Nicole McPherson had dealt with challenging pregnancies before.
The forced bed rest and extra monitoring had become part of her normal childbearing experience, so when she got a phone call on Mother's Day weekend about another complication it wasn't a total surprise. Along with her husband Mike, Nicole was prepared to do whatever it took to give their baby the best chance.
This time, providing top-notch care meant having to go to Vancouver to be under the supervision of specialists, so at the end of May they drove down to the Lower Mainland.
"We had no idea what was going to happen, we were just going down for consults and meetings," Mike said. "But Nicole wanted to be ready for anything, so she packed like she wasn't coming home."
The doctors were surprised they didn't have to convince or cajole Nicole that for the sake of the baby, she should remain in Vancouver for the duration of her pregnancy.
With Nicole staying at the Ronald McDonald House in between her constant appointments, Mike had to return to Prince George to work and look after their four other young children. Being apart was tough, but the couple knew it had to be done, for baby Nixon's sake.
"That was where the best care was, the best doctors," Mike said.
After being separated for six weeks, Mike was finally going to take a leave of absence from work and the couple were going to be reunited with Nixon's birth just weeks away.
Before they could be reunited last Saturday, Mike was going to fly their youngest, 18-month-old Gideon, to Calgary to stay with his parents for a few weeks.
It was at the Vancouver airport last Saturday morning that Mike got a text message that would change his life and the life of his family forever.
As he was waiting to board the flight from Prince George to Vancouver, Mike was already worried. He hadn't heard from Nicole since the previous afternoon. All the text messages he had sent since then had gone unanswered. At first, he thought she was finally getting some much needed sleep, but as the hours ticked away, he became more and more anxious.
"I got up [Saturday morning] and texted her when we were leaving that we were getting on the plane and she didn't respond by the time we landed, so I was getting a little concerned," he said.
It was in the departure lounge at the Vancouver Airport that Mike got a text from the father of one of the other patients staying at Ronald McDonald House. It turned out no one there had heard from Nicole in a while either, and they were getting worried.
"Just as soon as I had that conversation I just knew something was wrong," Mike said, taking a moment to compose himself as he recounted the events. "They went and sent somebody to check on her and she was gone."
Mike rushed to Ronald McDonald House, but had to wait for the coroner and police to do their work before he could say his last good bye to the love of his life and to the son he never got the chance to meet.
A preliminary autopsy has been completed, but a week after Nicole's death, Mike is still in the dark as to what happened.
"According to everything they've seen from everything else, she shouldn't be gone," he said.
Instead of spending the week reconnecting with his wife and getting ready for the birth of his son, Mike spent it making funeral arrangements.
"He was our baby and we were going to love him"
Nixon's journey was never going to be easy, but Mike and Nicole were preparing to deal with any challenges along the way.
Mike had started a Facebook page to document what both he and Nicole were going through. It was a place where family and friends could check on Nicole's progress and provide moral support.
"Mike started it and he wrote so eloquently," Nicole's sister Robin Sindia said. "Nikki would post things after a while - I don't think it was her thing in the beginning - but she knew she was doing it for Nixon and for her kids and for the family."
Nicole was providing daily updates on the site leading up to the day she died. Her last post, dated July 12, documented a special visit a group made to Ronald McDonald House earlier in the week.
"A group from a local bakery came to the house the other day and made us a wonderful breakfast and left us all with gifts!," she wrote. "What a special surprise!"
Now the site, named Nixon's Odyssey, is a tribute to the sacrifices the family has made.
First diagnosed with a cleft lip, doctors then determined Nixon had a duodenal atresia - a problem with his intestine that would require surgery after birth to correct. It was the latter condition that led the family to head to Vancouver for more tests and treatment.
"It in and of itself is not a huge thing, it's life-threatening of course, but it's a surgery they've been successfully doing since the '20s," Mike said.
The combination of the two conditions raised the possibility that Nixon might have Down syndrome, but a genetic test ruled that out.
Doctors recommended further genetic testing and a U.S. lab discovered Nixon had a rare chromosome abnormality, unlike anything they'd seen before.
"They have no idea what the effect would be," Mike said. "The one baby [who had a similar condition] had pretty severe issues, but they just don't know because it's something that happens so rarely and the testing is so new that they just couldn't give us any answers."
As time went on, other issues popped up, including a possible hole in Nixon's heart, but Mike said both he and Nicole remained optimistic through it all.
"We had decided a long time ago it really didn't matter, he was our baby and we were going to love him," Mike said.
"The love that these two had was the love that everyone else dreamt of having"
Family and children were always at the centre of Nicole's life. She had two children from a previous marriage, 18-year-old Alexa and 15-year-old Justice, and she made sure Mike knew where her priorities were as soon as they first met.
"I can remember our first date," he recalled. "She flat out said, 'it's a package deal, if you want to be with me, my kids are part of it because they're the most important thing in my life and they always will be.' "
Mike and Nicole got together in 2008 and were married in 2011. They bonded over family and a number of shared interests, from spending time at the family property at Ness Lake to fishing.
When Nicole wanted to move from Alberta back to her hometown of Prince George to be closer to family, Mike quit his job to make it happen.
"The love that these two had was the love that everyone else dreamt of having, if they didn't have it themselves," Sindia said.
For years, Nicole operated an at-home daycare so she could work and take care of her own children at the same time. She took a course to learn baby sign language and wanted to pass that skill on to other parents.
She also spent hours on online forums, helping other mothers who were dealing with difficult pregnancies.
"She wanted everybody to be loved and supported the way she wanted to be," Mike said.
Nicole knew from experience what support was needed. When she was pregnant with Justice, Nicole had to spend weeks on bed rest due to pre-term labour. With Gabriel, Nicole felt something was wrong when she was 19 weeks along and was put on bed rest once again.
"We thought we were going to lose him a few times," Mike said. "But thankfully we didn't and he's perfectly healthy."
In Gideon's case, Nicole had to be induced and the family had another close call.
"At one point he tied a full-on knot in his umbilical cord," Mike said. "He was one quick tug away from not making it."
"We're just going to do the best we can"
Remembered by her family as being smart, glitzy and crafty, Nicole was known for her ability to teach herself how to make hats, purses and sweaters without the help of a pattern.
She also made countless sacrifices for her family, foregoing things like haircuts and nail treatments to help the family make ends meet and provide for the children.
"She went without so [the children] didn't have to," Mike said.
The McPherson's drained their bank account dealing with the extra medical expenses associated with the difficult pregnancy and the family faces an entirely new financial burden as they move on without Nicole's income. To help in the interim, the family has set up an online fundraising site to cover the extraordinary costs.
"We're just going to do the best we can," Mike said. "We've got to be strong for the kids."
Anyone interested in contributing can visit http://gogetfunding.com/project/mcpherson-family-fund
The funeral for Nicole and Nixon will be held at Westwood Mennonite Church at 2 p.m. on Wednesday with a reception to follow at the Hart Crown Banquet Hall.
Nicole McPherson was 37.
