'My Mom Was Killed at Sandy Hook. Now My Family Faces Losing Me'

My mom, Dawn Lafferty Hochsprung, was the principal of Sandy Hook Elementary School and was murdered on December 14, 2012. She was the first person inside a conference room in the front hallway to recognize the sound of gunshots and was killed after going to confront the shooter.

The years following her death were a rollercoaster. For the first four years, I was rarely home while traveling the country advocating for gun reform. I kept myself so busy that I didn't take the time to process my grief and trauma, and in 2016, I really crashed.

After going through a divorce I hit rock bottom. I found myself in a really bad relationship and eventually had to look around me and say: "What am I doing with my life?" I started group therapy and saw my psychiatrist more regularly. I really focused on myself.

From 2017 to 2020, I worked 40 hours a week as an advocate for various issues, and any free moment I had was fully concentrated on healing myself—and trying not to be mad at my mom for being killed.

For a long time, I was really angry that she chose to go out in that hallway; I could not understand why she would do that. But as I reflected back on the years since her death, I realized that I had been doing the same thing.

This horrible thing had happened to me, but I hadn't been taking care of myself. Instead of focusing on my own happiness, I had been getting on planes to advocate around the country to try and help other people.

I had been running out into the hallway, and how could I be mad at my mom when I was doing the same thing?

That realization was a turning point for me. I was able to stop being mad and live without guilt, finally. I began to build a new life for myself, for which I am incredibly thankful. I am now engaged to a wonderful man, who has three children, and we recently bought our first house together.

Last year, I endured the turmoil of Alex Jones' defamation trial, in which he was ordered to pay almost $1.5 billion to the families of Sandy Hook victims for falsely claiming the shooting was a hoax.

I have not received a penny of that money, and will not for a very long time, but once it was over, we were finally able to live happily in our quiet little corner of Connecticut.

Then I was diagnosed with cancer.

Since January 2014, my eye doctor had been aware of a mass behind my eye, which he initially thought was scar tissue. For years he tracked the size of this mass and whether it moved.

Everything remained the same until I visited my eye doctor in December 2022. He told me the mass had grown bigger and that I needed to see a neurologist. It took a while to get an appointment, and by the time I had my biopsy 14 weeks later, it had tripled in size.

The biopsy revealed I had a stage-two primary orbital tumor and two stage-zero masses on my lymph nodes, which doctors told me would inevitably turn cancerous at a rapid rate.

I was terrified, it felt like I had been hit by a bus. There have been so many times in the last decade I wanted to call my mom, but when I heard the words, "You have cancer," I needed her.

I had to tell my grandmother, fiancé, and my siblings, who I sent a text message to because I couldn't physically say the words. The amount of support that I've received from my siblings is absolutely everything to me. My fiancé is amazing, and is just running around like a crazy man trying to take care of me and the house while still working full time.

After my mom was killed, I began compulsively researching everything that happened on the day of the shooting. I needed to know what she experienced, from the moment she walked into the school until the time she was shot and killed in the hallway.

I wanted to know every detail about the shooter. I wanted to see every picture. I wanted to walk through the school. I was obsessive.

I was very scared that after my diagnosis I would fall back into that realm of thinking, so I told doctors I want to know as little as possible. They asked whether I was okay with an aggressive approach and I said yes.

Around one month ago I began a low-iodine diet before starting radioactive iodine treatment this week. I am also taking a chemotherapy pill, which is not covered by my insurance, as part of a standardized chemotherapy regimen.

These two treatments will be combined for five weeks. At weeks three and six I'll go back for a body scan to determine what further treatment I'll need.

Because of my iodine treatment, I need to be isolated away from my family the second I get home. I have to use a separate bathroom and use biohazard laundry bags. I use disposable plates, cups, and silverware because they can't be washed and then go into the mouth of our 7-year-old.

After my diagnosis, I sat down with my medical team. I had a healthcare advocate through my employer and a social worker to help me navigate my finances. I was told I would be lucky to walk away paying $60,000 out of pocket. And that was the conservative guess.

As well as my treatment, I have to pay for things like bedsheets and washcloths I'll have to throw away after each use, because my body is full of nuclear medicine.

I have approached various charities and looked into countless grants, but I don't qualify for anything. My chemotherapy is done in a pharmacy, not a medical facility, which means I have to be able to pay for the treatment each time. I don't have the option of racking up a medical bill.

A friend of mine started a GoFundMe page to help pay for my treatment, which has been a godsend. In fact, it was the only way I was able to pay for my chemotherapy pills this week. I don't have parents to borrow money from, so my only other option is putting the treatment costs on credit cards.

I have family who mean the world to me who have seen me so weak I can't get out of bed. They've heard me in the bathroom throwing up. They've watched me fall down the stairs. We've had to explain what's going on to them, and I cannot imagine not being there for them. I am terrified that if I die, it's going to hurt them.

It's absolutely insane to me that I have to fundraise for life-saving medication. This week I paid nearly $8,000 for a five-week treatment cycle and I don't know how many more I'm going to need. There are so many costs associated with this illness that insurance doesn't cover.

My family needs help financially to keep me alive, but I cannot comprehend how this is possible. I've heard of extremely high medical bills, but I never imagined a person with considerably good health insurance would have to face something like this.

After mom was murdered, I spent most of my life working on gun violence prevention. Over the last decade, I've helped families who are going through all different types of trauma and violence

I've worked on child access prevention, unintentional shootings, domestic violence. I've done fundraising for scholarships. I have given back and given back to this country. So why, when I ask the media for help, do they ask for more?

I have shared so much of myself and my story to the country, specifically to the media. They want to speak to me because I am the Sandy Hook principal's daughter, and I have agreed in order to try and help other people.

But after a decade of working with certain news outlets, I'm in a position where I'm literally fundraising for my life, and outlets I have worked with for a decade are refusing to share my story unless I live blog my treatment or go on air when sometimes I can barely see out of my eye.

I am incredibly grateful to have built the media relationships that I have over the last ten years and had a list of people to turn to for help. But what if I wasn't the Sandy Hook Principal's daughter? Would anyone care?

What about everyone else who didn't happen to have their mom murdered in a high-profile shooting? What about the everyday person? It's terrifying to me.

I never thought I would have a reason to be thankful that my mom was murdered, but if she wasn't, the harsh reality is that this would probably kill me.

Erica Lafferty is an activist from Connecticut and the daughter of Dawn Lafferty Hochsprung. Her GoFundMe page is here.

All views expressed in this article are the author's own.

As told to Newsweek's My Turn associate editor, Monica Greep.

Do you have a unique experience or personal story to share? Email the My Turn team at myturn@newsweek.com.