BRIDGEWATER — Despite her challenges, Kelly Kangas always wanted to live an ordinary life.

“Kelly had her struggles,” her sister Kristi Bagley said. “She was childlike, but she wanted to be treated like everyone else.”

Kangas was born Kelly Bagley on Sept. 6, 1979, a few minutes after her twin brother Dan Bagley. In utero, Kangas received less oxygen than her twin, resulting in developmental disabilities and health problems, Kangas’ family members said.

Growing up in Bridgewater, Kangas and her three siblings had a “wonderful” childhood Kristi Bagley said. “We didn’t have a lot, but we made the best of things.”

From early on, it was clear Kangas had a love for animals that surpassed that of her siblings.

“The rest of us were like, ‘No, thank you,’ ” Kristi Bagley said, “But she would always be out there hugging them and playing with them.”

Recognizing her passion for taking care of pets, Kangas’ parents, Daniel and Cheryl, allowed her to have ample critters. Over the course of her childhood, Kangas had steers, chickens, ducks, geese, finches, cockatiels, rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, cats and dogs. Her father even built her a pond for turtles.

“It was good for her to have responsibility,” Kristi Bagley said “It gave her something to do that she loved.”

Through a special education program at Woodstock Union High School, where Kangas graduated from in 1999, Kangas worked in the cow barn at Billings Farm and Museum on some school days.

“She practically was the one doing all the halter training on the calves at Billings,” her mother said. “Those calves would follow her like a mother duck down the lane all the way to the barn.”

Although she wouldn’t change much, Cheryl Bagley said raising Kangas had its challenges.

“She took a lot of my time and my emotions,” her mother said “It was tough on the other three. They didn’t get a lot of my time and effort.”

Bagley recalled her daughter’s struggle to make friends and keep up academically. Then there were her health challenges.

“She was sickly right from the beginning,” her mom said. “She was a tough cookie.”

After spending about seven months at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, Kangas died April 25, 2024, from kidney and heart failure. She was 44.

Some adults with disabilities struggle to live independently and find love, but Kangas did both, which didn’t surprise her family.

“We worried about how it would be out in the world independently, but I knew she would find somebody and work,” Kangas’ sister Katrina Gedney said. “She just always had that spirit that she was going to do what everybody else did.”

Kelly met her husband, Mike Kangas, while both were working at the since-shuttered Brookside Nursing Home in Hartford. The two dated for about five years before they married on Sept. 8, 2009, in the backyard of her great aunts, Nellie and Pat Bagley.

When Kristi Bagley met Mike, she thought, “This guy is perfect for her. They’re very similar to each other in an innocent way. He loved her to death, and Kelly loved him to death.”

After living together at Nellie and Pat Bagley’s house for several years, the couple moved into an apartment in White River Junction and then to Gray, Maine, where they resided for about three years.

The couple had returned to the Upper Valley in early 2023, moving into an apartment in Hartford Village about six months before Kelly went into the hospital.

In terms of paying bills and running errands, Kelly kept track of things and Mike got them done. “They were inseparable,” Dan Bagley said. “She kept Mike on his toes. Whatever Kelly said, Mike did it.”

The couple’s chihuahua, Gracie, was their baby. “Gracie was the other love of her life,” Dan Bagley said.

The Valley News couldn’t reach Mike Kangas. He remains at the Hartford Village apartment with Gracie and the couple’s cats but has isolated himself since his wife’s death, his sister Tiffany Kangas said. “He’s been having a real hard time ever since,” she said.

Along with Brookside Nursing Home, Kelly worked at many Upper Valley establishments, including the Vermont Institute of Natural Science in Hartford, Price Chopper in West Lebanon and Union Arena in Woodstock.

“She was a good person and a good worker, but she was a slow learner,” Boris Pilsmaker, the owner of Mountain Creamery, a restaurant and ice cream shop in downtown Woodstock which closed in October 2024.

Kangas washed dishes at the restaurant briefly about 20 years ago. She started in the winter, the restaurant’s slower months, but “when summer hit, it was too much for her,” Pilsmaker said.

More recently, Mike Kangas washed dishes and prepped food at Mountain Creamery.

But when his wife’s health took a turn for the worst, he quit to take care of her. “He was amazing.” Pilsmaker said. “They had a good life together.”

Before entering the hospital, Kangas and her mother didn’t talk to each other much. “Her rights and wrongs and my rights and wrongs were different,” Cheryl Bagley said.

Bagley disagreed with the way Kangas treated her great aunts, who are both deceased.

“Kelly was very pushy,” Bagley said. “She would push them around to get what she wanted, usually money.”

However, once Kangas’ health started declining, Bagley spent days at a time in her daughter’s hospital room.

Known for her pranks, like buying gag gifts, Kangas cracked jokes until the very end. “She had this belly laugh when she started everybody else cracked up,” Bagley said.

Even while on a restricted diet and bedridden, Kangas’ spirits were high. “She had no reason to laugh, but she did,” Bagley said.

Bagley recalled the day a nurse sat on a stool to change the bandages on her daughter’s infected leg. “You be careful that dragon doesn’t bite you,” Kangas told the nurse.

The nurse jumped, unaware that Kangas was referring to the dragon tattoo on her bandaged leg.

“The other nurse was laughing,” Bagley said.

Kangas remained conscious and talkative until her final day. Gracie, her chihuahua, was at Kangas’ bedside when she died.

“I don’t know if it’s a twin thing, but there’s a big void,” Dan Bagley said. “Just having her as a sister every day was an honor.”

Emma Roth-Wells can be reached at erothwells@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.