Sometimes You Just Know

We were friends for 87 days before we started dating. Despite being told you should date someone taller, prettier, smarter, more religious, you asked me out.

When asked why, you said YOU KNEW.

We dated for 438 days before we were married. Despite being told we were too young, to wait till you were out of the Navy, marry someone from the same religion, we tied the knot.

When asked why, we said WE KNEW.

By December 19, 1995, we had been married 620 days. I woke up that morning with our growing baby in my stomach and a sinking feeling I couldn’t shake. When I heard about a fatal car accident on the radio while driving to work, my heart stopped. Despite being told it was hormones, paranoia or my imagination, when the State Trooper walked through the door, I hung my head.

©Jodie Beckstein
©Jodie Beckstein

When asked why, I said I KNEW.

When you left this world my heart felt it, I KNEW. How do you bury your soulmate, your unborn child’s father, your rock? How do you plan a funeral for your husband when you are 21 years old? How do you move forward and live again?

GOD had given me a piece of Ben in our unborn child to help me go on. HE KNEW.

Today, you have been gone for 7,306 days (20 years). Sometimes it feels like yesterday, other times it feels like a lifetime ago. You have almost been gone as long as you were here. But your memory lives on through your family and friends, through your beautiful child and through me. I have been blessed with a second chance at a powerful love, like the one I had lost. A chance to be whole again, to have another child and to live.

Thank you for loving me. Thank you for taking a chance on our love. Thank you for choosing to walk your short journey on this earth beside me.








Jodie Beckstine Killian

Jodie Beckstine Killian has always been a little different. Growing up in a small Wisconsin town she stood out from the rest as a person born with Hypochondroplasia. As a budding entertainer, this wasn’t a disability but a “super” ability that allowed her to get noticed, but not always in the way she hoped. Stares, discrimination and cruel comments are something she deals with daily and writes about often. She currently lives in Florida. (She doesn’t miss Wisconsin winters). She works in marketing, social media and is currently writing her first novel.

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Jodie Beckstine Killian has always been a little different. Growing up in a small Wisconsin town she stood out from the rest as a person born with Hypochondroplasia. As a budding entertainer, this wasn’t a disability but a “super” ability that allowed her to get noticed, but not always in the way she hoped. Stares, discrimination and cruel comments are something she deals with daily and writes about often. She currently lives in Florida. (She doesn’t miss Wisconsin winters). She works in marketing, social media and is currently writing her first novel.

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