My Annual Countdown

For 5 years now on the anniversary of my sweet daughter's death, for some reason I am emotional the week leading up to it. She died on July 22, 2004 and like the original date, it falls on a Thursday again this year. 

I haven't shared my anguish with anyone until now. Everyday I remember. Her last Sunday, for example, we went to church in the morning and got to meet personally the pastor's wife for the first time. Later we went to the zoo with my family who was in town visiting, then shared a meal at a BBQ joint close to our home. She has no more appetite at this point and we had just convinced her to let us put diapers on her because it was so painful for her to sit on the toilet even though she was on a pain pump. She was 6 years old so she was incredibly embarassed about the whole thing. I think some of her organs were beginning to shut down by this point because she was having trouble trying to even go to the bathroom. She was no longer walking at all, in fact it was to painful to even put on shoes since her legs just dangled off her wheelchair, so we covered her feet with pretty socks that didn't weigh anything. She could still move her arm at this time, but she had started feeling a burning sensation in her hands and we would gave her some baby washcloths soaked in cold water for her to hold and alleviate a bit of her discomfort. I still have one of her washcloths tucked away in my bible to this day.

This is my little girl giving my brother a big kiss. Her face lit up when my family showed up. At the time they lived 400 miles away. You can see her holding one of the washcloths in her hand there.

 She slept alot, laughed alot and cried out in pain whenever she needed to change positions and we had to physically move her ourselves since she was unable to do it alone. We read scriptures over her constantly, i sang songs of worship to God with her, she loved to sing, and we watched ALOT of movies.

There was a breathing machine that we had to ocassionally put on her to help her a bit. It was huge and heavy so it was kept by either the couch or the chair she spent most of her time in. Despite her pain, her spirit was always so sweet and mindful of everyone else's needs. She must have been loaded most of the time because she was on a morphine pump, but all i noticed was that it caused her to doze off every now and then.

I also remember a waitress bringing her a milkshake at the BBQ place when she didn't want to eat anything, and my little girl just went on and on about how nice that was of her. It really touched my daughters heart and after she passed, I took her a card to let her know how meaningful her act of kindness was to my girl and how she died only 4 days later.

 This was at the zoo that day. She wanted her picture to be taken with the white leopard in the background.

We sat her on a pillow and rolled up a towel between her legs to keep them stable to keep her pain to a minimum. You can see she had full use of her arms and hands still, and she smiled.....

Thanks for letting me share a little of my pain with you, it has been especially difficult since my husband and I separated, and he's not speaking to me right now.