Monday, October 5, 2015

LUCOM professor shares personal experience of losing young daughter

Mon, 05 Oct 2015Shelley Andrews :: LUCOM Marketing and PR

At first glance, the words don’t appear to go together. But in a heartfelt message called “The Fellowship of Suffering,” a Liberty University College of Osteopathic Medicine (LUCOM) professor showed how even in our greatest times of grief, God is there.

Aaron Kelley, D.O., LUCOM Chair of Community and Rural Medicine, shared his story during the weekly LUCOM convocation on September 23.  A few years ago, he and his wife felt a tug from the Lord to take their four young children, three boys and a girl, to Kenya.

“We had never done a family mission trip before, and we really didn’t know what we were getting into. We just went knowing that was where we were supposed to go,” said Dr. Kelley.

They ended up in Bomet in early 2013, close to Tenwek Hospital, for a two-year assignment.

“The kids just fell in love with the place,” said Dr. Kelley, mentioning their love of the outdoors and new friends.

However, the fun stopped when the entire family caught a stomach bug.  Within a week they had all recovered, except 13-month-old Hannah. She stayed very ill and was unable to keep anything down.

Dr. Kelley and his wife took Hannah to the hospital, but blood tests revealed nothing. With hope, they brought Hannah home to see if she would recover. One night, she stopped breathing. They rushed her to the hospital again, with Dr. Kelley administering CPR the whole way.

“I was walking with my baby girl giving her compressions, stopping every three yards to give her rescue breaths,” said Dr. Kelley. “I just remember this immense darkness. It felt like there was nothing but darkness.”

Since it was the middle of the night, staffing was limited. Dr. Kelley was faced with the task of intubating his young daughter.

“As I was walking up to the bed, I just remember uttering a prayer to God, ‘You need to do this because I can’t do this.’ By the time I had the equipment in my hands, for the next 15 or 20 seconds, I was not her daddy. I was an ER doc just doing my job,” said Dr. Kelley.

That was the first of many moments Dr. Kelley says they felt God step in as the situation worsened. A CT scan revealed what was wrong with Hannah:  hydrocephalus caused by a mass in her brain. The Kelley family says prayer led them through the days that followed. Hannah had surgery, but her health continued to decline.

“We felt like this was it, we were going to lose our girl, but outside of all of that… God was still in control,” said Dr. Kelley.

Dr. Kelley says God gave them just enough strength to get through the toughest moment: the moment they decided it was time to take Hannah off life support.

“I remember, over and over, just praying that God would send one of his best angels to escort my baby girl home. Not just any angel, I wanted one of the best angels. I can’t wait to find out which one He chose and thank Him for that,” said Dr. Kelley.

The Kelleys did not grieve alone. Their friends in Kenya held a memorial service for Hannah. Despite their limited incomes, those who attended donated money to help the family get back to the United States.

After laying Hannah to rest, Dr. Kelley and his wife returned to Kenya to finish out their assignment and were forced to revisit those places where Hannah spent her last days. The pain, he says, is always just below the surface.

“I don’t ever get to have a complete family picture again and every time we do family pictures, it tears me up because my daughter is always going to be missing,” said Dr. Kelley.

But he is able to find peace in the comfort that Hannah’s story, through media reports and his personal blog, continues to touch lives across the world. 

“This is only one chapter there is an entire book yet to be written. And that book is never ending,” said Dr. Kelley.

The Kelley family added a new member to the family in October 2014:  Joshua Hunt Baraka Kelley.  Baraka means “blessing” in Swahili