The Day Everything Changed

On September 12, 2016, at 12:31 PM, AJ’s light went out in the Emergency Department at Sacred Heart Riverbend. The initial explanation was Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, though the truth was crueler: he had been neglected and abused—“battered prior to his death”—with injuries ignored by the very systems and people meant to protect him. The walls of the ED blurred as I, five months pregnant with my daughter, collapsed to the floor, the Riverbend chaplain at my side.

I remember the screaming—my screaming—and AJ’s once-lively body, now lifeless and surrounded by the medical equipment used in the many attempts to save him. I remember the detective later telling me there would be a death investigation, an autopsy, and a timeline for when we needed to make arrangements for his body. I was also informed that we couldn’t take AJ’s belongings home until the investigation concluded – standard procedure. I felt a profound emptiness that no one could touch. The internal screaming never stopped—though life, somehow, carried on.

As news of AJ’s death spread, people often asked how he died rather than wanting to talk about the beautiful life we had lost. My grief became frozen in time. The weight of everything that came after AJ’s death was crushing. I was preparing to bring a new life into the world while piecing together the wreckage left by the systems I had trusted—systems that failed my son and shattered my faith. I was terrified, overwhelmed, and heartbroken.“Complicated” doesn’t begin to describe the storm of grief, fear, and betrayal I was forced to navigate—without clear guidance, direction, or support.

Infant loss isn’t just the loss of a child—it’s the loss of joyful moments, of future dreams for your growing family, replaced with hospital bills, funeral costs, and a fear it could happen again. In my case, it happened all while I was postpartum, with no bereavement leave left and a maternity leave on the horizon.
As a new mom to my daughter, I faced a whirlwind of questions and chaos—but the systems I had trusted failed us. The pediatrician ignored mandatory reporting rules under Karly’s Law. Child welfare and law enforcement failed to coordinate. Agencies hid behind statutes of limitations and refused to engage in conversations about preventing future tragedies. Community services weren’t built to hold this kind of pain—there was no space to honor AJ, no support for the mental and emotional whiplash of grief, especially while raising surviving children in a world so eager to move on. 

And while I struggled to keep going, the people around me often misunderstood the depth of my grief. Some said things like, “You’re still on that?” or “You have a daughter now; you should be moving on,” as if grief had an expiration date. Others quietly left adoption pamphlets during my pregnancy, implying that “bringing another child into your life so soon might be too much.”

What emerged from that unbearable pressure wasn’t just grief—it was a quiet, burning rage I had never known before. A rage that didn’t scream, but simmered beneath the surface of my broken heart. It wasn’t random or misplaced—it was sacred. Rage born of betrayal by systems I was told to trust. Rage born of love so fierce it demanded justice. It was the kind of rage that comes when you’re expected to carry the weight of unthinkable loss with grace, to perform survival while the world looks away.

This rage whispered what no one else would say out loud: This was preventable. My son should still be here. He should be laughing, crawling, getting messy at dinner with the dog by his side. Instead, I was handed silence, bills, blame, and the expectation to somehow move on with the reality that it could happen again.

That rage became a flame—first to keep me alive, and then to fuel the work. To change the systems. To speak the truth. Because AJ deserved more – so much more. And so did I.

Determined to turn grief into purpose, I poured my heart into action. I returned to school and earned both my Bachelor’s in Psychology and Master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Bushnell University. Every class, every paper, every late-night study session was driven by something deeper than ambition—I needed to make sense of what had happened, not just for myself, but for families like mine.

I wanted to understand how healing works in the aftermath of trauma so profound it shatters the soul—so I could help create what didn’t exist when I needed it most. Spaces for grieving parents. Systems that understand the collision of infant loss with death investigations, postpartum survival, unpaid leave, and stacks of bills. A world that doesn’t just expect you to survive the unthinkable—but walks with you through it, and believes healing is possible.
 

In 2018, I filed a lawsuit against the State of Oregon, AJ’s pediatrician, and the clinic overseeing his medical care. The decision to take legal action wasn’t made lightly. For over a year and a half, I did everything I could to be heard. I reached out to agencies, spoke with professionals, and pleaded with people working inside these broken systems—hoping someone would care enough to act. I wasn’t looking for a fight. I was looking for protection, for accountability, for change.
 

But doors kept closing. Calls went unanswered. Meetings led nowhere. And all the while, the harm continued. Filing the lawsuit was never what I wanted—it was what I had left. It was the only way I could shine a light on the failures that were being ignored and force the systems to face what they allowed to happen.
 

That lawsuit, which settled in 2020, exposed serious systemic breakdowns. And yet, one of the most painful blows came when a Lane County judge ruled that AJ did not fall under the protection of the Vulnerable Persons Act. That decision was crushing—not just legally, but emotionally. It shook my belief in institutions. It chipped away at my hope in humanity.
 

Still, I fought on. Because turning away would have meant accepting the unacceptable. And I couldn’t do that—not then, not ever.

In 2019, I worked alongside Senator Sara Gelser Blouin to help pass Senate Bill 490, holding unlicensed daycares accountable with substantiated child abuse or neglect allegations. In 2020, I testified virtually during the COVID-19 pandemic in support of legislation to open police records—breaking the secrecy that had obstructed justice. From 2021 to 2022, I served on an Oregon Child Abuse Solutions Advisory Committee, helping to launch the state’s first training program for primary care providers to recognize signs of child abuse—ensuring that no other child would slip through the cracks.

Since 2022, I’ve worked as a professional counselor associate, pursuing licensure while advancing my mission: to fiercely advocate for families affected by child abuse, support families experiencing infant loss, promote prevention, and build comprehensive family supports that foster safety, connection, and resilience. I’m committed to raising awareness and developing training initiatives across mental health, healthcare, education, child welfare, and other supportive systems to better recognize and respond to child abuse. Alongside this work, I’ve built businesses that provide immediate, tangible support to families navigating unimaginable loss.