Cassidy was diagnosed with Ewing’s sarcoma last year and has been battling the rare type of cancer with numerous chemotherapy treatments.
Her mom Kelly Pettit Huff decided to buy tickets to the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas as a special treat for Cassidy — unsure if her daughter’s health would allow the trip.
But Cassidy pulled through and, five weeks after finishing chemo, the mom and daughter took the trip to Vegas, oblivious of the tragic events that were about to occur.
Kelley bought the tickets for her daughter as a birthday present and something to look forward to as she went through “a gruelling year of chemo” she wrote in a post she shared about the fateful night.
“I am so thankful for every concert goer, perfect strangers, who came up to Cassidy and gave her a high-five, or a fist bump, or a hug, offered words of encouragement or shared their stories of a loved one who is fighting or fought cancer,” Kelley wrote about the evening. “It was so heartwarming to feel the love from people we didn’t even know and it made me so happy.”
Kelley shared a picture of a shirtless cowboy who wanted to dance with Cassidy adding: “He shuffled his feet a bit, twirled her (Cassidy) around, dipped her and set her down leaving her with a big kiss on the top of her bald head. She had the biggest smile. It brought her joy.”
But their blissful evening was interrupted by the sound of gunshots and Kelley called her husband immediately who told her to run as fast as she could and not to stay down.
“To avoid being trampled, I practically picked Cassidy up and threw her through a pretzel stand or some sort of serving equipment and crawled through behind her and we ran as fast as we could,” Kelley wrote in her post.
As they were both running Cassidy collapsed with fatigue and an off-duty police officer picked her up and his girlfriend grabbed Kelley’s hand and ran with her.
They took cover behind a truck and a retired police officer told us to keep moving while his daughter, also a serving officer, put Cassidy on her back and ran.
“He told his wife to take us to their car and get us home and come back for him later. What a selfless thing to do. We ran into the MGM parking garage and left before the streets were locked down. We were home by 11:15 p.m,” Kelley wrote.
Kelley thanked all those that helped them on the evening of October, 1 when Stephen Paddock shot and killed 58 people and wounded almost 500 others.
“I must thank each person who assisted us Sunday night and got us safely home to my husband and my other three little girls. I love you like I have known you forever and I will never forget you!!!!” she wrote.
“For whatever reason, it was not our turn to go that night… I wonder what happened to all of those amazing people who acknowledged my daughter and her fight against cancer. I do not understand why this happened nor can I even comprehend it. It angers me…I will pray continually for all those affected by this tragedy,” she said.
Read the mother’s complete Facebook post below:
I’m really struggling and honestly did not want to post anything about our experience on Sunday night at the Route 91…
Posted by Kelley Pettit Huff on Tuesday, October 3, 2017
What an inspiring story of courage. Please share if you think this was an extremely brave and inspiring story.
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