Eternal Love

The school year 2016-17 in our town started with a dark fall season ending in a darker winter. The school community was mourning, grieving and learning to cope with the deaths of two current students and two past students who took their own lives. Then on a cold, dark winter evening in January when I entered my daughter’s room, she was in shock and unconsolable. “It’s a fifth grader....he is so young...only ten!” That evening is etched in my mind. If it took so much for our family to come to terms with this incident, I wondered what the boy’s family would have gone through. It has been more than four years since this incident, when quite coincidentally I noticed a page set up by a mother in the memory of her radiant boy. I was drawn to this duo and as I looked deeper caught sight of innumerable posts - some touching, some heartbreaking, but mostly inspiring, and tremendously positive in the face of an unthinkable tragedy.

My throat tightened as I read “Sometimes it feels like he is just off somewhere being Tylen. I keep waiting for him to just appear with that grin on his face and the twinkle in his eye. I don’t think that will ever go away”. There is no timeline to overcome insurmountable grief. But in the face of the worst, extreme anguish and heartache, and an experience that a mother could never be prepared for, Emma Lewis Cunningham had turned her son’s memory into the “March Into Kindness Month” fundraiser. It was only eight weeks from the fateful day when an impulsive act went out of control and she lost her sweet, funny, big-hearted ten-year-old boy.

I cannot start to imagine the courage of a mother and her eternal love, as she resolved to make her little boy a part of a continued campaign for kindness. The kindness, which he embodied during his short yet memorable life! Tylen had a vision of a kind, peaceful world which he put together in this graphic. He wanted no one to be lacking or want for life’s basic necessities, which included love, family, equity and safety. Raised in a family which valued charitable giving, little Tylen utilized every opportunity to share with children who lacked these. In the true spirit of the season of giving, he wished for one Christmas present to be clothes for a homeless child. He loved animals, never wanting to hurt any and his favorite charity was the World Wildlife Fund. People who interacted with him remembered him to be a kind, fun, goofball who was trying to bring a smile on people’s faces. “The hardest part wasn't losing you, it was continuing to live without you”. How does a mother overcome this unsurmountable pain and pull together the strength to move on with her life?

In the wake of her unimaginable loss, Emma is the epitome of trying to heal by helping others. Other than running the March Into Kindness fundraiser, where she puts together kitchen starter kits for HGRM and food kits for food insecure kids through Kylees in Leominster , she does a fundraiser in October for warm clothing for Boston Rescue Mission and Lowell Transitional in supporting Tylen’s wish that everyone should have a home, food and clothing. There are drop boxes around town, where people leave their donations for the Spring and Fall fundraisers. Emma is grateful for the community support which has allowed her to continue supporting and even ramping up these charities for four years and going. I can picture Tylen looking down and shining brighter as his wishes continue to be fulfilled through Emma’s relentless deeds of kindness.

Emma’s strength and resilience in her work are commendable. Beyond her charitable work, in the times when there is so much stigma around speaking up about mental illness, I truly applaud her for being a vocal advocate for suicide prevention. “Beautiful people with big hearts, bright smiles and demons in this world they thought no one could help them with. We need this to stop, we need to start talking about it and demanding change. We need to stop pretending it will never affect us because I’m here to tell you IT CAN and when you finally realize that, it may be too late”. Emma’s powerful words shook me to my core. I learned of a surprising statistic from CDC, that in the US between 1999-2019, intentional self-harm (suicide) was one of the leading causes of death amongst the age group of 10-14. In the US, 1 in 5 adults is living with mental illness, but the stigma of mental illness can prevent people from reaching out and getting the help they need. The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) brings out the 9 ways to fight mental illness stigma. If there is even the slightest doubt, we have to speak up, like Emma says, and ask for help. And there are numerous resources, starting with one’s primary care provider (PCP). The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) recommends these tips to start a conversation with one’s PCP and request a screening. There is no shame in getting evaluated and asking for help if one needs to. NIMH also recommend keeping the suicide prevention hotline numbers handy because one can’t be too careful in such matters. ( https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ 1-800-273-8255 or 1-800-273-TALK).

Tylen will be remembered not only for his acts of kindness, but for the sweet, funny, strong-willed, curious, fearless, big-hearted goofball that he was! He will be remembered for wanting everyone to have food, clothes, home and family. He will be remembered for his love for animals and little children. And he will be remembered most through the eternal love of his family, especially his Mother! Happy Mother’s Day, Emma Cunningham and may you continue on your journey of kindness !