Last updated on September 28th, 2021 at 01:57 pm
As you might imagine, I meet THOUSANDS of twin moms each year. Many of those moms know me as Nat, the founder of Twiniversity, or as Nat the author of “What To Do When You’re Having Two”, but only ONE single twin mom knew me as Nat, the Yahoo Group member in an IVF support group, Tara Telford.
Tonight I found out that she lost her battle with Cystic Fibrosis and I’m broken-hearted.
When people mourn some turn to religion, some turn to family support or to their best friend, I personally find comfort in setting my hands free upon this keyboard. Since I can’t control my crying at least I can control my computer.
I need to tell this story. It’s a story of two women on opposite sides of the country living similar lives.
Tara and I met in a virtual support room for women going through IVF back in 2004 (it may actually have been Nov/Dec of 2003 but my mind is a tiny bit fuzzy right now). I’d been struggling with infertility for years and found this amazing support group online. While my infertility was unexplained, she knew that her cystic fibrosis played the leading role in her issues and IVF allowed her to be particularly careful. Despite all that she has been through her entire life, she knew that there was NOTHING more she ever wanted in life than to be a mom just like I did. I can remember countless nights spent in that chatroom discussing cycles, shots, hopes, dreams and often disappointments. We discussed how some of her family wasn’t 100% thrilled about her wanting children because of the difficulties she would face thanks to her CF. When Tara finished her IVF cycle and got the wonderful news that she was pregnant, in respect for the other women in the IVF group, she left that chat room and graduated to the “Pregnant after IVF” room. I was sad to see her go but prayed that I wasn’t too far behind her.
Wonderfully, within a few weeks of each other, I too graduated to the post IVF board. THEN the big news came, Tara found out there wasn’t ONE heartbeat, there was TWO! What a celebration. I can, believe it or not, still, remember her joy when she got the news. Tara stayed in our chat group but also joined a Pregnant With Twins group also on Yahoo. Spoiler Alert! I graduated to that room very close behind her too.
Going through this portion of my life with a total stranger that knew more than even my own sister did at the time was a life-changing experience. I shared a lot with my friends and family, but there was something about the autonomy of not knowing the person on the other end of the screen that really allowed me to be fully honest and just let everything out. Every happiness, every fear, every sadness, every concern. I let it all fly, and Tara commented on EVERY SINGLE post I wrote. She never missed one. We went from Yahoo to Facebook together and still to this day, she rarely missed commenting on posts when I needed a pick me up. She just commented on this the other day…
Our friendship just got closer and closer as the years went on. She being in Elk Grove, CA and me in NYC, we knew meeting up for coffee wasn’t in the plans, especially with twins on the way. But we made it work.
She had a fairly uneventful pregnancy while mine was full of twist and turns. I can remember her posting pictures of her growing belly and she always beat me! Her belly was glorious! She eventually gave me a wonderful birthday gift in 2004, when her twins arrived on my birthday. I’ve been calling her twins my “twins twins” since 2004 and we’ve joked countless times over the years about this. We would exchange small gifts from time to time and even exchanged sweet treats. She wanted Drakes Coffee Cake (she saw them on Seinfeld) and I wanted Chocodiles for my hubby which weren’t sold on the east coast anymore. We literally would send each other packages of cake. It was too funny.
One of the most amazing gift exchanges we’ve ever had was when I put four I (heart) NY t-shirts in the mail and our packages must have crossed in the air because the day she got ’em, I got a package with four I (heart) CA shirts. I AM NOT KIDDING! What are the odds of that? Neither had discussed that we even sent each other a gift! That’s just the type of connection we had.
In 2008 she found out she was heading east to DC. I wasn’t going to let another day pass by without making our friendship official. So the Diaz Gang packed up and drove down to our nations capital and met up with the Telford Gang.
While some would think it’s weird meeting perfect strangers in a hotel room, for me, I was finally meeting my friend Tara! I regret that we didn’t take more pictures. We toured DC and even spent a day at the zoo together. It was hard to talk because we had our monkeys to run after, but it didn’t matter. We were happy to just be together.
A few years later, I was asked to speak to my first twin mom conference in Sonoma and Tara took the drive to meet me. We met up at a winery and even met up with another twin mom friend Dawn.
There we had much more time to spend together. No kids + wine = BEST DAY EVER!
Thanks to Facebook, despite the thousands of miles between us, we were never far from one another.
Tara’s Cystic Fibrosis got worse and worse and I can remember her posting about her lung function percentages and I can remember having such a heavy heart as the numbers got worse and worse. She was going to need a transplant soon. The number got worse. Still waiting for that transplant.
Tara had a saying “Think Pink Lungs” and even allowed us to make shirts. Pink lungs meant a possible donation! So all her friends and family started sending support by posting our Think Pink Lungs pics!
My twins wore theirs proudly every chance they got. They have never known their life without Tara as a part of it. They knew that I had friends that, even though we were miles away, were still close and still friends.
Tara’s lungs got worse and worse until she got the call and ran to the hospital for a possible transplant. After a ton of excitement, they found out the lungs were not a match! NO! I could only imagine her devastation she felt since I was feeling so much too. Still waiting. Still waiting. Still waiting then FINALLY another call and the great news that it was a match! That was back in January of 2016.
A celebration began and I stayed glued to my computer/phone. I checked it hourly all night, all day, waiting for an update from her family. The update came, the DOUBLE lung transplant was a success and now we had to wait to see what happened next. From there, her recovery was hard. Very hard. I never knew a human could endure so much. Every time she got knocked down, she got back up. She NEVER gave up. She laughed as much as she could and would make so many jokes about her recovery that she made everyone smile. One of my favorites was this one from this past July.
She would post… I would comment. When I was really worried about her I would message her privately.
She inspired me. She’s been inspiring me since 2003. As a matter of fact, if you own my book, go to page 255.
She even inspired me to make a big life decision. To become an organ donor myself. And not just the “check on the back of my license” kinda donor, but an official “file with the state” type of donor. You can become one too.
So, my friends, these 1700 words could never do justice to all that Tara and I have shared and despite my broken heart, I had to tell her story. A Facebook “in memory of” could never do justice to the impact that Tara had on me. I hope that years later when her twins are googling her name, they find this post and if they do I hope they read this.
Tom & Abby, I hope you never forget the love your mom had for you. I hope you know that before you even took your first breath into this world she did EVERY SINGLE THING in her power to make sure that you were happy and healthy. She was so amazingly proud of you and everything that you turned into. Your mom had a harder path than most and I hope that both of you have her sense of humor and her amazing ability to always find the silver lining to any situation. I hope you live your life as she did, with no regrets and an open heart and always there for her friends. I hope you teach your children how outstanding their grandmother was when the time comes, and I know that she will watch over you forever. If you ever feel her memory fading, I am NEVER far away to remind you of how much I loved her and how loved she was. She’s touched my life like no one else on this planet and knew me better than most. She will live in my heart forever and therefore you will too. I pray that if you find this, you really do reach out to me. I love you both and you will always be the best birthday gift I’ve ever gotten. -Nat
Tara my friend, I don’t know what I’m going to do without you. I really don’t.
Tara’s family has asked that if anyone wants to make a donation in Tara’s name, you may donate to UC Davis’ local chapter of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, or to the Tara Telford Student Award at https://give.ucdavis.edu/GRAD/15006
I know Tara would want you to become an organ donor too. Do that right now, please don’t wait.
Thank you for letting me share Tara’s story. -Nat
Written by Natalie Diaz, Founder of Twiniversity and someone that will forever Think Pink Lungs.
