Interview Transcript

Interview with Melissa Bergstrom, music professor at Anoka-Ramsey

How long have you been teaching at ARCC?
Since fall of 2002, seven years

Have you taught at any other colleges?
No. I really like my job; I did church music before teaching. I sunk my teeth into the college life and I like it a lot.

You teach music, what made you want to pursue teaching music?
I went to school for performing and singing, I got my bachelors in voice performance. And I wanted to do opera and music theatre. Right after that, I got a part time church music job, to pay the bills, travel, auditions, and all that, there I started directing a choir, and it was the most fun thing I was doing in the day and week by far. Part of what I enjoyed the most was that I could talk a lot about the music, the composers, why they wrote them and what was going on in the world at the time those songs were written. It was my most favorite thing, the energy of working with people. After I did that, singing seemed really empty and lonely all of a sudden.

Do you plan on continuing teaching for awhile?
I do, I plan to make this my life’s work. When I interviewed for the job at Anoka-Ramsey I told them, “I think this might be my dream job,” and I think it still is.

Has it shaped who you are at all?
Hmm, that is really an interesting question… Well teaching music has made me much more aware of life experiences that people bring, to the classroom but also to fast food drivethru’s, gas station, church, kohls, or wherever you happen to be. You get to know students and about their life, and it’s amazing peoples stories, there is a lot going on, everyone has a story. You never know if this is one of the best days or worst days of someone’s life. I guess what I’m trying to say is that it’s made me more empathetic, even to strangers, to anyone, students and bank tellers. It’s made me more sensitive. I want to be a bright spot, not add to the misery.
I like to think that everyone is trying their best, or doing all they can. I like to give them the benefit of the doubt.

How did you meet your husband, Samuel?
It was actually my first day of college, we were both doing undergrad at Augsburg school.

Would you mind talking about Ellis?
Ellis, my son, was born march of 2004. We had a normal and healthy pregnancy, and delivery. Everything was great. But after birth he had a fever, and was breathing fast. His health deteriorated over 24 hours. He was diagnosed with a congenital heart defect, a structural defect in his heart, a valve in his heart didn’t work right. He was very sick. And because of the defect in his heart, his lungs didn’t work right either. He was on meds and ventilators from the first day. He had open heart surgery at month old. He had three more surgeries in three months, and he was on dialysis. He was in the hospital for first three and a half months of his life. The doctors kept saying, “He’s not going to live through one day.” Then it was, “He’s not going to live through his first week,” Then his first month and so on.
By then he was considered a “Hospice patient”.
Then it was, July 3, 2004, and I will never forget this day. The doctors said, “he’s going to die in a few hours. His body is too tired, and his heart didn’t recover from surgery.”
“so we’ll hug and hold him and be with him,” we said. And it was honestly the strangest thing, he got better, overnight, miraculously better. He was breathing on his own, he was peeing on his own. He didn’t need dialysis or ventilator or medications, it was literally overnight. We took him outside for the first time on July 4. It was amazing. He was home by end of the month.
He grew up into two year old boy. Ellis loved music, the alphabet, he was really smart. And it was so funny, his musical sensitivities, he would always cry at sad music, and get really excited and dance at happy music. If the song Ava Maria was playing, he’d burst into tears! (laughs)
As he grew though, his heart wasn’t ready for a bigger body to support, he really needed a transplant, and was on the transplant list for over year. He got the transplant July 2006. It didn’t go well, the transplant was hard on him. He was then in the hospital until early October.
After 5 weeks, he was home, and was doing well, getting stronger; and all of a sudden, his body rejected the organ, very sudden. very scary rejection. It’s usually a really slow thing, but one day he was fine, and then one day it was just wrong. I had a “mother’s intuition” feeling that it just wasn’t right.
I took him to the hospital right away but the doctors said, “heart looks okay,” but they said they’d send the x-rays to the other doctors just in case. And by the time I got back to the house, I had a message from the hospital saying you have to come back to the ER right now. We went to the ER, and checked into ICU. He lived three more weeks in the hospital on the ventilator. But he never regained consciousness. And he died December 4th. 2006
There were huge highs, and long periods of wonderful times and really absolute miracles. And tragic lows and losing him was the hardest thing ever. You hold on when he needs to be held on to, and you let go when you have to.

I heard you had another baby! Would you mind sharing that story?
Yes! We just had our baby boy, Finnian, four months ago. Wow, I can’t believe it’s already four months! It’s been amazing to have a baby around again. I always find my self saying,” Oh my gosh, Ellis used to do that!” You get to have more memories and that’s nice.
Last fall, we decided to try for a baby again. It was two years until we were ready to bring another life into the world. We had to be ready for something in case it happened again. We weren’t sure if it would, but we had to be ready just in case.
Finnian was actually born with a very minor heart defect, but it’s really common, and not serious. The doctor said that 20-25 percent of babies are born with this little hole. But because of our history, the doctors decided to look into it, even though they usually disregard it on any other baby. Finn is going in to see the cardiologist in December, but the doctor is 99.9 percent sure that it will be closed already. It should close soon.
But it’s kind of like snake eyes, in gambling. Actually I don’t know enough about gambling to know if this is a good analogy! (laughs) But Ellis got the worst card, the worst defect; Finn got the least serious one. It’s like a play of cards.

What’s it like having a baby around again?
It’s pretty awesome; I have to admit there are times that are sort of wistful. Oh Ellis would be such a great big brother! Our family would feel so complete if he was here.
But oh Finn is wonderful. They (babies) love you so much it’s so amazing you just glow when you have a kid in your life.

Would you have changed anything if you could?
Well if I had a magic wand and I could make Ellis 100 percent healthy, I’d do that of course. More so for him than for me. He loved school buses and baseballs, and he never had that chance to go to school or play baseball..
People say oh but now you have Finn. Or they, and the doctors did too, say it would have been easier if he’d died that first night, you wouldn’t be so attached to him, but Ellis was who he was, and I wouldn’t trade that for anything. I am so thankful we had two and a half years with him. He got two and a half years to live and that is most important and we had two and a half years with him, and that was a miracle in my book.
But yes, for sure, if I could I would bring him back. So yes, a magic wand, if you come across one let me know! (Laughs)
Oh and I just have to add this sidenote:
Finn was born with hair on his head,like any other baby and it was dark brown just a little in the back. His Hair fell out like it does on every baby, and one day Sam (my husband) notices a birthmark on the back of his head beneath his hair, you know we thought that was really cool but we kind of disregarded it. At 3-4 weeks old, nearly all his hair fell off, And Sam came rushing into the room, “you’ll never believe what this birthmark is!”
I look, and I kid you not, the birthmark was a perfect capitol letter E.
I don’t pretend to know anything, or the universe or anything, but that sent me to the moon. It was seriously the strangest thing. And people’s jaws drop, and they get goosebumps and tears when they see it, especially if they know Ellis’ story. My mom likes to say, “Ellis gave him a little kiss before he came down.”

Has it been hard at all now that you have a child, and you work?
That’s been an amazing thing. I’ve been teaching more online stuff, and so has Sam. Basically we have a day or so we need childcare. But each week we tag team. And because of that we often end up working evenings and weekends, but it’s worth it to be with Finn.
The music history class I’m teaching now is a hybrid, it’s two hours of class each week and the rest is on line. All the quizzes are online, and I have online lectures.

That had to make it easier on grading all those quizzes!
Yes it does! I realized you save so much paper, so many trees for the good of the earth. I try to be a good person and I’m not too keen on that ecological stuff. Haha I suppose though that the internet uses electricity so it’s kind of backwards! (laughs)

Well thank you so much for taking time out of your day to talk with me!
Oh of course! Anytime, it was great to talk with you. Sorry it was so long!





Interview with Amanda Mclain, student
What was your favorite thing about having Mrs. Bergstrom for your teacher?

My favorite thing about having Mrs. B was her knowledge of music and the background of where it came from. And her excitement over musical things

How did you react to her story about Ellis and Finn?
I knew Ellis from the time he was born and the whole time he was alive. His story and struggles were hard on my personally due to the relationship I had with both him and his parents. And when I found out they were having another baby, I was so excited! Nobody deserved that more than they did.