Bushwalking around Theodore

At one stage, Terence was walking up and down and around the hills around Theodore, and several times Kayleigh went with him. The most memorable (at least for Terence) was attempting to walk to Mt Rob Roy from our house (it's one  of the big ones behind Banks). Terence unfortunately wasn't feeling the best, so really should have not gone. They set off, Kayleigh all excited as it was one of the first times she went with her Dad. They made it from our house, and probably 1/2 way up My Rob Roy, when I got a phone call. Terence was rather ill, and there was no way to get to them. Kayleigh pushed her dad to keep going, telling him it was OK and that he only had to go a little bit longer and they'd be back to civilisation. She kept him going for the 30 minutes it took to walk back. Terence said he was so relieved to see the power lines near the back of Theodore but was so proud of Kayleigh for keeping his spirits going.

Another time, we went up the hills directly behind Theodore. Terence, being Terence, decided we were all going up the steep side, not around the back were the hill wasn't so steep. This was a test for Terence's anxiety and at some stages Kayleigh practically dragged him up the hill, when she wasn't helping Kiara up. about half way up, Terence turned around and said that his anxiety was getting too much and Kayleigh told him that the top was only up there and he could do it. Then right up at the top (like a metre from it) Terence did the same. Kayleigh laughed her head off. 'Dad, you ARE at the top.' she said. She though it was really funny. We probably didn't climb the hills as much as she wanted. She loved the views from the top of the hills, you can see a long way.

Family pic at the top of the hills behind Theodore

Losing Daddys wedding ring

Terence stopped wearing his wedding ring as his knuckles in his hands became swollen after eczema. In year 5, Kayleigh took to wearing the ring on her thumb. She thought that is was pretty good wearing her dads ring. She did try to wear my ring, but since it had diamonds in it, it was a no go - she did however tell Natassja that when I passed away, my ring was hers!.

Anyhow, one day her friend Alexandra was playing with her own ring, and for some reason threw it. They searched around for it and couldn't find it. Kayleigh then thought she would 'help' by standing in the same spot and throwing her dad's ring to see if they could find the other ring. They managed to loose both.

Needless to say, Terence was not happy. They went down the to school together and had a good hunt, but Terence's wedding ring was never found. Alexandra got her ring back when someone handed it in the next day. Kayleigh was upset about losing her dad's ring and she promised to buy him a new one when she was old enough to get a job.

Coping with grief

Everybody copes differently with major changes in their lives. The lose of Kayleigh affected everyone that knew her, and in someway changed people.

For Terence, myself and our other children, we all coped in different way, coming to realisation that Kayleigh was no longer going to be in our lives, but only in our memories. For me, I spent the first week probably in a state of shock, I really didn't cry until after the funeral. I had so much to do in that first week, arranging the funeral, deciding on flower colour (thank you Virginia for doing the flower arrangement), talking with the funeral directors, the endless stream of visitors that I had to explain again and again what had happened, yet still having to function. After the funeral, I completely lost it and cried for at least a day. After a week, Terence looked at me and told me that I better not be getting depressed (I have had issues with post-natal depression previously) because Kayleigh had always hated it when I was sad. I realise then that when you lose someone really close to you there are two choices : (1) wallow in your grief and give up, or (2) choose life, remember the person but learn to enjoy life again,even without them. I made the conscious decision to choose life, as that is what Kayleigh would have done, and Kayleigh would have wanted for me. In the time between then and now I have had many moments that I have felt such despair and loss that I wonder what the hell I am still doing here. Not a good thought. After a particularly bad day at work I exceeded the speed limit down Monaro Highway thinking that a convenient tree would do fine. The thought of my other kids stopped me from doing anything stupid

Terence felt his grief straight away. We even had to call an ambulance for him because he felt he couldn't breathe, his whole body had clamped up and he just couldn't cope. Terence dealt with his grief early on by crying in the shower, purging himself of the emotions before starting the new day.

Natassja never cried, or if she did, she did it in private. This is a common response from teenagers. I think Natassja was trying to be the strong one for all of us. Her older sister was gone, leaving her as the oldest child Her Mum and Dad were falling apart around her and her younger siblings weren't doing so well. It also didn't help her that she was the last one to talk to Kayleigh, that she was the one that noticed Kayleigh wasn't breathing anymore and she was the one that attempted CPR when she called out to us. She tried to save her sister and failed. Over the long term, Natassja has probably become more self reflective. She spends a lot of time with books and her drawings. She has drawn many pictures of Kayleigh and wrote things in her school books. But she doesn't talk about Kayleigh unless I ask her. She has never spoken about Kayleigh with her dad, but I do know she has spoken about her with her friends.

Little Terry cried on and off for about a month. Kids are resilient and terry was the one that seemed to vocalise his grief the most - maybe it's an age and maturity thing - he was 9 at the time, Lucas was 6 and Kiara was only 4. He was the one that seemed to cope the best. He likes to talk about the fun things that Kayleigh and he did and the ways that Kayleigh annoyed him. Lucas on the other hand has become more difficult. He was always a little stubborn and gets frustrated easily at things when they go wrong or he can't do what he wanted to do. His way of coping was lashing out and getting moody and withdrawn. Even now he can be difficult to get him to do anything he doesn't want to do.

Kiara is the one that still is sad - you can still see it in her face. She was only 4 1/2 when Kayleigh passed away,  but she was really close to Kayleigh. Kayleigh did everything for her little sister, got her a drink, made her lunch, read her books, sung her to sleep, played ponies with her. Every couple of weeks Kiara will sit there, on her bed or on the lounge, her eyes far away and such sadness in her face. She turns around to you and says  'I miss Kayleigh' and you know there is nothing you can do to cheer her up. Eventually she does something else and the sadness passes but it is heartbreaking to see such a little girl trying to deal with her sadness.

Slamming on her guitar

When Kayleigh was in Year 6, the music teacher entered all the year 5 and 6 students in a competition - they had to write why music was important to them and school. Kayleigh wrote that 'Music helps me relax and concentrate in the classroom. Music helps me learn.' The entries were sent away and a couple fo months later the school rang me to tell us that Kayleigh had won -- a guitar. They were going to pick them up the next day.

We didn't tell Kayleigh that night as it was a surprise, so when they turned up at the music shop, they were all in for a big surprise (5 children had won, Kayleigh was the only one in Year 6). Each student was given an acoustic guitar, which made Kayleigh very excited, but we couldn't help noticing that she kept looking at the electric guitars in the shops. That night we asked Kayleigh how she felt. She said she was sooooo happy that she'd won, all the other kids in her class were jealous. I then asked her if she really had wanted an electric guitar. She ummmed and arrrr'ed and then said yes - I think she was trying not to be ungrateful for the prize she'd won.

The next day we took Kayleigh back tot he music shop, the guy recognised us from the previous day. We explained that Kayleigh wanted an electric guitar if he could help. The guy was really helpful, he accepted the return for full retail price and then Kayleigh chose her guitar - -she wandered around a bit but kept coming back to the Washborn 'Anarchy' and in the end thats the one she chose.

Kayleigh played with her guitar almost every day, but never really got the hang of it. We bought her an Avril Lavinge song book to try and learn and she was OK at one of the songs, but her favourite song to play was of course 'My heart will go on' by Celine Dion. Over and over and over again.



Kayleigh's Guitar