MOORE, Okla. – Jeany Neely was a nurse who cared most deeply about her two teenage sons, Jacob and Taylor.
The home the boys shared with their mom was destroyed in the Moore tornado May 20.
Taylor, 17, and Jacob, 19, lost their mom Jeany in the storm.
“We actually looked out the window and saw that house be destroyed,” Jacob said. “So we ran into my closet. The first thing I remember is hearing windows breaking and my foundation being ripped up. My roof came up and I saw a bright light.”
Jacob rode out the storm with Jeany and their dogs in an interior closet of their home on the east side of I-35.
They were both sucked out of that closet.
Jacob had just minor injuries.
Jeany died of blunt force trauma when she was hit by debris and a nearby car which flew into the house.
“They were roughly right next to each other,” Michael Neely said. “When the car came in, I think it went directly to her.”
“At first I thought she was just unconscious but when I got closer, I realized she was probably not going to make it,” Jacob said, who held his mom in her final moments.
Taylor rode out the storm in a locker room at Westmoore High School.
“I wish I had been there too, to be with her.” Taylor said. “If I could have just told her, ‘Get out of the house.'”
The family got to say goodbye.
The boys, their dad, Michael Neely and step-mom Stacy Neely spent several hours with Jeany’s body before the coroner moved her to the morgue.
Michael Neely is an Oklahoma City Police officer and so authorities allowed him and his sons into the evacuated area so they sit with their mom.
“Not only have they (Jacob and Taylor) lost their home, she was their home,” Stacy Neely said. “They’re good boys. She did an amazing job raising them. She was an amazing mother.”
They found a note sifting through the wreckage.
It reads: “One task a day. Live, love, laugh. Keep silent. Keep God close. Love the boys.”
“She was a great mother; I couldn’t have asked for a better mother,” Taylor said.
If you would like to help the Neely family, there is an account set up for Jacob and Taylor at the Municipal Employees Credit Union.
You can make a donation to the “Taking Care of Our Own” account at any ME/CU location.
That’s the foundation Chad Peery set up for Oklahoma City Police officers’ families.
Peery was a close family friend.