The Mom Who Gave Birth in the Shadow of a Mass Shooting
Because no two paths to parenthood look the same, “How I Got This Baby” is a series that invites parents to share their stories.
Ella was 5 years old when her family moved from Los Angeles to Boulder, Colorado. Her parents wanted a more peaceful place to call home, away from the traffic, pollution, and gun violence in their neighborhood, and life in the mountains turned out to be just as magical as they had hoped — full of family ski trips and hikes. Ella’s dad would often come home from work and tell Ella and her brother to round up the neighborhood kids for a game he called “Monster.” He’d chase them all around, pretending to be scary. Of course, to Ella and to all of them, he was anything but.
As she grew up, Ella’s dad continued to be one of the most important supporters in her life. When she moved from Colorado to New York for college, he’d often visit and hide Post-its with cheerful messages around her dorm room for her to find after he left. And when she got engaged to her boyfriend, Wells, her dad drove to California — where she had moved — to be there for her final bridal fitting and her birthday. A few months after their wedding, Ella and Wells FaceTimed Ella’s parents with more good news: They were going to be grandparents.
Throughout her pregnancy, Ella worked long hours as a public-radio reporter, often covering the COVID-19 pandemic. It was a difficult and isolating time, but she loved being pregnant, and her excitement kicked into high gear when she found out she was expecting a girl. “I was leaning into the coziness of creating life, looking at my belly and talking to her from the very beginning,” Ella says. “She was my little co-worker, hosting programs with me.”
On a sunny Sunday in March, Ella and Wells sat on the shore of a lake debating baby names. They chose Sophie, the middle name that Ella’s parents had given to her. Her third trimester was days away, and she felt equal parts tired and excited.
The next day, Monday, March 22, 2021, Ella was delivering a live broadcast when she noticed that she had missed a call from her mother. Minutes later, she and her family found themselves at the center of a tragic mass shooting.
Ella shares her story.
On hearing the worst news of her life
I was live on the radio when I saw my phone light up. My mom was calling, which was weird. She knew I was on air. During a quick break, my phone buzzed again.
“Mom, I’m at work. Can’t talk now,” I told her.
“Ell, don’t freak out. I have to tell you something.”
Speaking strangely and slowly, she said there was a shooter at the supermarket. My heart dropped into my stomach. I pictured her crouched in the cereal aisle dodging bullets, calling to say good-bye.
“Mom, I love you,” I told her, thinking those might be the last words she’d ever hear.
“Oh, honey, I’m not in the store,” she clarified, “Ell, Dad went grocery shopping.”
She told me not to panic, and that she was driving to find him.
I always thought becoming a mother would be the most defining moment of my life. But it was then — when my own mom spoke those words — that everything changed.
On the panic that followed
I stood outside my office building gasping for air, clutching my stomach and my phone. All I wanted was to call my dad — to hear his comforting voice tell me this was a mistake and that he was okay. But what if he was still near the shooter, trying to run or hide others? I feared what would happen if his phone rang.
My mom hadn’t been able to reach my brother, who was a medical resident coming off an overnight OB/GYN shift in Wyoming, and she asked me to call him. I prayed he wouldn’t pick up, sickened at the thought of having to repeat what my mom had told me. He answered and went into a full-on panic, grabbing his car keys and speeding toward Boulder while calling all the local hospitals to see if our dad had been admitted.
Too numb to drive, I asked Wells to come pick me up from work. I also started calling reporter colleagues in Colorado to see if anybody knew what was happening. Nobody had updates beyond the news that was trickling out on social media. I kept refreshing the Boulder Police Department Twitter and reading vague messages like “active shooter at the market — avoid area” and “police en route.” I saw someone tweet that the suspect was in custody. I tweeted back: “Did everyone make it out?”
Crouched next to a bush, I finally pressed “Dada” on my phone. It felt as though my heart was squeezing tighter with each ring. Maybe he’d dropped his phone while running away? Or he was injured and just needed to hear my voice? When I got his voicemail, I began to sob. Wells arrived and told me that my mom had actually called him before she called me, hoping to strategize about how to tell me what was happening without endangering my health. I felt certain that Sophie was feeling all of my trauma. “I’m very upset,” I whispered to her, rubbing my belly as if I could ease both of our nerves, “But you’re going to be okay.”
The truth is, I was deathly afraid — that my dad was missing, and that the panic overtaking me was going to kill my baby.
On finding out her greatest fear had come true
Back at home, I was glued to the news, hysterical and helpless. My brother and mom waited at a “reunification” center on a college campus near the market where buses of survivors were supposedly being dropped off.
I couldn’t eat. Wells called my OB, who told us not to worry about food. “Babies are resilient,” she said. “The baby will be okay. Drink water.” I watched a livestream of the Boulder Police Department’s press conference. The commander shared that an on-duty policeman who’d run into the market was among those killed. When I learned the officer had seven children, my heart split in two. Reporters asked the police question after question about motive. I felt for them — I’d been them — but I was simultaneously raging. Who gives a fuck about motive? Where were the missing people? Where was my dad?
CNN flashed images of my beautiful hometown and the market where I used to meet friends and buy gummy worms. I’d spent many Sundays there buying groceries with my dad. Now the parking lot was littered with caution tape and shattered glass. I stared in disbelief at footage of SWAT officers ushering terrified shoppers and employees away from the scene. When the camera zoomed out, I noticed a man face down in the parking lot. Studying the TV, I called my mom. “Is that Dad?”
We tried to tell ourselves it didn’t seem like him — to not register that the lifeless body on the ground was wearing the same jeans and black jacket my dad wore every day. It just didn’t look like Dad. I watched a second press conference, where the police announced that ten people had been killed but didn’t name them. It was getting dark and harder by the minute to deny that the body face down on the pavement might be my vivacious, gentle, adoring dad.
“Ella, if Dad is gone, we will figure out how to carry on,” my mom told me over the phone, “because that is what he would want us to do.”
Wells’s parents booked us flights to Boulder for the next morning. I knew I needed to rest and calm my nervous system for Sophie’s sake. But I couldn’t sleep. I’d seen the shooter on the news, shirtless and bloodied, flanked by police escorting him from the scene. I kept picturing myself in court screaming at him.
Twelve hours after the shooting, in the middle of the night, my phone rang. It was my little brother, wailing. “Dad’s dead, the coroners are on the line,” he said. Two voices came on and told me that they’d heard I was pregnant. “We want you to take good care of that baby,” one said. Folded over on the bed and melting into Wells, I couldn’t reply. This was not the way the story was supposed to go. This was not my life.
I’d spent the past few months thinking optimistically about the world I would bring my daughter into — planning the songs I’d play during labor and the sweet photos I would take. There’s a photo of my dad holding me and looking at me in awe after I was born, and I planned to re-create it with his first grandchild. We hadn’t seen one another in person during my pregnancy because of the pandemic. But when we had Zoomed a few weeks earlier, he was beaming as he talked about the ultrasound images I’d sent him from my 20-week anatomy scan. He’d picked “Gramps” as his nickname. He was retired and so excited for this next chapter.
Now, I was flying back to Boulder for his funeral.
On a hellish third trimester navigating grief
My daydreams about meeting the baby inside me turned into nightmares. I sometimes screamed myself awake as visceral, vivid images of my baby dying as she was born filled my head. My body shook. I would hold my belly, obsessively counting kicks to make sure Sophie was alive, all too aware that, in a matter of seconds, things could go irreversibly wrong.
Back in my parents’ house, my brother, mom, Wells, and I camped out in the basement together. I’d force myself to eat forkfuls of lasagnas and salads people showed up with. Nothing had a taste. Wells would bring me water. I felt disgusted. Images of my dad getting gunned down played on repeat in my head. I was anxious about everything — including the possibility of going into early labor from all the stress. I just wanted to sleep.
Thank God for the psychologist I worked with. She had me fill a box with meaningful messages and trinkets I could reach for to reorient myself to the present when I was imagining Sophie dying or replaying the shooting in my head. But the reality was that I’d gone from thinking about nursery design to thinking about how I was going to survive until my next OB appointment.
When Wells and I returned to California, we tried to go for walks on the beach. I’d feel so swept up by darkness that I’d run into the woods and scream. I didn’t recognize the pale, hollowed-out person staring at me in the mirror.
As my due date neared a doula suggested bringing my dad’s photo with me to the hospital for the birth, but I couldn’t. I needed to be strong, and seeing anything that reminded me of him made me feel weak and broken.
On going into labor on Father’s Day
I woke up on my due date feeling leaky and panicky. It didn’t help that it was Father’s Day. When I went to get checked, they confirmed the leakage was amniotic fluid. Following 24 painful hours of labor with my mom and Wells by my side, Sophie joined us. Just over eight pounds, she was healthy and perfect. Her entrance into the world was incredible. Having her on my chest felt like medicine. She’d gone from being my little pandemic co-worker to my reason to keep going — a source of hope for my family during the darkest days of our lives. As I held her in those first few moments of her life, I’ve never had a stronger urge to say “Thank you.”
While delivering my placenta, though, something switched. I started seeing stars and told the doctor I didn’t feel well. Someone took Sophie from me. People in scrubs rushed in. Wells watched in horror as blood poured out of me. The doctor and nurse managed to slow the hemorrhaging. I narrowly avoided needing a blood transfusion. When I came to, the bliss was gone, replaced by all the anguish I’d been carrying for months. My dad’s absence felt especially acute the next day, just after my mom and in-laws left my hospital room. As I nursed Sophie and studied her tiny fingers, brown curls and cute sounds, another thought overtook me: How am I going to protect my child in a world that didn’t protect my dad?
On learning how to feel some level of safety again
In the hospital over the next few days, I couldn’t stop weeping. The nurses asked what was wrong. “I miss my dad — I thought he was going to be here” was all I could choke out. A social worker came to my bedside and told us about postpartum resources, but even she seemed at a loss.
When I brought Sophie home, I was a hermit. Friends would ask me to go for walks, and I’d say “no thanks.” As a new mom, you’re already on guard and overwhelmed, but this was different. I avoided public places and well-meaning people who’d try to peek into the stroller. If I was alone with Sophie and we needed to go to the store, I’d spiral.
When Sophie was 6 weeks old, I forced myself to go to a local support group for new parents and babies called Parents’ Place. I had been spending a lot of energy holding in the story of what happened to my dad and what my journey into parenthood had been like. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk about it. It’s just that it was such a violent, horrific thing to bring up. I almost felt like I was contagious — as though hearing my story would make it more likely to happen to the person I was talking to.
But at a certain point, I couldn’t hide it anymore. Just like becoming a mother had become such a huge part of me, what happened on March 22 had become part of me too. When a Parents’ Place teacher opened her class with “Let’s go around and say how you’re doing” and my turn came, I admitted I was really struggling. Then I nodded at Wells, giving him the okay to tell this room of sleep-deprived strangers that my dad had recently been killed in a mass shooting.
As has been the case with so much about motherhood, what happened next surprised me. Every person in the room instantly met me with love and strength that I think only new parents can channel. I felt held, accepted, and cared for — like I could take off the mask I’d been hiding behind and go back to talking about purée recipes. I felt less alone and with more time and support, it got easier to just be.
On returning to therapy
When Sophie was 11 months old, I was editing a story for work when I saw an alert about an active shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. I started having a massive panic attack. The combination of what had happened to my dad and what was happening again — this time to helpless children not much older than Sophie — broke me. After that, so many things terrified me. I’d be at the farmers’ market and think: There could be a shooter here. I’d constantly think about what I’d do if a gunman opened fire — of how I’d throw my body on them, doing whatever it took to wrestle the gun away. I couldn’t function. I needed help.
I started working with a therapist who helped me understand that anxiety is a normal part of grief, and that it was actually okay to exercise situational awareness, which is something my parents always taught me. I’d practice walking into a store and taking stock of the exits. I learned to let myself think through an emergency-escape plan. Then, knowing I’ve done my due diligence, I’d try to stop dwelling on it.
On having a second child
The summer after Sophie turned 2, we welcomed a second baby, James, into our family. His delivery was somewhat medically complicated — he had shoulder dystocia — but going through the postpartum period with more time and tools to manage my grief was a completely different, infinitely easier experience. A few months in, Wells and I decided to move our family of four back to Boulder. We wanted to be close to my mom and brother and to grieve and move forward in the community that had raised me.
On facing her dad’s shooter in court
In September 2024, just after James turned 1, I hired a babysitter and spent the better part of the month in court facing the shooter who killed my dad and nine others. When he was found guilty on all counts, there was an audible sigh of relief throughout the courtroom. I put my head down and quietly cried. Before the judge sentenced the shooter, victims were invited to share our stories. When my turn came, I looked toward my dad’s murderer and told him what I’d been wanting to say for a long time: First I told him that I wished he’d received more love in his life, because maybe then none of this would have happened. I believe that to my core. Then I told him that, had he parked at the supermarket that day, gotten out of his car, and, instead of pulling the trigger, just screamed at the top of his lungs, “I need help!” my dad would have been the first person to run toward him. I never looked directly at the shooter, but a reporter told me he looked up at me.
On preserving memories of her dad
I talk to my kids about “Grandpa M” all the time, and I miss him every day. Sophie requested that we keep a picture of him by her bed. We often read a children’s book about a kid who loses a grandparent. I tell her and her brother that they have a protector — that whenever they’re scared, they can ask for Grandpa M and that he will always be in their hearts. More than anything, I want Sophie and James to learn about who their “gramps” was — not about how he left the world but how he chose to live in it.
We recently moved back to California, but before we did I took the kids to play on a slide abutting the supermarket parking lot where my dad was killed. It was my first time returning there since the shooting, and I really wanted to reclaim the space. I was nervous about going inside the store, but Sophie had to use the potty so I took a breath and led the kids through the entrance. We were met with familiar faces and warm energy. I handed Sophie and James Paw Patrol balloons from the floral section and as I watched them gallop through the store, I was transported back to my childhood of Sunday market runs in those aisles. I felt my dad walking with us.
On how she copes with her fear, grief, and anger today
Before my dad was killed, I already thought about mass shootings a lot. I was in third grade during Columbine. My parents took me and my brother to a memorial for the 14 people killed. My teacher comforted our class by explaining that the massacre that had happened a 30-minute drive away would never happen to us. But Columbine scarred me — and the wound reopened when, in 2012, a shooter opened fire at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, and killed 12 people, including one of my mom’s students. I felt a similar “close call” feeling in 2015, when a gunman murdered two journalists in a Virginia newsroom I’d nearly joined. And again in 2019, when my boss called me after my wedding tasting saying there’d been a shooting at a nearby food festival. I saw these senseless tragedies happen again and again. But there is no way to prepare for when it happens to you.
There are days that I still feel so unnerved that I have to pick Sophie up early from school. At times, I question whether to send her at all. But I know my dad would have wanted me to take my kids to school and to the playground and to the movies. I hear his fatherly voice saying, “Be careful. Trust your instincts. But also: Live.”
After every school shooting since Uvalde, I’ve begun to imagine my dad peacefully waiting to receive the children who don’t make it out alive. I see him standing there in his jeans and black jacket, arms open — a warm and comforting light telling them it’s okay. He made me feel so safe and loved. I want to tell all those parents that my dad is there for their angels. He’s working up there, and I’m working down here.
The names of the subjects have been changed to protect their identities.
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