Aaron Story told by Gayle Keech

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Today on Father's Refuge, we welcome someone whose story is woven into my own in ways only grief and faith can explain. Gail Keats and her husband Anthony lost their son Aaron many years ago, a loss that reshaped their lives forever. Our families met through Camp Happy Days during our daughter Jessica's battle with cancer, and through the heartbreak of losing her, Gail and I walk through different roads but the same valley. In this conversation, we're going to talk about Aaron's life, the weight of losing a child, the long road of healing, and the faith that keeps us standing when the world feels shattered. This is a conversation for every parent who has loved deeply, lost painfully, and is still trying to find their way forward. Gail, thank you for being here and for sharing Aaron with us. How are you doing today? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm I'm very happy that you and I are finally getting on a podcast interview so that you can tell your parenting story and talk about Aaron. And I'm I'm so sorry that we're in the same club.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Nobody Yeah, defin definitely one we didn't want to be in.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Yeah, parents never expect to bury their children. It's usually the other way around.

SPEAKER_00 1:57

Correct.

SPEAKER_01 1:58

So did we meet through Camp Happy Days or was it courageous kids?

SPEAKER_00 2:02

Camp Happy Days, I think.

SPEAKER_01 2:04

How long have we known you?

SPEAKER_00 2:06

Mm probably close to let's see probably close to twenty years now.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Yeah. Jessica passed away in two thousand one. And so we met you before that. And she's been gone almost twenty-five years now. Well this is yeah, it is twenty-five years because this is twenty twenty-six and she died in two thousand one.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Right. Aaron died in nineteen ninety-two.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Okay. So Ga Gail, for listeners who never met Aaron, tell us who he was, what made him unique, and what do you want people to remember about him?

SPEAKER_00 2:39

Well, and I mean this is probably common. Probably every parent says this about their children. But, you know, even though he was small, he was originally diagnosed when he was two and went through six months of chemo. Well, and went through several surgeries. He didn't six months chemotherapy. He had neuroblastoma. And by the time that he was diagnosed, it was, I want to say it was stage four. And so anyway, he went into remission and he was in remission for a couple of years or whatever. And we decided it was time to complete our family. And in my seventh, sixth or seventh month, the cancer had come back and it came back with a vengeance. But what made him special was his gentle. I mean, he was a beautiful child. He, you know, people often told me he was too pretty to be a boy, and he was just a gentle soul. And even at a very young age, he loved the Lord, and he was a very spiritual little being, and you know, and just very sweet, very meek and humble. He had he looked like me, but he had his daddy's personality. Because my husband is very meek and humble and you know, very Christian man, you know.

SPEAKER_03 4:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

And so, you know, and everybody that everybody that I meet that's ever met Aaron, they tell me their special story. Their what they remember of him. And it's mostly it's mostly church people used to, you know, the we used to go like into the hospital 'cause shortly after Aaron died, we had a niece that got cancer. And, you know, when we would go up there to visit her and there was still a lot of the nurses and they would, you know, tell us their stories, their sweet stories and things of Aaron, you know. He just never, you know, like a lot of kids, you know, they would kick and scream during during treatment or or needle sticks or whatever, and he just he just took it like a champ.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

So can you walk us can you walk us through the season of life when Aaron passed? What moments or memories from that time still stay with you today?

SPEAKER_00 5:02

I remember, you know, once he passed away. I mean, at first I'm like, you know, okay, he's finally healed. You know, when everybody would would t tell me when we were during treatment, and even when they told us there was when he relapsed and there was nothing else that they could do, you know, people would say, you know, well, you know, basically to believe God heals and you know, whatever, whatever. And all that's true. I I truly believed that. But it wasn't until he died that I realized or it dawned on me that, you know, Aaron got the ultimate healing.

SPEAKER_02 5:43

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:43

You know, when we think of healing, when we when people say this, you know, or at least I always did before he died. I always thought, you know, healing meant here on earth.

SPEAKER_03 5:54

Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

But it wasn't until after he died that it dawned on me, well, we'll and then there was a song that talked about the ultimate healing. And that's when it registered with me that he got his ultimate healing. You know, and there for a while I I floated through life with that, you know, but then then once the once the shock and once that that little feeling left, I guess per se, then anger setting. And I was very angry, you know, it changed his death has changed the way that I look at death. It changed the way I believe.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

Right.

SPEAKER_00 6:35

And you know, and like I often tell people, when I meet people who's lost their child, you know, I have I still, after all these years, I still don't know what to say when I meet somebody that's lost a child. But you know what? I really know what not to say. You know, because people said a lot of well-meaning things that were just hurtful, you know. And and then I would see other people, you know, it was people that, you know, and you know, I'm human. I seen other people and even in our family that wasn't, you know, now grant you I'll never win Mother of the Year award, but I would see somebody that wasn't the best of a mother and watched their child fight cancer. And you know, and I can remember just being so angry and thinking, you know, this'll be the kid that lives. You know, I would do I would have laid down my life for, you know, I will. My I got a grown kid and I got a little kid now. And I would lay down my life for any of them.

SPEAKER_03 7:47

Right.

SPEAKER_00 7:48

You know, but you know, I just knew that this girl was gonna live, you know, because she had in my eyes, in my worldly eyes, a crappy mama, you know. And so I was angry. I I was just an angry person. I mean, and you know, now I'm not, you know, I've had years, I've got years behind me or under my belt, or whatever saying you want to use. You know, I I finally let go of I would say 99% of that anger. And it wasn't easy. I think my Lord and Savior gave took it away. Um, you know.

SPEAKER_01 8:31

So how how old was Aaron when he passed away?

SPEAKER_00 8:35

When he passed away he was six.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Okay. So grief changes shape over the years. How did your grief look in the early days? And how does it look now so many years later? You've kind of touched on this a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

At the beginning, I mean, like I said, I I once the, as I call it, the Nova Kane wears off, and then you have to get back to the daily grind.

SPEAKER_02 8:59

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:00

Well, you know, all I did was lay in the bed. Anthony, he got back to normal. He went to there was a few months he took off uh from work. Graciously, the company was wonderful to us, and uh he finally just went back. His way was to to get back to normal. Let's let's just get life back to m normal. And me on the other hand, I wanted to lay in the bed and die.

SPEAKER_02 9:29

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:29

And it wasn't until one day I was laying in the bed, you know, contemplating suicide, and a voice, a voice in my head, I guess you could say, says that because during all of this, I gave birth, me and the newborn light to have died. He weighed two pounds and 13 ounces, and he stayed with my sister because at the time I couldn't take care of myself, more or less take care of a baby.

SPEAKER_03 9:55

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:56

And so anyway, so I'm laying in bed and I'm contemplating, okay, well, what's the best way? What's the best way to do this? Because I wanted the less pain, the less mess. Yeah. And so I'm laying there and I'm I'm thinking, and a voice spoke and says, You do this, this child is gonna wake up. This child is gonna grow up one day and think that you didn't love him enough to hang around for him, that you loved Aaron more than you did him. And so I'm like, okay. And so that's when I started to see when I started to turn around, I guess you could say, see see things different.

SPEAKER_01 10:38

So you're talking about your older boy, right?

SPEAKER_00 10:40

Well, the yeah, my my younger one.

SPEAKER_01 10:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:43

Yeah, because Aaron was the oldest and Andrew was next.

SPEAKER_02 10:47

Right.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

And me and Andrew both like to have died, him being born. And so anyway, he was staying with my sister and her family too, because we ended up going down to Charleston for a bone marrow transplant and we couldn't take the baby with us. And so my sister and her husband volunteered to take him. And basically, first 17 months of his life, he lived with you can say he lived with my sister. And so, and then I went through a phase where I was scared to get close to that baby because I thought, if surely I get close to him, something happened to him. And so I had to work through that. And then, but yeah, I mean, you just you go through all these different phases, and then like Christmas time, the first Christmas without Aaron come around. Well, I didn't want to put up a Christmas tree, I I didn't want to celebrate, I just wanted to stay in my own my own little cocoon and let the world carry on without me. And again, that voice is like, okay, Aaron had Christmas for six years. You know, he had Christmas for six years and would have had Christmas for the rest of his life had he lived beyond. Why are you gonna deny this one child this Christmas, even though he was a baby? He would have he uh was born in January, so this is at December, and uh but yeah, Anthony was my rock. He loved me despite the anger and the and the crabiness, and he just continued loving me and praying for me.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

He he knew you were hurting.

SPEAKER_00 12:32

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 12:33

So that's that's good. He's a Anthony is a rock, and uh He really is. And I'm glad he was there for you. So Gail How did your faith respond to the loss? Were there moments of wrestling, moments of comfort, or moments where God felt especially close?

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Well, like I said, it was it was once I I heard the song the about the ultimate healing and accepted that to be God's word. You know, that was God's way of speaking to me.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:04

And just music means a lot to me. And uh so anyway, just being just listening to to music and accepting and when just thinking that I am going to get to see him one day when he's no longer hurting, and I started seeing all the upsides instead of not having him and feeling God God did something bad to me. Once I got past then that made the whole world of difference.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Right. So, Gail, our families met through Camp Happy Days during Jessica's battle. How did that community and meeting other parents walking similar roads impact your healing?

SPEAKER_00 13:47

Well, it's lets me I met other people. I didn't meet a whole lot. Well, no, I take that back. I did meet a whole lot. Yeah, and my heart hurt every time I heard that another child was diagnosed or or another child has passed away is the most heartbreaking. It was important to me to let these these other parents know you're not alone. I might be a a little further along in the the grief chaos, but you're not alone because until we started coming to the happy days functions, I had no I never met nobody, no child or family whose child was fighting cancer because it was like you went to the cancer treatment center here in Greenville in in Greenville, it was like everybody was afraid to talk to one another because you don't know. I because I remember before, like when we went down to Charleston for the bone mail transplant, I'd be like, I I don't want to talk to anybody that's that's fighting because just like in la in today's term, just like you go to look up something on Google or whatever, you're gonna get the worst case scenario. And me in my mind, I was not ready for that. I wasn't ready for the honesty. And so for a long time we I didn't talk to nobody at the cancer treatment center unless it was a doctor or a nurse. I didn't talk to any other parents. I didn't, and it was the same way in Charleston because I didn't want to hear what I guess the truth of neuroblastoma. And so I remember being at the cancer treatment center and there was a post back then. Back then it was Camp Happy Days, and they were having a something for parents. I I think it was. And yeah, it was something for parents. And Anthony wanted to go. And so I went. And everything was going good until it wasn't. And poor poor old Debbie. She so she told us what not to do. If you're not ready for the truth, which I was nowhere ready for the truth, I was living day by day with Aaron. And so we go there and she tell she had a a few dot I think she had a doctor and she had a therapist and she had a couple other people to speak. And then she says, she tells us, she says, now, if you're not ready for the truth, be careful about the answers. Be if you're not ready for the answer, be careful what you ask. So I looked at Anthony and I said, let's not ask anything. I don't want to ask anything. We can go, we'll look, we'll listen, whatever, but don't ask anything. Well, the doctor asked something about he asked Anthony had asked this doctor about it was uh one of the chemotherapies, because one of the chemotherapies could, you know, hurt the heart. Well, this doctor just goes on and on and on. And then he asked us what what cancer Aaron had, and I told him, and I mean, he just kept on and on, and I mean, it was like, okay, well, it go go on. It's he's like, neuroblastoma. He's like basically telling us that he wasn't gonna live long and seeing nobody had ever told me that. And our doctors here had never told us that. And I was okay with that. I didn't, I didn't ask the question because I felt like if I wanted to know the answer, I could ask the question and they could tell me. And I just was not ready for what this, and so I vowed that day. Uh Debbie came up and was like, hey, how'd you like it? And I I looked at her and I said, I didn't like it. I said, you told us to be careful of what we asked. And I said, we were careful about what we asked. I said, but you didn't tell the doctor to just answer the question that he's asked. And I said, and I was just, I was just furious. And I told her, I said, I will never, never be back. And when that unfortunately that doctor was right, and it wasn't it wasn't too terribly long that he passed away because he never got to go to camp. And but now Andrew did, being a sibling, he he got to go. And and that's I think by that time I we met you and Katie and Jessica, but I didn't really know I didn't really get to know y'all until after Jessica passed away.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

So losing a child affects every part of a marriage. How did you and Anthony navigate grief together and what helped you stay connected through the pain?

SPEAKER_00 18:46

God. I mean, the Lord had to be have his hand in it, because that and being that my personality is so different from Anthony's. And, you know, between the Lord and Anthony, Anthony just being a godly man, because I can assure you I was far from a godly wife. And it just I don't know. It's just because he loved me, is all I know.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Right. That's a g that's a that's an adequate answer. Absolutely. And I can guarantee you that as I look back on Jessica and all the things that we went through as a family, the that event probably shook the foundation of our faith more than any other Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

I I agree with I agree with you one hundred percent because it sure did mine too. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

There was a there was a song, I forget who sings it, says I'll praise you in the storm. That was a song that's a sort of thing.

SPEAKER_00 19:41

I wasn't doing very much praising. I Yeah. If my memory serves me re if my memory serves me correctly, I don't think I was doing too many praising.

SPEAKER_01 19:51

Yeah, me either. But but I I I think that God kinda gave us through that song, I think God kinda gave us a picture of the thunderstorms. We're standing on the beach or or whatever, and you see the storm out over the water and then it starts getting closer and closer, and then you start having to depend on God more and more. At some point we did wind up praising him. Right. Because we we believed that and one of the things that that I had to was an epiphany to me as a father was that Jessica didn't belong to me. Right. She belonged to God. It was he he just allows us to be caregivers and support people, parents to the children that he gives us. I was like, Jessica's my child. You know, God was like, Well, not really. And we prayed, we prayed ceasingly for her healing.

SPEAKER_00 20:41

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

And we had a lot of hope. We had a great amount of hope at the outset when she had her when she had her surgery, she had her emergency surgery at MUSC Children's Hospital, and the surgeons came out and told us, if she lasts twelve months, you'll be lucky. Because the the tumor was attached to her brainstem. And they got about ninety percent of it. But when it when you start talking the brainstem, that's that's kind of a death sentence. And so we knew we knew, um, she lasted fourteen months, and at that one month period after she got out of that surgery and she started doing chemo and radiation and all that all those modalities or treatment or therapy, whatever, we had a lot of hope still. We still clung to a lot of hope. We hoped that God would heal her here on this side of heaven. And of course, the closer and closer we got to that fourteen month period, we came to the realization that she probably wasn't gonna make it. And uh I walked down Maple Ridge Drive in a thunderstorm a couple of times with a a beer in one hand and shaking my fist at God in the other, and I didn't care. I ha I hated thunderstorms, I hate lightning, but I really didn't care, and I bargained with God and asked him to take me and not her. So yeah, I I went went through all of that. And Katie and I, we we did not we didn't go s seek a therapist. Our pastor was a he was the uh director of pastoral care at Trident Hospital. He didn't even tell us to go get counseling. He didn't direct us.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

Yeah, we never did either.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

He didn't direct us in one direction or the other. And so we we just kind of sucked it up. We should have we should have gotten our other children, Justin and Christina, we should have gotten them some help. And we didn't because we didn't know. And Father's Refuge is born out of the the feeling of hopelessness that I had when after she passed, because there's some support for moms and mothers, but there's almost zero support for fathers.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

Well, because most most of the time your fathers, they are I mean, I can't I'm not a man, so I can't but I picture it in my mind is that there's a certain amount of I'm the man, I'm the man, I'm the strong one, I'm Right. I don't need help.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

Men don't cry.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

Yes. When especially when you're like in our ages, the way we were raised, men didn't cry.

SPEAKER_02 23:00

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

Meant how many times growing up have you seen a little boy all and cry and be like, oh get up, take it like a man, don't be crying like a girl.

SPEAKER_03 23:10

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:11

And that kind of thing. And but yeah, we never saw therapy. Now uh and of course Andrew was too little, you know. He doesn't even remember you know, he was so little he don't remember Aaron. He just knows what we tell him in the pictures he sees.

SPEAKER_03 23:28

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Um so it it takes us a while to to come around.

SPEAKER_02 23:34

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:34

To see to me, I don't know, I'm I'm not there at your everyday life, but the times that I have been around, you have an you have an Anthony spirit in Katie.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:48

Yeah. And unfortunately they got mind in your spirit. They got mind in your spirits and attitudes and our speaker mind and and uh so yeah, I can definitely see a hand of God here.

SPEAKER_02 24:03

That's good.

SPEAKER_00 24:04

Because, you know, if there had been two, you know, it'd have been better if it'd been like if you had the Katie spirit and Katie had Katie's spirit, just like if I'd have had Anthony's spirit versus, you know, with Anthony's spirit, but if they had been two of us, two of Gail Spirit and Jane spirits, and you put them together, we're all different we would be doomed.

SPEAKER_01 24:29

They always they always say that opposites attract.

SPEAKER_00 24:32

And that's and that is the God honest truth, yes.

SPEAKER_03 24:35

Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Yeah. I tell my I tell my son Andrew, I says, he always talks about finding a mate. And I tell him, son, you're gonna have to find one that's like your daddy.

unknown 24:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:49

You're gonna have to look for your daddy's spirit in a female in a female body, because he looks like his daddy, but now he has my he's got my spirit over me.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

He's a chip off the old block, huh?

SPEAKER_00 25:03

For real, for real.

SPEAKER_01 25:05

And I said, You just I told her, I said, You have to look for you a martyr, is all I can over the years, how have you kept Aaron's memory alive? What traditions, stories, or moments help you feel connected to him today?

SPEAKER_00 25:18

Just telling his story, mention his name. Some people it it makes uncomfortable and kind of well. Sorry for you. If I'm talking to somebody and a story relates, I share it. Because as I don't know from my father's point of view, but from a mother's point of view, our biggest fear is our child will be forgotten. And because life goes on. I don't want I don't want my son forgotten. I will never forget him.

SPEAKER_03 25:49

Right.

SPEAKER_00 25:49

And Anthony will never forget him. And my my family will most definitely never we talk about him. Now my now my sister and her husband is gone, and there's nobody left but me and my niece and her little family and my little family, and that's that's all that's left on my side of the family, other than we do have a cousin that we stay real close to. And we just talk because we just I tell Aaron stories. My cousin had a had a little grandbaby to pass away, and she, you know, she uh talks about him and nobody feels uncomfortable. We just we really talk to them talk about them as if they if you if you were an outsider looking in, you would think we were talking about somebody that was in the here and now. Because, you know, I got pictures that's hanging in my wall in my walls and got pictures and things on my Facebook page. Um when I hear a song or whatever, I'll go in because like there was this song and it was by back then we didn't listen to secular music, but Aaron was at my sister's house and her kids were, or at least one of them was a teenager, and when they listened to rock music or whatever, there's this song. It was by Vanilla Ice, and it was called Ice Ice Baby. And here's my little sweet, bald-headed boy, you know, and he's putting his hat on and he's turning around backwards, and the whole song, the only thing that he could sing or could remember was he would listen to it and dance to it, but then when it gets to the ice ice baby part, then that would be what he could sing.

SPEAKER_03 27:37

Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

You know, it so just so if I, you know, if the song comes on, like there has been times where the song has come on, and I'll go and write my thoughts on Facebook and tell a story, tell that very story about how he turned his little hat around and he just the just the different things that he did or things that he said, or back then my sister, my sister sang in a in a gospel group, and he was little, and I think at this time he might have been about five, maybe, and he was like, you get sick, and like he wanted to go to my sister's house who lived the next street over. And he she says, Well, you can't stay right now, honey. I have a headache. And he asked her, he said, Well, where's the oil? And she says, The what? He says, The oil, meaning oil.

SPEAKER_02 28:30

Right.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

And so anyway, she said it's in the kitchen cabinet. So he knew where he goes and gets it. And he takes the lid off and he sticks his finger, his fingertip down, and he makes a cross on her forehead and lays his hand on her head and prays.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

Well then we go home. We we go back home. And it wasn't long after that, a little couple of hours or so, and he asked to call her. And so I dialed her phone number and he says, Hey, Aunt Cabrin, how you how's your head? And she says, Oh, it feels much better. He says, Good, now can I come to your house? Now can I come to your house? You know, and when a lot of people I've been asked before, did y'all not have enough faith? Did God not heal him because y'all didn't have enough faith? We are not sure. Did you have sin in your life? When I'm like, Well, first of all, you obviously didn't know the child. The child had more faith in his little pinky than most adults have in their whole body.

SPEAKER_02 29:38

Right.

SPEAKER_00 29:39

Because he would stop and anoint you with oil in a minute. And I remember going to this church that is singing, and everybody it was uh, I don't know what denomination. It wasn't a Baptist denomination, but they were they were singing and dancing and praising in the spirit. And so anyway, he uh the pastor, there was something going on with his son. I don't I don't know if it was a rebellious son or whatever, but he was having issues and he was laying, not laying, but kneeling down at the altar praying. And and he said later on, after as the service was becoming coming to the end, that he that he was praying and he said and he felt a hand touch his head and he said, and when I opened my eyes, he says, it was this little fella, and said, and he was just praying up a storm. And uh and that was Aaron. I mean, he he just he was just an amazing little boy. You know, we never got never got angry, was always shared with people. He was just he was just different.

SPEAKER_01 30:50

Right.

SPEAKER_00 30:50

In a good way.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

Well, I appreci I appreciate you sharing that. So you're welcome. For the parent listening right now who's hurting, maybe even drowning in grief, what would you say to them from your own?

SPEAKER_00 31:01

Don't give up. Take your time. You take grief one moment at a time. Don't try to think about tomorrow. Take one moment at a time, then the and then it goes from one moment at a time, and then it might be an hour at a time. Just take in other words, long story short, take your time. Don't do anything drastic. If you have faith, keep your faith. It might get weakened, but don't give up. And you just for lack of a better way of saying it, just keep on keeping on and make sure your kid don't get forgotten.

SPEAKER_01 31:35

Gail, thank you for opening your heart today and for letting us see Aaron through your eyes. His life, his joy, and his legacy continue to matter not just to your family, but to every parent who has walked through the valley of loss. Conversations like this remind us that grief doesn't end, it transforms. And in that transformation, God meets us with a kind of strength we never knew we had. For every father, every mother listening today, if you're carrying the weight of a child you've lost, you're not alone. There is refuge, there is hope, and there is a God who sits with you in the silence and walks with you in the storm. Gail, thank you for sharing Aaron with us and to our listeners. You're welcome. Thank you for being part of the community of healing and honesty. Until next time, may God give you peace for today, strength for tomorrow, and the courage to keep walking forward. This is Father's Refuge. We'll see you on the next episode.