But the reality is sinking in.
“This whole last week, I’ve been thinking it’s a bad dream and I’ll wake up,” said Kyler Ross of Meeker, whose wife of five years, Lindy, was killed in a one-vehicle accident May 19 outside of Tremonton, Utah. “But I’m realizing it is real.”
Kyler and Lindy celebrated their fifth anniversary April 23.
While Kyler lost his wife, his three children — ages 4 and under — who were also in the vehicle, came through virtually unscathed.
“The kids are great,” Kyler said. “One of them had glass cuts on his arm and scratches on his head, but other than that they came out completely unharmed.”
All three children were securely strapped in their car seats. Kyler saw to that himself.
“She (Lindy) was just finishing loading everything up and I strapped all three of the kids in their car seats,” Kyler said of the morning of the accident. “I had installed the car seats in the truck the night before. That’s the other important thing, she (Lindy) always had me do it, because I could get them in there snug. Even the officer commented on how tight they were strapped in.”
“There’s no doubt these kids are here today because they had car seats and they were strapped in really good,” said Brady Ross, Kyler’s father.
Lindy, however, was not buckled up. At least not at the time of the accident.
“She always wore her seat belt,” Kyler said. “I believe the only reason her seat belt was unbuckled was because she had probably reached for something or got something for the kids.”
A service for Lindy, 23, was held May 24 in Boise, Idaho.
Kyler and Lindy had plans to move to Boise, where they used to live and where Lindy’s parents live. Kyler intended to return to college at Boise State University and study computer information systems.
For now anyway, all of that is on hold.
“I want to be able to go back to school and finish a degree, but right now, I have a lot of other things to figure out,” Kyler said. “So, I don’t know what I will do as of yet.”
Lindy and the kids were traveling to Boise, where Lindy was going to work with her mother cleaning upscale houses, when the accident occurred.
“I think I spoke with her at 1 something,” Kyler said of his last phone conversation with his wife. “She had just got to Park City and was asking which way to go on the freeway to get up to Boise. That was the last thing I heard from her.”
Kyler was exercising at the Meeker Recreation Center when he was notified of the accident. Scott Isenhour, area manager for Redi Services and the bishop of the Meeker Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, told Kyler about what had happened.
“I was at the recreation center and Scott walked in and asked me if I was alone. Then he waved me to follow him,” Kyler said. “He told me the kids were completely fine, but my wife was not.
“They had found a tithing receipt (in the pickup), which they were able to trace it back to the church here at Meeker,” Kyler said. “So they got on the phone and were asking for the bishop of the Meeker Ward, who happens to be my boss.”
Kyler has worked at Redi Services since October 2008.
After the accident, the three children were taken to a hospital for observation. A Utah Highway Patrol trooper had his wife stay with the kids until family arrived.
“When something like that happens and there’s no immediate family, they can’t leave them at the hospital, so social services will find a foster home for the time being,” Kyler said. “A trooper said that’s what the protocol was, but he didn’t want that to happen. He decided he couldn’t leave them at the hospital, so he had his wife come and get them. He checked with me first. I had my sister, who lives two hours away, pick them up at the trooper’s house.”
Kyler’s three children — Zayden, 4, Kaleah 2, and Deklan, 9 months — continue to ask about their mother.
“We took them to see their mom at the funeral home in Boise, because they were still asking where is mommy and not quite understanding she’s not coming back,” Kyler said.
“For a long time, they kept thinking she was in the truck,” Brady Ross said.
Telling the children their mother was dead was a father’s worst nightmare.
“That was the hardest thing I ever had to do,” Kyler said. “But they know mommy is sleeping and her spirit is in heaven.”
Kyler later visited the scene of the crash.
“I can’t explain it, seeing where your wife passed away,” he said. “It was tough.”
The family’s faith has sustained them through this painful time and helped to make sense of what seems like a senseless situation.
“It just seemed like a testimony to us that the Lord called her home for reasons we can’t quite understand,” Brady Ross said.
“I know that my wife is in a better place,” Kyler Ross said. “I believe I will see her again one day.”
While he tries to figure out a future without his wife, Kyler knows one thing for sure, she would want him to keep going for the sake of the kids.
“She loved her kids and her family very much,” Kyler said. “I know she would want me to continue caring for those kids just as well as she did.”
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A memorial fund has been established at Mountain Valley Bank in Meeker. Checks should be made payable to the “Lindy Ross Memorial Fund.”
