It's no secret to anyone who knows my daughter and I that we are incredibly close. This isn't unusual as there are many mothers and daughters who would consider themselves best friends. In our case though, she is not only my best friend, she is also my reason for being here today.
On February 11, 2018 our world came crashing down around us, when my husband tragically ended his life. My daughter, Chev, and I were one room away from him when it happened. I don't recall a lot of all that went down, as is normal with that kind of trauma, but I do know that at age 10, she was incredibly level headed and helped remind me that there were still plenty of reasons to keep going even though her father had chosen otherwise.
We had always been close, as moms and children often are, but as someone who practiced attachment parenting and chose homeschooling well before most others had to, we were quite used to always being together.
Chev's father and I worked as actors for much of her early life, which led to us bringing her to set with us quite often. This resulted in her capturing the lead role in a short indie film in 2015 called The Littlest Cthulhuist.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
That was a very fun time for us, although too short lived.
When her father died, it was hard for me to see how I would ever be able to go on. I honestly thought that I might be better off joining him, but that thought disappeared when I looked down at her and decided that he might not have realized that he had other options, but I sure did.
Since then, she and I have fallen into our own "new normal" as we have rebuilt our lives working as a team. She is now 13 years old; still homeschooled and still my sidekick. We have a dedicated Anime Night every week where we spend the evening fangirling over the anime du jour and discussing our thoughts, musings and theories.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The above photo shows us wearing our matching Attack On Titan Survey Corps jackets.
Our tragedy was definitely the kind of thing that tends to rob kids of their childhoods, so we have worked hard to keep fun and whimsy in our lives even though grief is something that never really leaves. I can say definitively that I would not be doing this well if it weren't for her and her driving presence in my world.
Little did I know that the day I brought her into this life, that she would someday, be what saved my own. For that, I will be forever grateful to her.
