Taunton cop walks 6-year-old daughter down the aisle before she loses battle with illness
TAUNTON — This is a love story.
It is a story of grief and grit and the determination to seize moments of joy amid heartbreaking loss, not once but twice.
It is the story of a radiant little girl who loved life so much she crawled when she could no longer walk and never, never stopped dancing.
“She lit up the room. You were happy just being around her,” Taunton Police Officer Jeremy Derosier said of his 6-year-old daughter Aubriella, who lost her battle with mitochondrial disease on Oct. 8.
It is the same illness that claimed the life of her baby brother Bryce “Almighty Brycey” Derosier on June 27, 2018 at just 16 months old.
“They chose us as parents and we did the best we could and hopefully when we see them again they’ll say we did a good job,” Jeremy Derosier said Monday.
Jeremy’s wife Jamie said she remembers the day she found out she was pregnant with Aubriella, the “beginning of the happiest moments” of Jamie’s life.
“From the beginning my arms wrapped around you providing you comfort, support and the best love I knew,” Jamie said at Aubriella’s funeral at Saint Mary’s Church in Norton, where the family lives, on Friday, Oct. 15.
All Jamie ever wanted was to be a mother, she said. She knew from the start she would name her daughter Aubriella and their “love began to grow,” Jamie said.
“Aubriella was my best friend, the most lovable person I knew, she could make me laugh from my toes,” Jamie said.
After Bryce died, Jamie said losing her beautiful, sweet little boy, who had such grace and quiet strength, was indescribably difficult. But he left a giant legacy of bringing people together and showing them how to love and be kind.
More:‘Fly high sweet Bryce’: Derosier family says good-bye to All Mighty Brycey
Losing his exuberant, magical, unforgettable sister Aubriella is also unspeakably hard. But she also gave the world a gift, Jamie said at Aubriella’s funeral.
“Her time was the blessing. Everyone wants to know where it’s going or how it’s ending and she showed the value of the minutes in between,” Jamie said.
To meet Aubriella was to love her, Jamie said.
She was a spunky free spirit who “wrote her own story.”
She loved to dance to techno music. Even when she could no longer stand, she danced from her stroller, Jeremy said.
She was “fashion forward” in her signature upside down heart glasses, Jamie said.
She loved to cover her head in Band-Aids and eat apple slices at McDonald’s which she called “Don Dons.” She wore her favorite outfits, like her pumpkin leggings, whether they were in season or not and didn’t care what anyone thought about it.
“Aubs’ joy lifted the room. Aubs’ laugh filled your heart,” Jamie said.
And if the question was whether to go on an adventure, her answer was always an emphatic, loud, unambiguous yes.
Her tagline was “go, go, go, go.”
She didn’t want to sit still and miss a moment of life, no matter the obstacles, her mother said.
Jamie recalled a trip to the beach when Aubriella was having seizures caused by her mitochondrial disease. But she refused to give up and got past the seizures and spent four hours laughing and playing, swimming in the ocean and building sand castles.
“It was amazing,” Jamie said at her daughter’s funeral.
“She showed us her resiliency and her fight for those moments.”
Back-to-back diagnoses
The Derosiers found out Jamie was pregnant with Bryce on Aubriella’s first birthday “and it felt like we could not have been more blessed, a girl and boy. We bought a new house and it was ‘perfect’,” Jamie said.
But over time they started to notice something was not right with Aubriella. She was weak and didn’t sit up until she was 16 months old. At 2 ½ she still wasn’t walking or talking.
When she was diagnosed with a severe form of mitochondrial disease it came as a shock. Neither Jeremy nor Jamie has the disease — which can cause poor growth, loss of muscle coordination, weakness, neurological problems and learning disabilities, among other things — but it turns out they are both carriers, Jeremy said.
As a precaution they had Bryce tested two weeks later, and he was also diagnosed with the same severe form of mitochondrial disease — even more shocking, because Bryce had no obvious symptoms, Jamie said.
But that would change two weeks later, in February of 2018, when Bryce suffered a 20-hour seizure and ended up in the ICU.
Band of brothers and sisters
That was when Jeremy found he had a band of brothers and sisters to help his family through the crisis.
His fellow Taunton police officers donated 107 shifts and told him, “don’t worry about us,” Jamie said at the time.
They plowed the family’s driveway. They brought them food. And when it came time for Bryce to leave the hospital, when there was nothing more that could be done for him medically, a sea of blue escorted him home.
The department has rallied around the family once again during Aubriella's illness, Jeremy said.
“They’ve been there for the highs and lows. They’ve tailored my life to have to have no thought or concern about my occupation. I don’t know another profession or another department that would do that for me,” Jeremy said Monday.
A downward spiral
Jeremy will always remember Aubriella’s first steps. They came late, when she was nearly 3 years old, but that made the moment all the more remarkable.
And Aubriella could only ever speak about 18 words, but she was smart and funny and found ways to communicate exactly what she was thinking, her father said.
Life held many challenges for her but she was doing well, he said.
Until April. That’s when her health started to decline steeply, he said.
She could no longer walk and near the end even had trouble holding her head up, he said.
So they did for her what she could no longer do for herself, and not just her parents but other family members, friends, classmates, strangers — supporting her literally and figuratively.
On her last day at Joseph C. Solmonese Elementary School in Norton on Monday, Oct. 4, the staff threw a huge party for her, complete with a slide show of photos of Aubriella that had the whole room crying, Jeremy said.
Aubriella was dancing in her stroller and yelling with joy and left the school with bubbles raining down on her — one of her favorite things, Jeremy said.
Aubriella's bucket list
When it became clear Aubriella’s time might be limited the family set out to cross items off her bucket list.
“We just stayed in the moment and asked ourselves, ‘How can we make this the best it can be for her?’” Jeremy said Monday.
She loved beaches, so they visited Ogunquit, Maine, their house stay donated by a family who were complete strangers. As Aubriella’s story was shared on social media, people they didn’t know reached out to help in any way they could, Jeremy said.
Their generosity has inspired him to want to do the same.
Now he asks himself, “Once in a while, can we find a way to make someone smile like Aubs made everyone smile?” he said.
Then on Oct. 5, the family got the royal treatment at the Red Sox-Yankees wild card game at Fenway Park. During the first inning, when the team’s mascots paid Aubriella a visit, she kept kissing Wally on the nose and hugging him. And the team even put a message up on the board welcoming Aubriella, Jeremy said.
Surrounded by love
At about 2 a.m. on Oct. 8, Jeremy and Jamie knew something was changing with Aubriella and called family over, telling them if they wanted to see her, now was the time, Jeremy said Monday.
Everyone stayed. Reassuring and guiding each other. Jamie held Aubriella in her arms for three hours, Jeremy said.
It was gut-wrenching, he said. He felt helpless, not a good feeling. But if such an unthinkable thing had to happen, it was the best possible way it could have happened, he said, with Aubriella surrounded by love, in the arms that had nestled her from the very beginning.
“Aubs’ mind was saying, ‘go, go, go,’ but her body was saying, ‘I’m done’,” Jeremy said.
Would do it again
It was “a perfect storm,” Jeremy said.
Neither Jamie nor Jeremy had any idea they were carriers of mitochondrial disease before Aubriella’s diagnosis, Jeremy said.
You might think, if they’d known, they would have chosen never to have had children to avoid the pain of losing them, Jeremy said.
“But in reality, I’d do it all again, just to have another 16 months with my son and another six-and-a-half years with my daughter,” Jeremy said Monday.
Fairytale wedding
One day, Jamie posted a video saying they might never get a chance to do the things most parents take for granted, like rejoice at Aubriella's wedding.
So, she wanted to experience in the present what they might not get a chance to do in the future.
And someone responded, "Let's help you make that happen," she said.
The person told her, "It doesn't have to be when she's older or when she's chosen someone. She's chosen life with you. You guys have vowed to celebrate every day of life together," Jamie said in Aubriella’s wedding video made by Imperfect Joy Films and Photos.
So on Sept. 14, Jeremy walked his little girl down the aisle at Oakholm Farm in Brookfield by a dazzling lake on a sparkling day.
It was a “fairytale wedding” and Aubriella loved every minute of it, Jeremy said.
“It was probably one of the greatest times of my life,” he said.
They arrived in a horse-drawn carriage, greeted by a “unicorn” wrapped in garlands, captivating Aubriella.
Jamie and Aubriella wore weddings gowns, Jeremy a suit and boutonniere as family and friends looked on. And of course there were bubbles.
“We vowed to be her parents forever,” Jeremy said Monday.
In Aubriella's wedding video, Jamie said, “Maybe these children were given to us to share how to heal through this pain. I don’t know. But they’re the greatest gift I was ever given in life.”
“When Bryce was passing we were lifted up so high and we could have fallen so deep and then to have it happen again with Aubs. People were like, ‘God wouldn’t do that to you twice.’ And it’s happening, but we know that we’ll be okay. Days like this, these beautiful memories — we know that you have to live in the moment,” Jamie said.
“She’ll have a beautiful moment and we’ll cherish that and it will carry us through,” Jamie said.
On the day of the wedding, Aubriella had one of those beautiful moments.
She was sitting in her stroller and her father said, “You look so pretty. Are you looking to have a party tonight?”
Aubriella reached for him and shouted with abandon and a huge smile, “Yeah!”
Jamie said she vowed to Aubriella to sing happy birthday even when it’s not her birthday, “to know that there is no control of any situation, and to give myself grace and her grace in every situation, to know that love is worth fighting for.”
Jeremy put a ring on his daughter’s finger and told her:
“I continue to look back and say it’s an honor to be your parent and know that no matter where we go, where we’re at, you’re there, too.”
Jamie Derosier's sister Danielle Slavin has organized a GoFundMe to support the Desrosier family in this difficult time.