Mum grieves, as son’s life cut short in accident
Kelly Groves misses hearing her son’s voice.
She misses him talking to her about the future, telling her all his secrets and saying he loves her at the end of every phone call.
Groves is still struggling to come to grips with the fact her 21-year-old son Tyler Anthony Christopher Groves is dead.
He was killed when a car he was a passenger in crashed on Cemetery Rd, near Sanson, shortly after 4am on August 26.
When Groves’ phone rang at 5am that day, she thought it was Tyler calling on his way to milking. She didn’t pick up. Then, it rang again. When she answered, it wasn’t Tyler on the phone, but a police officer. ‘‘She said: ‘There’s been an accident’, then she passed the phone to his girlfriend’s mother.’’
She told Groves that Tyler was in Palmerston North Hospital.
‘‘I said: ‘OK I will be on my way’, and she said: ‘Kelly, he’s dead, he died’.
‘‘I don’t remember anything for about two weeks [after that].’’
Tyler is one of more than 330 to die on New Zealand’s roads this year.
Groves said her son was a nice, caring man, who had just started getting his life together.
He had a steady girlfriend who he had just moved in with, and they had shifted to O¯ taki for work.
The main reason Tyler was keen to get his life in check was his younger sister, Isabella, 15. ‘‘They had a plan that if I died he had to look after her, so that’s why he had to get his s... together, for her.’’
Tyler had a cheeky personality, which Groves said was on show when he was cremated in a pink and white fluffy onesie he used to wear to parties.
‘‘He was a really hard worker and he really loved his friends.’’
She moved to Wellington when Tyler was young, but he moved back to Palmerston North to attend Boys’ High and after that never wanted to leave the area, so he could be close to his friends.
Groves said she never realised how many friends Tyler had until his funeral, when hundreds of people turned up.
As Tyler grew older, Groves said he started to become more of a friend to her than a son.
‘‘I miss him so much. This is the worst thing I’ve ever gone through.’’