins who was just leaving Provo for the reunion.

On Saturday Alyssa was still having fairly strong and intermittent contractions, but nothing that was consistent enough to go to the hospital. I spent a large part of the day at Larry's cousin, Julie's house, who was only about 20 minutes away from the hospital. Julie did not go to the reunion because she had just barely had rotator cuff surgery. We spent most of the day just talking, laughing, and reminiscing. Julie and I are about the same age and have a lot in common. Her husband, Chris, passed away from pancreatic cancer about eight years ago (the same time that Larry started getting sick). She was left with four boys to raise on her own and has done an incredible job. She could sympathize with me on so many levels and gave me so much good advice, the most important being to record Larry on my phone whenever I got the chance. They have several recordings of Chris that they very much cherish now that he is gone.

I finally headed back to Dallin's house in the evening. I had just placed my order for dinner at the BYU Creamery when I got the phone call at about 7 pm they they were headed to the hospital! I was so excited as I was going to have to go home in the morning if the baby had not come yet. Dallin and Alyssa had invited me to be there for the birth if Mom Kelly did not make it in time (they were only allowed to have one extra person in the room with them). Being that she lived in Colorado the chances of me being there were pretty high. As Mom Kelly has thirteen other grandchildren, and has been present for several of their births, I think she was highly in favor of letting me have this experience.

When Dallin and Alyssa first invited me to the birth I wasn't sure what I thought about the whole idea, but having been through it now I would do it again in a heartbeat. It was such a sacred and special thing to be a part of.

Alyssa was very determined to have the baby naturally, but by 2 am Sunday morning, she had very hard contractions through the night with very little progress and she made the decision to have an epidural to help control the pain and allow her to rest. After getting some rest they gave her some pitocin to get her labor going. Finally at about 10:05 am beautiful Adilynn Christine Rose was born!

As it was Sunday, and our sacrament meeting is now available to watch on zoom, I had the opportunity to listen to our ward's meeting. It was fast and testimony meeting where people from the audience randomly come forward and bear their testimony of Christ and the things about the Gospel that they know to be true. I was about 3/4 of the way finished with the meeting when the doctor and all of the nurses came into the room and told Alyssa that it was time to push. I turned off the meeting and later learned that Larry had born a very powerful testimony that I was so sad to have missed.

A few hours later I was headed back to Dallin and Alyssa's apartment to take a nap and get packed up so that I could head towards home. As I was pulling into their parking lot I received a phone call that there had been an accident that morning and Andy had passed away. I was so grateful to have not received this news any earlier. I later learned that they had gotten home late from the reunion the day before and did not get everything put away, a gun being among the things that did not get put away. Andy had gotten up early and found the gun and had accidentally shot himself that morning. This news was so heartbreaking to our whole family. Andy will be greatly missed by all of us. I couldn't help but think that Addie and Andy were able to give each other a high five as they passed each other in the spirit world. Andy left this world at around 8:00 am and Addie came to this world at about 10:00 am. We love you and will miss you so much Andy.💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙💙