Lilee-Jean

Lilee-Jean Frances Putt

It is with a heavy heart that I must tell you sweet Lilee-Jean passed away yesterday at 5:25 p.m.  She spent the past eleven days at Canuck Place Children's Hospice.   The staff there did an incredible job of keeping her pain-free and comfortable.  Above, she sleeps peacefully.  I am so grateful that we have this very, very important hospice in Vancouver.  Lilee's parents, Chelsea and Andrew, left this message on her Love for Lilee facebook page:

It is With broken hearts we make this post.. As of 5:25pm, our princess Lilee-Jean Frances Putt, our angel here on earth, is now looking down on us from heaven. She had a rough day today, and is no longer in any distress. She passed away curled up in Mommy's arms, listening to daddy play his guitar. -Chels & Andrew.

On Thursday evening, as Bill and I left for our evening walk, a rainbow appeared.  It seemed to explode over the treetops.  Bill said it was the first sunset rainbow he had ever seen and I can tell you that it brought a beautiful excitement to our day.  Lilee-Jean has touched so many hearts, it seems entirely reasonable to me to believe that her spirit was sending light ahead of her departure from earth.  Edited to add: Bill has done some research on sunset rainbows, and we now understand how very rare they are and how incredibly fortunate we were to see that one at the exact moment we walked out of the house.  My sister's comment that Lilee-Jean is "now free to slide on that extraordinary rainbow" brings me great comfort. Here is a link Bill found to a small article on sunset rainbows. 

 

As we walked home a short time later, these colours danced behind the trees.  Lilee-Jean's parents drew up a "Dancing in the Rain" list when they knew that her days were numbered.

They soaked up every beautiful memory of their precious child that they could.  People from all over, but most especially from their hometown pulled together to help complete many of the items on the list.  Lilee spent a day in school, she celebrated her 21/2 years old birthday, she and her parents spent a week in Hawaii, they went to Whistler, they went on a boat ride, and in August, they celebrated Halloween and Christmas.  People in the area dressed up, decorated their homes and gave her and her parents a lifetime of beautiful memories in just a few weeks.  Below, she and Chelsea, her mom, dance through the snowflakes on their Christmas morning.  Thank you to Kim of KLM Photography for capturing that moment so beautifully!  

I am quoting these words from Chelsea's blog.  They are from her most recent post.  I can't recommend any blog more highly.  Her words are printed on my heart forever.

Posted AUG 31 2013 by LOVEFORLILEE in A WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN: LEARNING TO LIVE with 83 COMMENTS

The air is crisp and calm, the sky clear and endless, like
it always is after a storm. I am thankful Lilee is asleep, not in
any pain. I am thankful she wakes up from time to time, to eat her
favourite things or to tell us she loves us. I’m thankful for the
“dancing in the rain” photos, comments and videos our communities
have sent us. And I’m so very thankful for this House and the
amazing people in it. But I am sad. I am exhausted. My heart is
aching with an indescribable pain. Each night we have been here, I
have fallen asleep with my bed pushed up against Lilee’s as close
as it will go, holding her hand. Any movement, any sound, my eyes
fly open and my hand is on her heart. Up. And down. Up. And down. I
feel her chest move. Thump thump. Thump thump. I feel her heart
beat. The panic subsides, I place her hand back in my hand and I
try to get some sleep. Each night is increasingly worse, knowing
its one day closer, but never knowing how close. Thursday night,
after a day FULL of dancing in the rain by all the people sending
their love to us, thunder and lightening filled our room. Sheets of
rain came steadily down from the open sky and I couldn’t breath.
How poetic, I thought, if she passed tonight. How true to our
story, if the rain storm took her away with it. My brother and
sister in law were the last of the immediate family to see Lilee,
and they were en route from Edmonton as this end of summer storm
raged on. Since we have been here, well.. Since we have noticed
Lilee declining, I have made sure Lilee knew that I was okay. I
have made sure she knew that when SHE wanted to go, when she was
ready, that I would be there and that I would be okay. It was
important for me to make sure that she never held on because she
felt like I needed her to. But last night, through thunder and
lightening I asked Lilee to hold on. I asked her to wait for her
uncle and Aunty to come give her a kiss. I was so afraid and so
panicked that it was her night to go, and they hadn’t gotten to say
goodbye that I sat up in my bed and waited. My heart beating out of
my chest. My breaths short and shallow. 12:30am, The minute her
Aunty and uncle left after giving her a kiss, I laid my head on my
pillow, my eyes began to close as my heart beat softened and my
mind calmed. I finally fell asleep. I am not ready to say goodbye
to my daughter. To my world. But I never will be. I am in the
process of accepting that I don’t have a say, and that in not
accepting it I will rob both Lilee and myself of time I could spend
soaking her up. Taking her into every cell in my body. I am calm.
And I am at peace. She has no pain, and we have had our time. I
have given her the peace of mind to go when she needs to, that she
will never be alone and that Mommy and Daddy will be fine. I am
holding on to every moment, as tightly as I hold onto every tear
behind my eyes. I am taking in every syllable of every word, and
staring into her eyes for as long as they are open. Piece by piece
I am absorbing her essence deep into my soul where it can not
escape, where I can keep it safe until the end of time. We are in
the house that will transition Lilee from earth to heaven. That
will transition me from being a mother of a toddler to a woman with
a broken heart and soul.

I am the calm before the storm.

Chelsey.

Below, Lilee-Jean and her Dad have an "eye-to-eye" moment on their Christmas morning.  Andrew wrote these words on their return from Hawaii.  They touched me deeply and I reprint them here because they say so much about family and about love and about the power of an innocent child.

This is my family. (Written after Hawaii trip in may)

August 28, 2013 at 6:17pm

How Ironic does it seem that I am so sad after having one of the best weeks of my life.
Why would I be upset, after enjoying the most magical vacation ever and creating so many life long lasting memories with two people I love?

Of course the simple answer is, it's over.

But it is so much more in depth then just that simple phrase. We have to leave behind a facade of being a happy, healthy, normal family....Maybe even more sad is that we needed to put on the facade in the first place.
And those simple words, "it's over" seem to be all to common in our lives. It seems we have been told in one way or another that "it's over" so many times and It just gets harder and harder no matter what the circumstance. I don't want ANYTHING to be over these days. Story time, singing songs goodnight, jumping on the trampoline, or a good relaxing game of golf! I wish it could all go on for ever, and nothing needed to change.

Now we are heading home again, with another dreaded MRI date lurking In the near future. This test will most likely tell us again that "it's over."

Chelsey put it best in a tweet that I can't think of without completely breaking down. A quote out of a Disney movie by a kind of cute, freaky looking blue thing. Oddly enough, this was LJ's favorite Disney chAracter. Im certain he is her favorite because she understands the importance of this exact quote. (I'm saving it until the end incase you too can't fight back the tears enough to continue).

The way LJ treats us is so heart warming. Its the things she does for only mommy and daddy that show us how much she cares about our little family, no matter how small it is. Like when we are eating meals and she cuddles my arm, and then mommys arm, and then both our arms at the same time. Covering us in ketchup. Or the way she would ask, with her head tilting slightly in a slightly higher then normal pitched voice "you wanna go to hawaii mommy? And yooouuu wanna go to hawaii daddy?" She knows that sometimes we need to be reminded that we are in this together. No matter how broken we may be we are still family. And she shows us that because she loves us so much, and there is nothing I am more thankful for in the world.

I've made a lot of mistakes in life. Everyone does. But some of my selfish mistakes have aided in the brokenness of our little family. I will never regret anything more then that in my life. I have a daughter who loves me unconditionally, whom I love unconditionally. And a "baby momma" who allows this broken family to keep working through our hardships. I am a very VERY lucky dad. And I think I have the strongest, most beautiful, loving family in the world.
So here it is, the simplest, most meaningful quote an intergalactic being has ever uttered.
"This is my family. It may be small, and broken, but it's my family and it's good. Yeah, it's good." - Stitch (Lilo and Stitch) 

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Two trucks full of snow arrived, courtesy of the Chilliwack Hockey Team (I hope I have that right) and here, her dad and a few members of the team unload it.  

I took the photo below at the picnic that Chelsea and Andrew organized so that some of Lilee-Jean's friends and fans could have the opportunity to meet her and feel something of her incredible spirit and energy.  The teenager in the photo was, I know, forever touched by Lilee.  I didn't get her name, but her mom told me she had come to the picnic to gain a glimmer of understanding of that relationship that her daughter had been talking about.  I know that young girl and her mom are grieving this morning, but they will find comfort in time in the fact that they brought one more touch of happiness to a child's life that was the epitome of joy.  Again, "eye-to-eye" contact.  Lilee had extraordinary abilities and knowing how to connect is one of them..  she seemed to look right into the heart of those she loved.

There was more.  Much more.  But in the end, the day after their Christmas celebration, Lilee took a sudden turn for the worse.  She and her parents moved into the hospice where they continued to soak up as much of her beautiful light as they could.  Last evening, after learning that she had passed away, I walked down the hill to Jericho Beach.  

There are often beautiful sunsets by the beach, but it's hard not to feel the extraordinary light, with its range of pinks and chorals and mauves was coming straight from Lilee-Jean.

As Chris Weir, the principal of the school that Lilee attended for just one day, posted this morning: 
"Goodbye to our beautiful kindergarten angel, Lilee-Jean Putt. In your short time here, you touched people in such a way that leaves a legacy that makes this world closer, stronger and filled with more love. You have forever changed me and your story will live on through so many of us. All our love... Sweet dreams, beautiful girl."  
My response to him is an attempt to convey the depth of the impact Lilee-Jean made on me, and I believe, on the world.
Beautifully put, Chris. Your words have spoken for me, and I know, for so many of us. We are changed. Bless your dear little heart, Lilee-Jean!