Eight Years

1997 ~ 2014

Eight years since we last hugged, laughed, chatted, prayed and listened to music together. Missing Leah continues to hurt so very much, but the sharp edges of my grief have softened and the pain has become more bearable. Some days are harder than others, especially when there’s family get togethers or significant events, where Leah’s absence feels so real and so painful.

A few days ago I opened an email from author Sarah Geringer, where she describes creating her Vision Board for 2022. I hadn’t really heard of such a thing before, so I did a bit more reading on the topic. I came across this definition here:

_{A vision board is a visual reminder of the goals, plans, and purposes that you have prayerfully been given from God. I like to think of it as a creative prayer journal. Writing the vision out by creating a vision board helps us to maintain focus and clarity of mind. It also keeps us intentional in our actions.}

https://undoubtedgrace.com/creating-a-christian-vision-board/

I liked the sound of this and thought it would be fun to make one. I also reckoned it might help me to keep my focus on what matters. I used the free version of Canva for my creation. This is the “digital” end result. I’m planning on printing off a copy and placing it where I can see it, as an ongoing reminder of what really matters:

Obviously, there are other things in my life that matter too, but I think that if we put first things first, the remainder will fall into place. On a somewhat related note, I really like this quote from “The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse” by Charlie Mackesy:

Thank you to all who have journeyed with us over the years, especially during those times when we couldn’t see a way through. We could not have done this on our own – your loving care for us has been tangible evidence of the goodness of God.

I recently came across this song by Tasha Layton and it really comforted me, I had it playing on repeat on Leah’s 24th birthday two weeks ago:

Into the Sea (It’s Gonna Be OK)

My heart is breaking
In a way I never thought it could
My mind is racing
With the question, “Are you still good?”
Can you make something
From the wreckage?
Would you take this heart
And make it whole again?

Though the mountains may be moved into the sea
Though the ground beneath might crumble and give way
I can hear my Father singing over me
“It’s gonna be ok, it’s gonna be ok”I’ve blamed myself
And if I’m honest, maybe I’ve blamed You too
But You would not forsake me
‘Cause only good things come from You

Though the mountains may be moved into the sea
Though the ground beneath might crumble and give way
I can hear my Father singing over me
“It’s gonna be ok, it’s gonna be ok”

From beginning to the end
You’re so close
You have never let me down and You won’t
In the valleys, in the shadows I know
You’re so close
You’re so close

Though the mountains may be moved into the sea
Though the ground beneath might crumble and give way
I can hear my Father singing over me
“It’s gonna be ok, it’s gonna be ok”
It’s gonna be ok, it’s gonna be ok
I’m gonna be ok, I’m gonna be ok

Six Years On

Every year I take the day of the anniversary of Leah’s death off work (annual leave). In the early days, I used to save up my holidays and take the whole week off, as I used to be totally incapable of functioning around this time. Thankfully I am now able to focus on my work on the days leading up to Leah’s anniversary, although every day I am of course very aware of what I was doing at this time in 2014.

I decided to take out Leah’s Youth Bible (the one she used most) and have a look through it. As soon as I opened it I noticed that she had cut out her daily devotional  reading for Thursday 31st January 2013, laminated it and tucked it inside the front cover of her Bible. By the end of January 2013, Leah was having weekly blood tests at our GP surgery and had already had her first appointment at the Sperrin Unit; the Haematology/Oncology department at our local hospital. While we were in the Sperrin Unit Waiting Area, waiting to be called into that first appointment, I was devastated when a young nurse bounced up to us and casually asked us if we were waiting on chemotherapy. I was already very uncomfortable with the fact that our fifteen-year-old daughter had to attend an Outpatients appointment at the Haematology/Oncology Unit in the first place, but this suggestion/implication that our teenage daughter, who was so vibrant and full of life, could possibly be ill enough to ever require chemo, was more than I could bear to contemplate. Leah, however, took it all in her stride and chatted away cheerfully to the lovely Clinical Nurse Specialist who subsequently attended to us.

Anyway, I have digressed; the piece that Leah had cut out and laminated is entitled ‘No Accident’ and I thought that I would transcribe it here as it’s very good and I can see why Leah liked it:

 Marianne Williamson said “Love is what we were born with. Fear is what we learned here.” Families, friends and life experiences can create fears and limitations that hold us back. We go about life doing the best we can in this messy mixed-up world in which we live, but if we’re not careful we can allow these fears to take over.

We can live by the labels put on us by others: ‘not good enough, not up to the task, never make it, won’t succeed:’ we label ourselves; ‘useless, worthless, a mistake.’ These labels can cause us to live believing we don’t matter, our life is irrelevant and unimportant even unwanted. Nothing could be further from the truth.

God doesn’t make mistakes. You’re not here by accident! You ‘are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things He has planned for us long ago.’ (Ephesians 2:10) “I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11) 

Don’t live a life of fear, receive God’s confident guaranteed hope for your life; He promises ‘Everything I plan will come to pass…’

Shake off your labels. Take time to think about what you believe about yourself. Are you walking around with negative labels attached to you? Look today at what labels God gives you in Psalm 139:14

Following this, I looked up Psalm 139:14 in Leah’s Bible. As I expected that they would be, these lovely verses were underlined. It gives me great comfort to think about these particular verses being special to Leah. Psalm 139 has long been one of my favourite psalms too.

Shortly after Leah was diagnosed she told us “God has a plan for my life, we need to see the bigger picture.” Leah did not say this lightly, Leah was fully informed about the seriousness of her illness and the possibility that she might not recover from it. She struggled with many aspects of her illness, such as the loneliness and social isolation of long weeks spent being nursed in isolation, and the horrendous side-effects from her intense chemo treatment, but she sought daily to trust God through it all and she didn’t fear death.

I remember so vividly one of the occasions when Leah was critically ill on a ventilator in ICU and the doctors weren’t sure that she would survive the next 24 hours: I played “Our God is a Great Big God” on her iPad. Leah was too ill to even open her eyes but her face lit up in a big smile and her hands (despite being attached to various monitors) did all the actions (every single one) to this song – because Leah’s God truly is a great, big God.

Broken yet Blessed

This morning as I sat having my Devotional Time, I looked up and there across the room I saw it – the beautiful miniature Christmas Tree that Esther Scobie had made us for what would be Leah’s last Christmas. My youngest had decorated the room after I went to bed last night! Little did any of us know in December 2013 that it would also be Esther’s last Christmas.

Tears spilled down my cheeks as I remembered the many thoughtful cards and notes that I received from Esther over the years, but especially during Leah’s illness. It is so hard to say goodbye to the special people in our lives.

Yet how blessed I am to have known Esther and how blessed I am by the many other beautiful people that God has brought into my life – some for a short season and some for the long haul.

Philippians 1:3
“I thank my God upon every remembrance of you”

Colors of Goodbye ~ A Book Review

Despite my determination NOT to buy any more new books until I had made some inroads into the pile of unread titles weighing down my bookshelves, as soon as I read about the new book written by September Vaudrey and published last month, I was hooked. Within minutes my fingers had navigated the familiar keys of my keyboard, the book was ordered and it was on its’ way.

As soon as it arrived, Colors of Goodbye: A Memoir of Holding On, Letting Go, and Reclaiming Joy in the Wake of Loss captivated me with its tasteful cover and the delicate artwork that marks the beginning of each new chapter. I couldn’t wait to start reading it. I read the entire 292 pages in less than a week. There is much about September’s journey as a grieving mother that is different to mine, but there are also many similarities. September’s 19 year old daughter has a car accident and she is in a coma. They are told that she is ‘brain dead’.

September is a natural writer, she shares openly and authentically with her readers how she processes everything that happens:

Praying and hoping that God will perform a miracle and heal Katie.

Wondering if she should tell her adult children everything about Katie’s medical condition before they fly home or if she should wait and speak to them face to face, but thereby run the risk of them being informed via social media or text whilst en route?

September describes being alone with her daughter in ICU and noticing how quiet it is, save the beeping of the monitors and the rhythmic whoosh of the ventilator. She holds her daughter’s hand and asks herself “Is this real or is it a parent’s worst nightmare?” I too was that parent, alone in an ICU room with my unconscious daughter and the sounds of beeping and swooshing, knowing I would never again hear my daughter’s voice or feel her loving embrace.

Interspersed with these details are references to September’s unshakeable faith in a God who cares and her unfaltering sense of humour – I felt so at home in this book.

September writes through her pain and talks us through some of the challenges of being a grieving parent who is parenting grieving children. She speaks of her and her husband being together, yet alone – he doesn’t know what it feels like for a mother to lose a daughter and she doesn’t know what it’s like for a father to lose his little girl. Their four other children are teenagers and young adults and between the six of them they demonstrate a range of grieving styles. September describes the delicate process of learning to respect each other’s ways of coping. Her stoic husband Scott describes their grief and loss as being like an amputation – ‘the wound will eventually heal but we’ll still be missing an arm.’

September gives us insight into her thought processes as she endeavours to both hold on and let go. To find enduring ways to remember Katie and honour her place in their family, whilst at the same time not wishing to turn their home into a ‘Katie shrine’. September talks about the gaping wound in her soul that her daughter’s death has created and how easy it would be to fill this hole with bitterness, anger and self-pity. On the three year anniversary of her daughter’s death September discovers that the sorrow that has been her constant companion since Katie died was now mingled with ‘an inexplicable sense of peace and unapologetic sparks of joy’. September writes of this discovery:

God, always the gentleman, had not rushed me or demanded I accept this life whose story line still horrified me, and perhaps always would. He had simply continued to invite and to fan little embers of joy beneath the ashes as constant reminders of His love for me. He had not forgotten me or my family or our pain.

September’s authentic voice, as she writes movingly about the life and death of her beautiful daughter Katie and life after loss, has helped me to reflect on my own grief journey. Whilst travelling through the story of this grieving mama, I have revisited some of my own difficult places and found little pieces of healing. I highly recommend this book to anyone seeking to navigate the minefields of grief and loss while holding on to their faith in a loving God.

In this 6 minute video September and Scott talk about their loss. Scott says that he has good news and bad news: the good news is that you won’t always feel this way, that gradually the intolerable ache softens, the bad news is that you never get over this. He says that he’s learned to get on with life, but the loss of his daughter is always just below the surface. September says that in the almost eight years since Katie died, that God has continuously showed up in their story, usually in the thumbprints of other people – especially when people don’t forget your child and they don’t forget your sorrow – she describes ‘church’ as a community of people who do life together.

A Theology of Suffering

Malcolm Duncan  is one of my favourite N. Ireland Bible teachers. I first heard him live at New Horizon in 2014, a few months after Leah had died. My concentration and attention span were limited but Malcolm’s preaching really held my attention.

Malcolm’s charge at New Horizon in 2014 was to preach each night from the Sermon on the Mount. On the Thursday night Malcolm announced that he felt that God wanted him to depart from what he was scheduled to speak on, in order to talk about suffering and grief in a message entitled His Presence in our pain. It was such a God moment. There were many friends and family there that night who were grieving deeply for Leah. Not to mention the many others in the 2,500 strong crowd who were grieving for loved ones or who were experiencing other kinds of suffering.

Malcolm said that night:

Have you ever cried out to God, “Why?” How can we not be moved when we hear the stories of Christians around the world that are suffering such horrific persecution. At some point in their life, every Christian will go through something that causes them to ask, “Why?” Mary and Martha went through that experience when Lazarus died.

The sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one who you love is sick.” Never think that sickness or death or suffering or unanswered prayer are an indication that God does not love you.  There is a cruel theology in the church that says if you are facing illness or sickness it is because you don’t have enough faith – that is NOT the case.  Suffering does not mean that God is punishing you.

Within weeks of this event, Malcolm Duncan was going to know grief and suffering like he had never known it before. In the months that followed, three members of his close extended family died by suicide, while three other family members – his mother, his wife and his brother, were simultaneously hospitalised in three different hospitals, for very serious illnesses.

Two podcasts that Malcolm subsequently recorded with Dave Criddle, entitled Hard Times and Hard Times Part 2  have been such a blessing to me. I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve listened to these podcasts and sat writing notes in my journal.

In these podcasts Malcolm and Dave talk about how they’ve attended church feeling weak and broken and that it’s ok to not be ok. They said that although sometimes they have felt God’s presence in a very real way in their suffering, there have been many other times when they don’t feel God at all, they just continue on because they believe.

Malcolm talks about his faith being less ‘fluffy’ now and about being clearer about the difference between joy and happiness – happiness is fleeting and depends on our circumstances, whereas joy is deeply rooted in something much more meaningful. He says that emotional pain has caused him to dig deeper for meaning , but he also acknowledges that for many people, pain and suffering become the fulcrum on which their lives turn away from God.

How many times I have stood sobbing at Leah’s grave (this past week included), contemplating one of her favourite verses inscribed on the kneeling plate:

Malcolm’s life has turned further into God, which he describes as ‘a work of grace’. He talks about saying to God “Unless you get me through this, I won’t make it.” Ah, but how those words resonate with my own heart.

He asks “How does one travel with sadness – the absence of a sense of God’s presence -because finding God in the midst of suffering is not a given?” He says “What do we do with a God who doesn’t always heal, One who doesn’t always answer prayer?” Malcolm courageously admits to having thousands of questions. It is like the Balm of Gilead to my soul, to at last encounter a Christian leader who admits to being plagued with many of the same questions that I have wrestled with.  He says that one day God will answer all of our questions, but on that day, the questions won’t matter anyway.

Near the end of the first podcast is my favourite line of all, when Malcolm says that our churches are caught up with thinking about a theology of healing, when perhaps what they/we really need is a THEOLOGY OF SUFFERING!

“Hard Times” with Malcolm Duncan & Dave Criddle

“Hard Times, pt. 2” with Malcolm Duncan & Dave Criddle

Tomorrow is a New Day

My first day back at my own desk, where I used to work before I went off work to care for Leah, turned out to be incredibly difficult.

Not because my work colleagues aren’t nice – they are lovely. We even managed to pop out to a local cafe for lunch. I enjoy their company and I love eating out.

Not because I don’t like my job – I love my work.

What broke me was the vivid awareness, that the last time I drove that route to work, parked in that spot, worked at that desk, I had four children alive on this earth.

This awareness triggered an almost overwhelming wave of grief.

It took all of my willpower to get through this first day, while praying silently for strength.

At the end of today, as I headed back to my car, on a nearby street, the tears started flowing.

My intention was to drive straight to the cemetery and spend some time at Leah’s grave.

I started the car and pulled off, but very quickly parked again – I had a flat tyre!

Normally in these circumstances I would attempt to change it myself and then some kind gentleman would invariably come along and offer to do it for me!

Not this time – a flat tyre was the last thing that I needed at the end of an emotionally fraught day.

I stayed in the car and phoned my husband and sobbed down the phone.

He phoned me back a while later to say that he had phoned “Roadside Recovery” to come and change the tyre for me.

The idea of needing Roadside Recovery to come and change a tyre upset me even further.

On my last day of working in my present location after Leah was diagnosed, my car broke down. I ended up sobbing in the car, waiting for Roadside Recovery to turn up. I write about this here.

Here I was again, two years later, on my first day back in that same office, sitting sobbing in the car, waiting for Roadside Recovery to turn up.

I felt so defeated and demoralised.

I listened to “Oceans” by Hillsong on continuos repeat as I sat in my car and waited for the same Roadside Recovery company to arrive. To my immense relief, it wasn’t the same man as the last time. Emotionally I would have found that very difficult – too much déjà vu!

The young man who arrived was cheerful and pleasant. More importantly, he didn’t tease me about being ‘helpless’ or ‘incapable’. He apologised for taking so long and did what he had to do, swiftly and graciously.

By 7pm I was good to go and headed off to visit Leah’s grave.

The graveyard felt so peaceful.

The previously vacant plot opposite Leah’s now contains a baby boy. The card on one of the fresh wreaths tells me that he’s a little brother. I thought about his heart broken family.

Leah’s kneeling plate was looking all dusty so I walked back to the car for some baby wipes to clean it up a little. I don’t like her ‘joy’ being covered over.

In closing, I’ve just two things to say about today:

Firstly, grief can be rough, very rough.

The wound of grief is like a deep wound that has scabbed over. All that it takes is for something to knock the scab off that wound and the flesh is once again laid bare, painful and bleeding. For a little while, everything feels as raw as it did when that wound was first acquired.

Secondly, tomorrow is a new day.

One of my very favourite Bible verses is

Lamentations 3:22-23 (ESV)

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.”

Another Milestone

Whenever Leah was diagnosed in 2013 I desperately wanted to keep on working. I love my job and going to work is one of my coping strategies. However, it quickly became apparent that I needed to be at home with Leah. I write about the circumstances that led to me going off work here.

I did not at all begrudge doing this, but at the same time I also felt a distinct sense of loss.

When we returned from Bristol, towards the end of 2013, I had a conversation with my employer about returning to work. I wanted to believe that my daughter was going to be well enough for this to happen.

In early December 2013, I asked for and was given a 2014 work diary. I wanted this tangible symbol that I would soon be returning to work and would need this diary. I kept it in my bedroom where I could see it, as reassurance that all of our lives would soon start returning to normal.

Then, in January 2014, Leah died. I couldn’t imagine ever being capable of working again. Just getting out of bed and getting dressed was quite an achievement. My employers were very supportive and patient. Eventually, by mutual agreement, it was agreed that I would return to my part-time post on the 1st September 2014.

Due to someone being on Maternity Leave, I was offered the opportunity of initially returning to a post in a rural area, somewhere that is more convenient for me. I was very pleased, as I knew that this would make my transition back to work easier, for several reasons.

As September approached, I felt both excited and nervous. The weekend immediately prior to my returning to work was awful, just awful.

My grief intensified.

I imagined that if my employers could see the state that I was in, they wouldn’t even let me through the door, much less let me loose on the unsuspecting public.

Besides my overwhelming grief, I didn’t know if I could still enjoy my work.

I wondered if everything that had happened, had changed me so much, that I would no longer find any satisfaction in what I had once found so fulfilling.

Well, work has been so good for me. It’s the only part of my life that’s more or less the same today, as it was before Leah took ill.

Having something in my life that hasn’t changed, when it feels like everything else in my life has changed beyond recognition, is so reassuring.

To my amazement, I soon discovered that I still knew how to do my job.

Not only that, I still love it.

Many mornings I still cry on my way to work, but as soon as I get there, the busyness of my work commitments push my distress to the back of my mind.

In the first few months after returning to work, as soon as I stepped outside the Health Centre to come home, I used to feel the heavy cloak of my grief descend upon me once again. Sometimes on my way home, I would pull in somewhere and give way to my emotions, so as not to upset everyone when I arrived home.

One day at work, someone momentarily forgot my name and introduced me to a work colleague as “Leah’s Mummy“. I thought that was so beautiful – that acknowledgement that although my daughter is dead, I am still her Mummy. I loved that they weren’t afraid to say Leah’s name in case I would get upset or something. Leah’s school is close to where I was working and her story is well known in the local community.

My work colleagues didn’t make a big fuss of my grief and I wouldn’t have wanted them to. However, quietly, behind closed doors, words of support were uttered and hugs were given, whenever I most needed them. I really appreciated that, as some days I was just hanging by a thread.

Today was my last day working in that rural town, sadly for me.

On Monday 15th June I return to my permanent post in the City. To the office where I was working during the early months of Leah’s illness, until shortly after she received her diagnosis. To the desk where I received phone calls from haematology regarding Leah’s blood tests. To the carpark where I sat in my car and cried hysterically, because those blood results had convinced me that there really was something seriously wrong with my child.

I have a mixture of feelings.

I’m very aware that I’ve so much to be thankful for:

Thankful for paid employment.

Thankful for a job that I love.

Thankful that I was given the opportunity to ease my way back into working life via a slightly quieter rural location.

Thankful for supportive work colleagues, both where I’m leaving and where I’m returning to.

Thankful for relatively good health that has enabled me to not have even one day’s sickness absence since my return.

Thankful that the same God who has been by my side up to now, continues to walk with me and will give me strength for all that lies ahead.

Love Notes

Leah and Miriam 2005

Today I was unpacking a bag of stuff that came down from our old house and I found another of Leah’s “love notes”.

She wrote it to me in 2012, when I was very upset about something that had happened.

In it she quotes Psalm 9:9-10

“The Lord defends those who suffer; he defends them in times of trouble. Those who know the Lord trust Him, because He will not leave those who come to Him.”

Then she writes some beautiful words of encouragement, regarding the situation that I was distressed about.

Of course, when I found this note, all I could do was cry and sob my heart out.

How I miss Leah’s love notes, her timely hugs and her words of encouragement.

Yet, I know it is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.

I am also mindful of how blessed I am to have a husband and four children.

I am blessed that I am loved.

Simon, Miriam, Rachel and Leah,
October 2004

I am mindful of how blessed we are as a family, to have had Leah in our midst for sixteen precious years and 16 days.

I am so blessed by each little note that I find, that reminds me of Leah – not that I need reminding – and the part that she played in our family.

She was my flesh and blood, the one whom I carried in my womb for nine months, felt every kick, birthed into this world, fed at my breast, gazed into her Moses Basket to check she was still breathing, shopped for, cooked for, loved with a Mother’s love and reluctantly handed back to the One who loves her with a perfect love.

Parenting brings so very many challenges – no one ever said it was going to be easy. I guess I just didn’t know it was going to be this hard.

How easy it would be to give up on life, to drown in this pool of tears.

However, just as Leah’s response to her situation was “God has a plan for my life“, so it is mine.

My hopes and prayers could be summed up in the words of 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (NIV)

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.”

Sisters

Today is our eldest daughter’s 21st birthday. Our much loved, longed for, prayed for, beautiful, eldest child.

For weeks now I’ve been thinking about and planning for, the family get togethers we will be having to celebrate this milestone – when her University exams are finally out of the way.

I fished out Rachel’s baby book this morning, to get some photos of her as a baby, to make up a “Happy Birthday collage” – as one does.

I opened the first page, expecting just to see photos of Rachel, but amidst the first photos of Rachel as a baby, I was also bombarded with photos of two smiling little girls with captions like “sisters”.

Rachel was three and a half years old when Leah was born. She loved her new sister from day one and never showed any signs of jealousy or resentment.

Seeing these photos this morning, caught me completely off guard, and triggered such a huge wave of grief, that my breakfast threatened to make a reappearance.

Every family event is bitter sweet.

From Leah’s Facebook page.
The caption reads “I love having my sister home for the weekend.”

I wondered what I had been thinking of, when I had made plans to work today, but Wednesday is my busy clinic day and I almost never take it off. I also don’t like having too much time to think. I just wasn’t sure how I was going to regain my composure.

Thankfully, I rarely – if ever – look as if I’ve been crying, so once I reached the Health Centre car park, I blew my nose and was very glad, as I have been on many other occassions, of that “busy clinic morning”.

I’ve talked before about the song “Somewhere Only We Know” here and here.

I walked across an empty land
I knew the pathway like the back of my hand
I felt the earth beneath my feet
Sat by the river and it made me complete

Oh simple thing where have you gone?
I’m getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you’re gonna let me in
I’m getting tired and I need somewhere to begin

I came across a fallen tree
I felt the branches of it looking at me
Is this the place we used to love?
Is this the place that I’ve been dreaming of?

Oh simple thing where have you gone?
I’m getting old and I need something to rely on
So tell me when you’re gonna let me in
I’m getting tired and I need somewhere to begin

And if you have a minute why don’t we go
Talk about it somewhere only we know?
This could be the end of everything
So why don’t we go
Somewhere only we know?

Somewhere only we know?

“Grief triggers” are in many ways a case of “somewhere only we know“.

What triggers my grief won’t necessarily trigger your grief and vice versa.

I hadn’t anticipated this wave of grief. So, not only do we not know what will trigger somebody else’s grief, we often don’t even know what will trigger our own grief.

Such a steep learning curve.

My Sock Story

I recently discovered this very interesting site called What’s Your Grief?

When I read this post called Sometimes Socks Are Sad I thought about my own ‘sock story’.

Shortly after Leah was diagnosed we received a very generous financial gift from a very dear family friend called Shirley.

Shirley also had blood cancer and had been through a stem cell transplant. She wasn’t financially well off, but she had a very loving heart. She outlived Leah by approximately six months. She is very much missed by all who knew and loved her, but like Leah, she looked forward to the day when she would meet her Lord and Saviour face to face, the one who loved her most of all.

I suggested to Leah that this money be used to purchase items that she would need during her hospital stay in Bristol. Anyone who knows Leah knows that she just loved shopping in Primark.

On one of our trips to Belfast for one of Leah’s many hospital appointments, she and I headed into the centre of Belfast to their massive Primark store. Leah filled our shopping basket with pyjamas, underwear and soft comfy socks.

Bristol has an amazing flagship Primark Store in the former House of Fraser building.

Early on in our time there I was dispatched to this store to buy Leah more of her favourite socks. She called them “popcorn” socks because their texture felt bubbly like popcorn.

During Leah’s time in the Bone Marrow Transplant Unit in Bristol, she went to theatre three times to have her Hickman Central Line removed and replaced. Leah was very ill and I always found these times very difficult emotionally.

On each of these occasions Leah had to remove all of her jewelry and wear a hospital gown and cap. The only personal item that she was allowed to wear was her socks. She always wore her ‘popcorn’ socks. The lovely paediatric anaesthetists always commented on her socks and told her how pretty they were.

Even though my heart was breaking, I really appreciated the effort they made to notice the ONE thing about my daughter that represented her individuality. It also represented their efforts to engage with us as fellow human beings.

It was a similar story with Leah’s earrings in the weeks that followed. Chemotherapy hair loss, facial hair growth caused by cyclosporine and hamster cheeks from her steroid therapy, had all changed Leah’s appearance. Yet the hospital staff were always careful to notice and comment positively on her earrings.

Leah had a variety of cute earrings from Claire’s Accessories. I so appreciated the efforts made by the staff to notice that one small way in which Leah could still express her personality – so important, especially for a young person.

Then recently I was in Primark here in town. Without thinking, I wandered down the sock aisle. There I saw them, Leah’s favourite “popcorn” socks, in so many pretty colours.

I held my breath, I fought back the tears. I remembered when Leah was so ill in Bristol, that she couldn’t even swallow her own saliva and I had to assist her with all of her personal care. Every day I put clean socks on her feet. Soft, comfy, colourful socks.

What a privilege it was to be able to care for my daughter and show her my love. I thank God for the health and strength that I experienced throughout Leah’s illness, that I was able to care for her 24/7. Even the chronic migraine that has dogged my existence since childhood, took a backseat during those months.

Someone told me today about a mother who could not cope emotionally when her adult daughter was dying of cancer. Throughout her daughter’s three month hospitalisation that preceeded her death, her mother never once visited her, because she couldn’t deal with the situation emotionally. This person said to me “Vicky, you are blessed, because you are so tuned in to your own emotions, that you were always available to Leah, emotionally and in every other way.”

I agreed with her, I am blessed in that way.

I’m not blessed that my daughter took ill and died.

I’m not blessed that my heart is broken.

I am blessed though, that God created within me, the resources that I needed to care for Leah and show her my love, while she was living.