3/24/2024 0 Comments Alisa samsonova sandWhile the world ponders the anniversary, the four of them will spend the day together, insulated from news reports and reporters. And through it all, the Parkers agree, they’ve learned how to not only manage the aftermath of the most profound kind of loss, but to be present for others who face challenges.īut some moments, including a succession of Dec. Friends have also helped immensely, while strangers have been both incredibly kind and cruel. They are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and faith has been an anchor and a salve. She and Robbie started The Emilie Parker Art Connection to bring art - which Emilie loved - to other kids across the country. Alissa wrote a book, “ An Unseen Angel: A Mother’s Story of Faith, Hope and Healing After Sandy Hook.” She co-founded Safe and Sound Schools with Michele Gay, whose daughter Josephine was also killed at Sandy Hook. The Parkers have spent a decade honoring Emilie’s memory, but also keeping life - and childhood - as normal as possible for their other girls. Sometimes Alissa wonders what her firstborn would be doing - what she’d be like in what would have been her 16th year. Her little sisters Madeline, now 14, and Samantha, 13, have aged well beyond Emilie. She is frozen in that stage of development, Alissa’s memory of the moment both fond and fraught. Emilie was just beginning to understand the concept of connections and was excitedly pointing out that some of the flowers had black centers and pink petals, while others had pink centers and black petals. The morning that Emilie died, Alissa and Emilie had been admiring the black and pink flowers painted on the wall of the little girl’s bedroom. And that’s no longer as scary as it used to be,” he said. They can exist in the same place at the same time. And we can also carry with us the pain of losing somebody and the sorrow associated with that. We can enjoy the things that make us happy. “We have learned how to be able to hold two things. “You can’t look at my wife and my girls - at our family - and not agree that we’re very, very blessed and we have a lot to be grateful for,” he told the Deseret News this week. And in a year marked by not just a milestone anniversary of the deaths of Emilie and many of her small classmates, but also by a lawsuit the Parkers won against a talk show host who claimed the killings were a hoax, Robbie Parker said he finds himself wanting to talk less about how traumatizing and hurtful events have been, and more about his family’s growth and how normal in many ways life now is once more. 14, marks the 10th anniversary of the shooting at the elementary school. That faith evolves and matures as surely as grief changes. That laughter comes back and grief, while never far away, is often replaced with fond, fun memories that bring joy. They’ve learned that you can live through unspeakable loss and come out strong, though you never forget or stop missing the one who was taken. Alissa and Robbie Parker have learned a lot in the decade since their daughter Emilie, just 6 years old, was killed by a shooter at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, along with 19 other children and six adults.
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