Originally Posted by prairiemary

Today marks 7 years since I laid beside my Amy,and felt her final breath on my face.I just wanted to breath it in,and never forget it.I laid with her awhile,I knew her pain was gone,but mine was just beginning.I was just 41,I should have been the one to die,not my daughter.I had somehow survived a deadly case of G.B.S., was not expected to live,in fact I "died" 3 seperate times, but was revived each time,not easily I was later told.So when my daughter did die,I right away knew what was happening to her,she left her tired,painful,diseased shell of a body,and was looking down on me,and she was so happy and totally pain-free.But I was selfish,I wanted her to come back to me.The nurses left her in that bed,and we,her family, had to pack up her belongings in the room,while she laid there,looking like she was sleeping.I wonder if that is how it is done in other hospitals-do they leave your loved one laying there,as they ask the family to pack up the room?I miss her soo much,and think of her everyday.Does time really heal?No,not really. Time will never heal me,it just changes my sobbing to crying,but it has not healed my heart.A mom should never out-live her child.I survived my illness,just to watch my child fight cancer for 19 months,then watch her die.Why? I had to plan her service all alone(my husband ignored it all,went back to work,left me alone)sometimes it felt like she was telling me things,like when I selected all of the songs for her service,all of them one after the other,not even thinking,just writing what came into my head.I wrote her eulogy,myself,on the morning of her funeral,it just came pouring out,all that I wanted to say in it.Then at the service,I stood at the front,in the room full of 500 people who loved and knew her,and read her life-story,by myself.It was the last time I would be able to brag about my Amy,to so many people.After the service,I asked my husband to stay by me,to please don't leave me.When the recieving line started,I looked to my husband at my side-but he was gone,he had left me alone. When the funeral director asked if they could deliver all of the flowers to the retirement lodge,I selfishly said they could't,I said I wanted ALL of them to come home with me,afterall,they were for Amy,not anyone else,and I knew I would find some comfort having them with me. We live 15 miles from town,on an acerage.I grew Lillies out here,and Amy loved the STAR GAZER flowers,and they are usually all finished by then,but on the morning of her funearl,september 15, I went to the lilly patch,and there in front of me,was one final blooming lilly-a perfect STAR GAZER.I took it ,and placed it on her casket, the only flower on her casket,but it meant more than buying any flowers to put there.I am sorry for this long story-but its the day that I allow myself to go back and think of this day.I hope it can help someone,with their sorrow.When she was little,at bedtime one night,as I tucked her in,she told me I was her beautiful flower,and I told her that she was my heart.So with every note,letter,card we gave to each other,we signed them with a heart,and a 5 petal flower.I don't know how to put pictures on the computer yet,so I have no flower,just this heart.