Tragic Manhattan mom Marina Krim has revealed how she stays “connected” to her two dead children.
In an uplifting essay published on Sheryl Sandberg’s new community website optionb.org, she claims 6-year-old Lulu and 2-year-old Leo have sent her a “message” of love to help her grieve.
The pair was found stabbed to death at their Upper West Side apartment in October 2012 at the hands of their nanny, Yoselyn Ortega.
Krim, 41, describes how, as the weeks and months went by after the killings, something “magical” happened.
She became hypersensitive and began noticing things such as street art — a stencil of a young boy holding a sign filled with colorful hearts, for example — that instantly linked her to Leo.
She felt that “maybe the universe was trying to tell me something, that it was helping me to realize that there was a beautiful ‘new’ relationship waiting to be developed with Lulu and Leo.”
“Over the next few weeks, my senses were awakened. I started noticing other connections,” she says.
“One quiet morning, I was walking along the beach and the Peanuts theme song, a family favorite that was played at the kids’ memorial service, was blasting from a beach house.”
She goes on to describe how a jogger stopped her and her surviving 3-year-old child, Nessie, on a beach and said: “You and your daughter are extraordinarily beautiful.”
Writes Krim: “Surprised, I thanked him and he jogged away. I really loved that simple message from a stranger. I wondered if somehow it was being delivered from Lulu and Leo.”
The mom and her husband, Kevin, have set up a foundation, choosecreativity.org, in honor of their lost children. In the Option B essay, Krim recalls how, on the first Mother’s Day after Lulu’s death, she had an idea.
“On our last vacation together, Lulu and I had collected dozens of large sand dollars.
“I spent this Mother’s Day hanging up those sand dollars for display on an empty wall in our apartment. It was a simple way to express myself, feel present, and connect with Lulu and Leo on a really tough day.”
Ortega is awaiting trial.