Parkland shooting hero and Navy veteran Christopher Hixon gave his life as he attempted to save other people from a crazed gunman at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Hixon’s wife and mother have spoken out about his courageous legacy and their decision to put a beautifully appropriate quote on his tombstone.
“My husband was a security monitor at MSD. It was his job to run over and find out what was going on,” Christopher’s widow Debbie Hixon told Fox News. “He ran into the building and encountered the shooter. At some point, he tried to disarm the shooter, and lost his life because of that.”
“Chris was super,” added his mother, Toni. “There are no words that can explain how much I loved him. He just did everything for me. There was nothing that I could ask for that he didn’t provide for me. He was the best son any mother could ever want.”
“I cannot get over it,” she continued. “I keep waiting for him to knock on the door and come walking in. He’s not there — it’s very, very hard. I kiss his picture every night before I go to bed, and I kiss it every morning when I get up.”
Christopher Hixon sacrificed his life to save students during #Parkland shooting last month. His widow, Toni Hixon, joined us on @foxandfriends to share her husband's story of love and devotion. pic.twitter.com/uI1G4IFzfC
— Ainsley Earhardt (@ainsleyearhardt) March 27, 2018
Debbie Hixon shared that she and her husband have two kids. Their oldest son, Tommy, is a 26-year-old First Lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps.
“He followed in his Dad’s footsteps in serving our country in the military,” Hixon said.
Hixon’s 22-year-old son, Corey, has special needs and is a truly “special guy,” she said.
MSD HS athletic director and former @USNavy MM1 Chris Hixon (pictured here saluting his @USMC son, Tommy) will be buried today in Hollywood, Florida. He leaves behind his wife, Debbi, sons Thomas and Corey, a special-needs young man, along with two grandchildren. #Parkland #RIP pic.twitter.com/MWpdTZzVVd
— James LaPorta (@JimLaPorta) February 21, 2018
Debbie detailed the reasons behind the powerful quote she had engraved on her husband’s tombstone.
“He’s buried in the national cemetery in Florida. On the tombstone, we put ‘If not me, then who…’ — the motto of the Travis Manion Foundation,” she said.
The foundation has released a video explaining more about the meaning behind this powerful phrase:
“Tommy had asked people to give donations [to the foundation] instead of giving presents for his birthday,” Debbie said. “My husband and I learned about that foundation in February and we thought, ‘Wow, what an awesome thing. We did a great job raising our son, that here for his birthday he’s asking people to donate to this foundation.'”
Toni said she and Chris taught their kids to “stand up, be present, be that person that is going to do the right thing.”
“When it came time for us to decide what we wanted to put on the headstone, we wanted it to speak to what happened,” she added. “We were like, ‘that motto really ties into how Chris lived his life, so let’s use it.'”
(H/T: Fox News)