Our small collection & backstory (Updated 2/15)
Feb 10, 2018 0:05:07 GMT -5
T, Bandalero, and 18 more like this
Post by lbradford0007 on Feb 10, 2018 0:05:07 GMT -5
Please feel free to remove if this doesn't belong here, I just wanted to share my story with you all... I want to preface by saying this is not meant to be a whoa is me, or a pity party. I wanted to share my story, and how I got back into collecting.
I was a die hard wrestling fan growing up, I had most of the Hasbro figures. I was always a die hard Bret Hart fan, still my favorite to this day. I quit watching wrestling around the time WCW was bought out by WWE. Fast forward about 15 years. I married my wife and a little 8 year old step daughter came into my life. A goofy little 8 year old named Kayleigh. Starting off we didn't have alot in common, until we came across Raw one night on satellite and it peaked her interest. We watched it that night and she was instantly hooked, as was I after a 15 year or so hiatus. This kid loved Bayley and AJ styles. December 28th was her birthday, and it just so happened that Smackdown was doing a holiday tour in 2016, and one of those events happened to be on December 28th in Nashville. We were able to surprise her with her first trip to see wrestling on her birthday. As a parent, the happiness in that kids face that night is something I'll never forget. She was also very craft and artistic, she crafted the womens title out of posterboard and carried that thing around everywhere, that is until we surprised her with the replica womens belt. She took it to school for her show and tell, and basically everywhere else that we allowed her to. For her birthday, I also bought for her, her first wrestling figures and she was in love. She had Bayley, Balor, AJ, Jericho, New Day, and Sasha. Those were the first wrestling figures I'd bought since I was a kid. I talked to her about all of my favorite wrestlers growing up. Bret Hart, Razor Ramon & Vader. Guys she had never even heard of before.
Fast forward again to April of last year, Kayleigh wasn't feeling good so my wife left work early one day and took her to the doctor. She was complaining about her ribs hurting so they did x-rays and found nothing abnormal. They chalked it up to growing pains and sent them on their way. About a week later the pains only got worse so we returned to the doctor, this time they did bloodwork on her and found that it was abnormal. We ended up at a world class childrens hospital as they tried to figure out what was wrong. Then we got the call, they took Kayleigh down for an ultrasound and found a grapefruit sized tumor in her abdomen. They took her the next day for a biospy, and we tried to remain as positive as we could. The biopsy came back with results that none of us were prepared for. The tumor was cancerous and they officially diagnosed Kayleigh with Undifferentiated Embryonal Sarcoma of the Liver. The kid never once complained, she was a champion throughout the entire ordeal. They agreed to let her come home for the weekend before they started the chemo. The first thing she did when she got home was snatch up her womens title belt, and play with her wrestling figures. We headed back to the hospital Monday morning to start chemo. Things started off promising but took a turn for the worse once the tumor started growing in size. Over the course of the next week the doctors had to quit with the chemo and focus on why the tumor was growing. They discovered that the chemo was working and the tumor was dying, but it was also bleeding out inside of her, and was essentially sucking up all of the blood that they were giving her. They decided to completely quit with the chemo and focus on a liver transplant at that point. The Make a Wish foundation visited us the next day, they asked Kayleigh if she wanted to go to Disney World, she said no. She wanted to go to Wrestlemania. They acted a bit surprised by her answer, and I could just grin. We waited, and waited and waited for a transplant. They called us in on a Sunday evening and told us that if Kayleigh did not receive a liver she would not make it through the week. Then by what seemed liike a miracle, the doctors woke us up Monday morning and told us they had found a liver for Kayleigh, but the surgery would be very high risk. As it was our only option we made the only choice that we could. They took Kayleigh down for surgery on May 15th, but at 5 A.M. on May 16th, they called us back and said that Kayleighs heart had stopped during surgery but they had brought her back long enough for us to say our goodbyes to her. She was surrounded by her friends and family when she took her last breath that morning. We laid her to rest on a Saturday morning with her favorite Bayley shirt, her womens title belt, and a few of her favorite wrestling figures.
The past 8 months have been excruciatingly hard for us, but the one place I have found solace is in wrestling. It was our thing. She used to talked about all of the figures she wanted to get. So I decided back around Christmas time that I was going to get back into collecting for Kayleigh and myself. Again, I do not intend for this to be a pity party. I want people to take this post for what it is, a story about an 11 year old girl that absolutely loved wrestling, and loved collecting figures even more. I found this website and have lurked for a while, debating on whether or not to share Kayleighs story. I felt it needed to be shared though. As a parent, the only thing that comes close to losing your child, is thinking that your child is forgotten. I want to make sure Kayleigh is never forgotten. She would be in awe at some of the collections on here. Thank you to all on here for giving me a little bit of light in a time of darkness. I have spent hours on here researching and reading about all of the figures that are out there. I'm slowly trying to catch up with a mixture of Kayleighs favorite wrestlers, and mine. Like I said earlier, if this isn't the place for this, please direct me to the correct forum. I posted on here because Kayleigh collected these wrestlers, so I felt it fitting. Anyway, if you're still reading, here's our small collection so far. I intend to post new pictures everytime I get a new figure to add to the collection. I hope to add some of the older wrestlers I grew up with, and the modern wrestlers she fell in love with. I have several more coming at the moment. I have left them all in their boxes for the moment, but I don't expect that to last very long as Kayleigh certainly would have done ripped them all open and had a Rumble with them!
I was a die hard wrestling fan growing up, I had most of the Hasbro figures. I was always a die hard Bret Hart fan, still my favorite to this day. I quit watching wrestling around the time WCW was bought out by WWE. Fast forward about 15 years. I married my wife and a little 8 year old step daughter came into my life. A goofy little 8 year old named Kayleigh. Starting off we didn't have alot in common, until we came across Raw one night on satellite and it peaked her interest. We watched it that night and she was instantly hooked, as was I after a 15 year or so hiatus. This kid loved Bayley and AJ styles. December 28th was her birthday, and it just so happened that Smackdown was doing a holiday tour in 2016, and one of those events happened to be on December 28th in Nashville. We were able to surprise her with her first trip to see wrestling on her birthday. As a parent, the happiness in that kids face that night is something I'll never forget. She was also very craft and artistic, she crafted the womens title out of posterboard and carried that thing around everywhere, that is until we surprised her with the replica womens belt. She took it to school for her show and tell, and basically everywhere else that we allowed her to. For her birthday, I also bought for her, her first wrestling figures and she was in love. She had Bayley, Balor, AJ, Jericho, New Day, and Sasha. Those were the first wrestling figures I'd bought since I was a kid. I talked to her about all of my favorite wrestlers growing up. Bret Hart, Razor Ramon & Vader. Guys she had never even heard of before.
Fast forward again to April of last year, Kayleigh wasn't feeling good so my wife left work early one day and took her to the doctor. She was complaining about her ribs hurting so they did x-rays and found nothing abnormal. They chalked it up to growing pains and sent them on their way. About a week later the pains only got worse so we returned to the doctor, this time they did bloodwork on her and found that it was abnormal. We ended up at a world class childrens hospital as they tried to figure out what was wrong. Then we got the call, they took Kayleigh down for an ultrasound and found a grapefruit sized tumor in her abdomen. They took her the next day for a biospy, and we tried to remain as positive as we could. The biopsy came back with results that none of us were prepared for. The tumor was cancerous and they officially diagnosed Kayleigh with Undifferentiated Embryonal Sarcoma of the Liver. The kid never once complained, she was a champion throughout the entire ordeal. They agreed to let her come home for the weekend before they started the chemo. The first thing she did when she got home was snatch up her womens title belt, and play with her wrestling figures. We headed back to the hospital Monday morning to start chemo. Things started off promising but took a turn for the worse once the tumor started growing in size. Over the course of the next week the doctors had to quit with the chemo and focus on why the tumor was growing. They discovered that the chemo was working and the tumor was dying, but it was also bleeding out inside of her, and was essentially sucking up all of the blood that they were giving her. They decided to completely quit with the chemo and focus on a liver transplant at that point. The Make a Wish foundation visited us the next day, they asked Kayleigh if she wanted to go to Disney World, she said no. She wanted to go to Wrestlemania. They acted a bit surprised by her answer, and I could just grin. We waited, and waited and waited for a transplant. They called us in on a Sunday evening and told us that if Kayleigh did not receive a liver she would not make it through the week. Then by what seemed liike a miracle, the doctors woke us up Monday morning and told us they had found a liver for Kayleigh, but the surgery would be very high risk. As it was our only option we made the only choice that we could. They took Kayleigh down for surgery on May 15th, but at 5 A.M. on May 16th, they called us back and said that Kayleighs heart had stopped during surgery but they had brought her back long enough for us to say our goodbyes to her. She was surrounded by her friends and family when she took her last breath that morning. We laid her to rest on a Saturday morning with her favorite Bayley shirt, her womens title belt, and a few of her favorite wrestling figures.
The past 8 months have been excruciatingly hard for us, but the one place I have found solace is in wrestling. It was our thing. She used to talked about all of the figures she wanted to get. So I decided back around Christmas time that I was going to get back into collecting for Kayleigh and myself. Again, I do not intend for this to be a pity party. I want people to take this post for what it is, a story about an 11 year old girl that absolutely loved wrestling, and loved collecting figures even more. I found this website and have lurked for a while, debating on whether or not to share Kayleighs story. I felt it needed to be shared though. As a parent, the only thing that comes close to losing your child, is thinking that your child is forgotten. I want to make sure Kayleigh is never forgotten. She would be in awe at some of the collections on here. Thank you to all on here for giving me a little bit of light in a time of darkness. I have spent hours on here researching and reading about all of the figures that are out there. I'm slowly trying to catch up with a mixture of Kayleighs favorite wrestlers, and mine. Like I said earlier, if this isn't the place for this, please direct me to the correct forum. I posted on here because Kayleigh collected these wrestlers, so I felt it fitting. Anyway, if you're still reading, here's our small collection so far. I intend to post new pictures everytime I get a new figure to add to the collection. I hope to add some of the older wrestlers I grew up with, and the modern wrestlers she fell in love with. I have several more coming at the moment. I have left them all in their boxes for the moment, but I don't expect that to last very long as Kayleigh certainly would have done ripped them all open and had a Rumble with them!