Before I get to Francis, I want to thank you all for coming here and recognizing him here in our Church.
If anything that has come out of this experience is that community and family is so important. We have been blessed by all of you and those who aren’t here with support both material and spiritual. We are loved.
Kate and I were talking a couple nights ago and the statement that came out of that conversation – was that we will always be a family of five. We might not all be here together, but Frankie will always be a part of our family.
We would not have chosen to do anything different with our time with him. Even if we were given the same diagnosis and the same result would occur. We had a perfect day with our son. Frankie was this stubborn Pyles from the beginning, and he was also the sweetest. Neither of our older kids warmed up to me like Francis did.
He fought from the very beginning. Crying as he was born and peeing immediately. He loved his head stroked, loved to cuddle against his mama’s chest, and loved to be held. He turned to his sister and brother’s voices and smiled at them. He was fully with us from the beginning. He always kicked back when he was in utero when his siblings hugged Kate’s belly. He always moved at the sound of my voice. Frankie wanted to share himself with us, which is I guess one reason why we are here today, to share him with you and we will continue to do so for as long as we can.
Something else that came to me as I sat down to write this, is that despite us wanting there to be a larger “plan” or looking for where God and his Spirit could be, we saw Him through all of this. We didn’t think we’d be able to hear Frankie’s voice, but we did. We didn’t think we would spend more than a couple hours with him, but we spent almost 24. We didn’t think that we would be able to meet him, but man, did we.
Kate and I know Frankie. Our hearts opened a new room as soon as we set our eyes on him. Our love for him was no longer this theoretical, abstract thing. I would do anything in my power to keep my son safe and out of harm’s way and in this case, it meant letting him go.
There will be plenty of hard days, weeks, months, and years ahead for us. They will all be worth it though, because we were able to spend that day with Frankie.
We often think that children belong to parents and yes, in a certain sense this is true, but they are also a Gift. There is clearly a Will involved when these little souls come to us at conception and we as parents are just stewards. We care, protect, and nurture these precious ones, but we don’t own them.
And this is certainly true in Frankie’s case. We gave him the best life we could imagine for him, knowing that his body would not work as it was supposed to. And you know what? That’s okay. He wouldn’t be our Frankie otherwise.
Francis Benedict was our son. Francis Benedict is our son. And he was enough. People even before his death would tell me that his life would mean something down the line or that his death would impact so many people or that our story would be such a gift to many people and I can’t discredit that because it has.
But I will say that Frankie can simply be. He can simply exist. It didn’t matter that he had Trisomy 18. In fact, we don’t even resent his genetic abnormality. Or that he died so soon after being welcomed into the Church and meeting us. It was enough that he was able to experience our love and live with us, even if it was only for a blink of an eye.
It’s a little surreal to me, that he is gone. In the last five years, I’ve buried a mother and now a son. I thought a few weeks ago that something would harden or that I would be angry, but I’m not, at least not right now. Instead, all I feel is love.
We miss our son terribly, especially whenever we venture into his would be nursery that he will never see. Yet, he doesn’t have to suffer or struggle and we wouldn’t have wanted him to bear it any longer than he did.
Once Frankie was born he was driving the boat. He chose how long he would be around and he chose when to slip away. He may not have chosen his genes, but he fought to be with us for as long as he could.
Another final image that has emerged in the past few days, is this old Catholic symbol of a pelican digging into its breast in order to feed its hungry chicks with its own flesh and blood. While this echoes Christ’s sacrifice for us, it also echoes Kate and I’s parental love. The grief is powerful, but the incredibly deep love that we have for Frankie is what has kept us going and continues to keep us going through all of this.
We love you Francis, it is a privilege being your parents, and we cannot wait to meet you again.
This, and More 