WEBVTT

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[sil.]

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Hi, I\'m Brett Hardy. I live
in Oakland, California with

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my cousin Lori and her husband David.
I\'m a very normal teenager.

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I like playing my guitar, I love
listening to rock music, it\'s, it\'s very

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loud and parents don\'t like it very much.
But in at least one way,

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I\'m not normal. My mother
died when I was 10 of breast

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cancer. This is my story and
I wanna share it with you.

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It may seem like a nightmare
but it\'s, it\'s real.

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But this is not just about my
mother dying\' it\'s about our life,

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our love and just going on

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and being helped. This is about
how I coped when mommy died.

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My family calls itself the Hoblaha\'s.

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We each have different last names. Ah,
Lori\'s last name is Hope, David\'s

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last name is Blake and my last name is
uhm, Hardy so we combined that together

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and it\'s Ho-Bla-Ha. We go on walks.

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And David like to play basketball.

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And we just do family things. So I

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better go back to the beginning
give you ah, some background. My

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mom graduated from medical school and just
about a year later she got pregnant with me.

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I was born on April 12,

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1985 in Highlands Ranch, Colorado which
is a plain community outside of Denver.

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Hi angel. Say hi, daddy.

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Highlands Ranch is uhm,

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a very white, people who
have of a lot of money, and

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they go shopping a lot,
they go to malls. And

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uhm, you can\'t see any power
lines, they\'re all underground and

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everybody has ah, two kids,
a dog and a goldfish.

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For my childhood was very happy. I,

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I had everything packed with anything
I wanted. I have ah, two parents,

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ah, I had a big house, I was then

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pretty well. We went on
Easter egg hunts, went skiing

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and sledgering and all kinds
of Colorado-based things.

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But then when I was three,

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something really big happened.
Uhm, we took my mom to

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the hospital. I remember it was at
night, my dad and my mom and me

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we drove to the hospital and we dropped her off,
we let her out and she didn\'t come back for

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two days. This is because she was
having uhm, a double mastectomy

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to an operation to get rid
of her breast cancer.

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So this was the first time
she was diagnosed and being

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a three year old lad no idea what cancer
meant. Why she went to the hospital

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and when she would come back or if she would
come back. Except for that ah, immediate

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ah, flight. I wasn\'t that much
of... I wasn\'t affected that much

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because my dad reassured me, told me she was
coming home, told me everything would be okay

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and we had my favorite meal. We had ah,

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microwavable pasta and meat
and we watched Ghostbusters.

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One great thing about my childhood was meeting
my best friend Liz who lived across the street.

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Liz.

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I\'m bad. She\'s good.

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Liz and I were completely crazy.
We would play, we would dress up.

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Pet go. Then go away.

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This doggy said he don\'t like us.

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We did, we did everything together. We watched
movies. Wherever we would go, we would go together.

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We were like twins. We were
like each other\'s shadow.

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She really help me just play

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and does not have to worry
about my mom being sick.

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And if I wanted to talk with her, she was
there for me to talk with her. So it\'s a

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big thing. When I was seven, my

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parents ah, got a divorce and it was

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really scaring for me but
it was very overshadowed by

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my mom getting sick again a
couple of months later. And

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there was nothing the doctors could do
with her with ah, conventional treatment

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of chemotherapy so she un...
Underwent uhm, experimental

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operation called a bone marrow transplant.
She\'s basically in the hospital bed

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for a month. My biggest fear
was that my mom would die.

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Nothing was set in stone anymore. Uhm,

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my world was a world of uhm, water.
I felt like I could... it, it would

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just slip in my fingers if I didn\'t hold
on tight enough. So I felt my mom could

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die, my dad could die, my whole world could
go away if I just don\'t hold on tight

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enough and keep myself together.
After the bone marrow transplant,

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my mom went into her mission which was the
time for us to get closer. And her mission is

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when uhm, she doesn\'t have cancer anymore.
So we decided

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to expand our family. We got
ah, Basset Hound named Belle.

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She was a fun dog to have around.
So that helped me a lot

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having somebody to play with. My mom

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find out she was going to die in Oc... in
October. When she told me right before I turn

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on the television one time and I, I said,
\"How many times that we heard that before.\"

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Cuz with her lots of times.\" And she said, \"No,
I know this time it\'s really going to happen.\"

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So I just started crying, for some
reason I picked up the phone and

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called up my teacher, my fifth grade
teacher, and I just told her uhm,

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what was happening. I think I just cried
on the phone for a while. I couldn\'t feel

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emotions very, very clearly and I
didn\'t remember very many things.

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I just kind of... I lost my concentration.
I was kind of you know, gone for a

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couple of weeks. We\'d got rid of
this thing, this thing so many times

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and it just seemed like uhm, God or
something was just... would just now let us

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get away from it. I was
really angry and uhm,

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I didn\'t project my anger at
anyone in speci... in specific

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but it was just an anger at the world
and the universe on how things

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works. Uhm, after that I

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found I was going to go live with Lori and David
rather than ah, live with my Dad or somebody else

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because uhm, my dad wasn\'t
able to race a child at

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that point in his life. So uhm,
by default, Lori and David

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got me. Lori and I met. I
didn\'t know her all that well

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so I wasn\'t sure what, what
life was going to be like. Hmm,

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and I remember this is gonna sound shallow and I don\'t
think I\'ve ever told her this but sure she\'ll don\'t

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like this. Uhm, I remember wondering.

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This was the first thought that came
in my, my mind when I was about ah,

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moving to Oakland and live with Lori and David. I
thought, \"Are they going to pay with the same allowance?\"

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I don\'t know why but that\'s
was the first thought that

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came in my mind, \"Are they going to pay me the
same allowance?\" Cuz I got five dollars a week and

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you know, who can\'t beat five dollars a week?
So yes, they didn\'t pay me the same allowance.

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But uhm, I saw another
question so they flew out

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and I thought they were kind of
strange Californians. I, I, I

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never met Californians like these people.
My mom just left

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in said, \"You\'ll get used to it.\"
Towards the end in November,

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I had a hospice councilor coming.
We played a game where you throw

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the football to s... to one person and if they,
if they caught it, they can ask you a question

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and it could be anything from
how do you feel when your mom

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is having a seizure to what\'s your
favorite movie, you know. So she,

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she let me bite off what I
could choose so to speak uhm,

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of grieve... of the grieving process.

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[music]

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When my mom died in December, December
6, the first day of winter break for me

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ah, I finally grasp that she died.

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And I remember that my
ah, cousin, my cousin

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Julie had told me when my grandma died...
that the day they died you\'re not supposed to

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think about it. You think about it
the next day. So I went back inside

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and I played a game with my two friends and
I said, \"I\'ll think about it tomorrow.\"

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Couple of days later, there
was a funeral service for my

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mom and I remember feeling nothing but

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guilt through that whole service
because everybody was crying.

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Everybody was crying but I wasn\'t crying.
I was the only... I think the only

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person who didn\'t have a handkerchief or a
clean exhale up to their nose the entire time.

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I didn\'t, I didn\'t cry the whole funeral.
I was just too much in shock

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to be sad. All I feel was guilty that
I should be the one not being sad.

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Ah, but sometimes your
emotions come at certain

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different... they, they come in and waves.
Sometimes you... or especially when you

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hear something has happened, i... it
doesn\'t comprehend quite quick enough.

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It takes, it takes uhm, days, weeks
even months to fully understand

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that the person is gone.

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But a week after that, December
15th I flew out to live with

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Lori and David. I never been to Oakland
before. I had no idea what it\'s going to be

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like. The first time I noticed is
these, these wooden poles sticking

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out of the ground with wires between them. The
power lines. There weren\'t with that power

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lines in Highlands Ranch, they we\'re all
underground. I had to sleep in the living room

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the first couple of weeks that I was there.
All my stuff which is piled up on the kitchen

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counter and the living room and that box
is in box and the box is lots of stuff.

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Then I moved into Lori\'s
office and we got Belle.

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Belle came out with Ayuho(ph) and
fit right in with her family.

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Belle, get off from the chair. Say hi
to the camera. Smile to the camera.

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Belle, Belle. Belle, Belle.

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Pretty early on before even my room
was ready and my stuff had arrived,

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I twisted my ankle and...
Uhm, on the steps outside

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my house. And I think that
actually played a very...

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I think that was more of a
blessing than a curse because uhm,

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it gave Lori and David a
chance to take care of me.

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My new family had a completely
different family dynamic. I had a, a

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father in the household for the
first time and three years

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having a dad was the most
different thing from my uhm, old

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family. But it was a very good thing.
Brettster(ph). What?

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I got to tell you on tape. Please get down.

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Because you\'re in your very good clothes.
Okay. No having fun in good clothes. It\'s

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against the law. (inaudible)

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right here in my home. Okay, I\'m done.

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I started my new school in
the fifth grade Redwood

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Day. I had never been put in a social situation
quite as difficult as switching schools.

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This place is referred to as the palace.
I actually thought of it

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more as a way to get a new start, you know.
Maybe I\'d be the most popular kid in the class.

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Maybe I won\'t, who knows? I
quickly made a couple of friends

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who\'d be really good friends for me.

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Pretty much from the time it was
about four, at that time I was about

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I guess 11½, I had sleeping troubles.

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In Highlands Ranch I sleep
with uhm, the TV on

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and I said put the light on. The lights was a fear
of the dark that I used to have, that I don\'t have

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anymore. And the TV was something
I could listen to and fall

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asleep to because I didn\'t
like my own thoughts. My own

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thoughts were not very pleasant, my thoughts were about my mom, what was going
to happen to her and if I was listening to the TV I won\'t have to listen to

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my own thoughts. When I came to
Oakland, I still kept the TV on

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and the light on but ah, eventually,
I turned the light off like

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I could sleep without the light and just the TV, the
light from the TV. That I could listen and then,

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we changed it to the fan.
And I would sleep with

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the night light and the fan and
then, after that I would sleep

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with my night light. Slowly,
I would sleep with no

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noise and no light. Lori and
David tried to help me cope

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when I first came by sending me to personal
therapist which is what I\'ve done my

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life... my whole life. And
ah, but that didn\'t seem to

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work for me. I couldn\'t
really tell my feelings

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freely with personal therapists
and so if we would stand

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up playing games or doing something
and I would just you know,

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answer their questions politely and I that
would be the end but I would have no emotions.

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So and that we heard on
about a uhm, a place called

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PediatriCare run by the East Bay Agency
for Children. Okay. So who has a feeling

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that come up... that comes
up with the (inaudible)

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. I was kind of guilty that uhm,

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one time ah, my mom wanted me to
go somewhere with her and I didn\'t

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go and that was like the day after she found
out she was going to die so I felt guilty

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about not going. The idea was
that ah, the best people

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to help kids who are dealing with a loss
is kids who are dealing with a loss.

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So I put you know, 12 kids in a group
of who have all loss someone special

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to them and then they have uhm,
instructors who kind of lead the group,

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talk about certain things. And it
normalizes loss and makes it so

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you\'re not dally and you
help the person who\'s

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the weird one. Or you might
wanna put happy, anger

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feelings too because ah, happy
is also a feeling that they

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could finally live in peace, you know?
We would write down all our feelings

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cuz if we, we know our feelings and
we can realize our feelings then,

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we can off power over them. We can
know how to deal with them. You kinda

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felt worried that your other special person would die
like your other parent? It\'s kinda like (inaudible)

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in mind but I (inaudible)

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my parents get sick you know, it\'s kind

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of... even if it\'s just a cold you know, we
have to go to the hospital just kind of

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nerve-wrecking for me. When
I wanna show my anger I...

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Punch a pillow.

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In PediatriCare we do an activity
called ah, the bubble doll.

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When I get mad I wish I could... Just

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punch the person back. Oh, just
punch the bubble doll. Oh, yeah. It

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feels good to deal anger in that way
because it uhm, it helps you realize that

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anger as a rough physical emotion. It, it...
Sometimes it needs to be expressed physically

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by moving, such a good way
to move and you know, punch

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by not be hurting somebody. So how many of
you guys felt like you didn\'t go to say

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goodbye? Yeah. That\'s a
hard one especially when

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someone dies. We would write letters to, to
people who had died same things that we,

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we didn\'t get to say which is
helpful because uhm, sometimes

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if we feel we\'re guilty that didn\'t say something
and do something if you all uhm, they,

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they didn\'t get to say goodbye. So
those gave a chance to say goodbye by

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writing a letter. Dear dad, you are

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my inspiration when I play sports in school. I
write a poem for you the night before you die

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that you never hear and sometimes I read
it to you and it makes me feel better.

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Uhm, I just wrote dear mom I wish we could gone
to the Hanna House together. I didn\'t know that

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you\'re going to die. If I did, I would
have gone. To write that letter to my

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mom was a way of... I guess

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knowing that she accepted my apology.
And knowing that it

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made me feel better, it
let me released the uhm,

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regret that I had. My question is why did

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my special person die and not
somebody else? The, the parents and

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the kids got together and they
asked questions on one another.

00:18:45.000 --> 00:18:49.999
Questions they won\'t feel safe asking.
Do you think it is

00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:54.999
your fault that our special person died?
Uhm, I do feel

00:18:55.000 --> 00:18:59.999
that way sometimes because uhm, my daughter\'s
dad and my husband died of a heart

00:19:00.000 --> 00:19:04.999
attack and I just wish so many times
that I could have helped him more and

00:19:05.000 --> 00:19:09.999
maybe he was under a lot of pressure, stress
and that I wish I could have been there

00:19:10.000 --> 00:19:14.999
more for him. To make sure that I take
care of my grieving as my life goes on,

00:19:15.000 --> 00:19:19.999
I\'m going to use the coping mechanisms
that I\'ve learned from PediatriCare.

00:19:20.000 --> 00:19:24.999
I wrote a poem about ah,
my mother\'s death and my

00:19:25.000 --> 00:19:29.999
feelings around it. My skin
is white and so am I, with

00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:34.999
fears of death and loss. Cancer cells and
long black caskets fill my mind with

00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:39.999
thoughts. So bleaking cold that I one
day will fall to this is(ph) pray. I

00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:44.999
succumb my tears just long enough to say
that I won\'t be caught in this big mouse

00:19:45.000 --> 00:19:49.999
trap without a fight. And I will climb
this fortress walls with all my might.

00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:54.999
And although I feel a part of me has been
taken rather fast, I know that this memory

00:19:55.000 --> 00:19:59.999
and all this pain was soon become the past.
Although this dolphin was wounded, it will soon

00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:04.999
swim again. And I will come to
realize that the end is not the end.

00:20:05.000 --> 00:20:09.999
What that means is

00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:14.999
uhm, the dolphin the part is that my mom loved to
go swimming with the dolphins. It was something

00:20:15.000 --> 00:20:19.999
she felt healed and rejuvenated her.
And so though this

00:20:20.000 --> 00:20:24.999
dolphin is wounded meaning me and
my lost uhm, he will soon swim

00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:29.999
again, it will be okay. Uhm, and I
will come to realize that the end

00:20:30.000 --> 00:20:34.999
being my mom\'s death is
not the end of the world.

00:20:35.000 --> 00:20:39.999
Uhm, I learned how to do uhm, how
to express my feelings through

00:20:40.000 --> 00:20:44.999
artwork. This is a piece of
artwork I did and it\'s a collage.

00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:49.999
I did it in art class. We had
to have a theme and so I

00:20:50.000 --> 00:20:54.999
did mine on a tribute to my mother. And that\'s
supposed to be my mother in the middle as a

00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:59.999
child. The jewels just something that I cut out
cuz I thought it was, it was really pretty and

00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:04.999
it fit. And she has a
gift wrap all over her,

00:21:05.000 --> 00:21:09.999
it means that she was a real gift
to everybody she was friends with.

00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:14.999
In front of that she has a little guy that he says
terminated. Yes, that\'s what basically my mom was.

00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:19.999
The left side was things that
occurred while she was alive.

00:21:20.000 --> 00:21:24.999
There is dogs, there is
cruises, there is Florida

00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:29.999
palm tree, there\'s doctor, there is candy.
We love candy,

00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:34.999
we have big, sweet tooth. The
lowest part represents what first

00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:39.999
happened, my mother was cremated and she\'s
holding ah, her will and a letter to

00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:44.999
me and so it drifts up her spirit and

00:21:45.000 --> 00:21:49.999
meanwhile on appear on Earth there is her
gravestone and a picture of my missile

00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:54.999
hit cuz that\'s what my world felt like.
And then the

00:21:55.000 --> 00:21:59.999
blue, blue dashed going into which
represents her spirit going into the bird

00:22:00.000 --> 00:22:04.999
which represents her being free
of her cancer and her pain.

00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:09.999
My acute grieving is definitely over now

00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:14.999
uhm, I was just being maybe I\'ll, I\'ll want
my mom around at a certain time and she won\'t

00:22:15.000 --> 00:22:19.999
be there. I remember something far that I...
We did and I realize I\'ll never see her

00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:24.999
again. And that\'s one uhm,
I have more grief but the

00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:29.999
acute grieving\'s over. I cope
with uhm, missing my mom by just

00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:34.999
missing my mom. My

00:22:35.000 --> 00:22:39.999
mother may be dead and my, my life is
completely changed but that wasn\'t mean

00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:44.999
I have to forget my mother. I
have ah, pictures all over the

00:22:45.000 --> 00:22:49.999
house and I have part of
my mom\'s ashes in a little

00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:54.999
canister with dolphins on it. And I have a
little place in my room with her pictures

00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.999
and ah, a candle. A

00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:04.999
big part of my ah, dealing with
my loss were Lori and David.

00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:09.999
Without them I don\'t know how I could have made it through
because they were s... they\'ve been so supportive

00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:14.999
of me. Ah, help me with this
documentary ah, talked to me,

00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:19.999
tell whatever I needed to do.
So uhm, I would encourage

00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:24.999
adults around children who are grieving
to do the same. Most important

00:23:25.000 --> 00:23:29.999
thing is to let people know that
you\'re there for them, people who

00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:34.999
have lost somebody. You can send them to therapy, you can
send them with a group therapy. But what was gonna matter the

00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:39.999
most in their grieving
process is their uhm,

00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:44.999
intercluster of close families and friends.

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:49.999
If there\'s somebody grieving I would
suggest to sending him a card

00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:54.999
every week saying hi, how you doing, cuz
writing them a letter, giving him a call

00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.999
every now and then. You know, letting him know
that they are not even sincerely saying,\"

00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.999
Oh. Hey, I can talked to you about ah, your mom
dying or sister is dying, whenever you want.\"

00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:09.999
but just saying uhm, \"Call me whenever
you want, talking about your life.\"

00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:14.999
You know, just uhm, interact, ah,

00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:19.999
communicate. I made this documentary to

00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:24.999
help people and ah, I hope that

00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:29.999
it helps children to understand
grief a little better,

00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:34.999
help parents and adult to understand
children who are grieving a little

00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:39.999
better and I hope it just ah,

00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:44.999
get people ah, more informed.

00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:49.999
Your loss cannot make you
sad, loss can make you

00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:54.999
completely depressed or loss
can make you sad and help

00:24:55.000 --> 00:24:59.999
people. Cuz in every loss there is
learning. There\'s something you can learn

00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:04.999
and you can teach people and uhm,
help them when they lose something.

00:25:05.000 --> 00:25:09.999
So that\'s what I like about
helping cuz I feel like that

00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.999
all these grief is not going to waste.

00:25:15.000 --> 00:25:23.000
[music]