Thursday 29 October 2009

Dying girl leaves notes for family

This story triggered a loud empathetic bell for me... when my mum passed away, my three sons each wrote their "Nanna Rae" a letter, which they enclosed and sealed in an envelope. These letters were left, unopened, on mum's coffin during her funeral. Of course we didn't open them. They were purely private between grandsons and their Nanna Rae.

"With just days to live and too sick to speak, a six-year-old girl hid notes and drawings all over her house telling her parents and her sister again and again "I love you."

"While Elena Desserich was writing the notes, her parents were keeping a diary so her younger sister Gracie would one day understand what happened after Elena was diagnosed with brain cancer.

"They transformed that diary into a book entitled "Notes Left Behind," which was released in the United States this week. All the proceeds go to a charity Elena's parents created in her memory to fight pediatric cancer called The Cure Starts Now.

"Elena's parents found the first notes in a backpack. Others were hidden between books on the bookshelf, in the corner of our dresser drawers, between dishes in the china cabinet or between photos stacked away in boxes.
"We started to collect them and they would all say 'I love you Mom, Dad and Grace.' We kept finding them, and still to this day, we keep finding them," Keith Desserich told WLWT television in their hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio.

"Literally, there are hundreds of notes that we found."

Desserich and his wife Brooke each hold onto a sealed note they've never opened.
"We always want to know that there's one more note that we haven't read yet," he said." (Source)

Here's a news story with some video footage.



In the meantime, 10-yo Jordan Vincent, who has been battling a rare form of brain cancer, seems to have "kicked cancer's butt", after an extremely long battle with it... (NB. I've been following her journey thru her father's blog, for about six months now).
Peas be with ewe
Cyalayta,
Mal :)

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6 comments:

  1. So beautiful! I hate it when kids suffer, its just not fair! Well I hate it when anyone suffers really. Great news about Jordan, how wonderful!

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  2. I agree Karisma but when it's kids it just breaks your heart. That beautiful little princess. Makes you wonder why.

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  3. No, it's simply not fair. Why Jordan? Why Elena? I don't understand... where is 'god' in all this? [no comment].

    Jordan is over the main battle, but it's an ongoing struggle for her with poor feet [not being able to stand or walk for long periods at all], and she's a few years' behind with her schooling as well. Send your thoughts her way when you can!

    I'm SO thankful my own three sons are fit, well, healthy, safe, loved and cared for in a loving family environment. If it were not so, I would honestly have seriously lost the plot a lot quicker a long time ago... but as they are in the best situation they can possibly be in, I'm so thankful.

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  4. very sad...no one knows why these things happen...only god knows..it's definitely not fair..

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  5. It's definitely NOT fair, you are so right.

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  6. Just so uplifting that story, and such mature foresight for a little girl..thinking of her family always!
    I just finished reading a book about Dr Charles Teo. You ought to read it if you can Mal, an exceptional guy he is! I would want him to be my surgeon if ever I was a kid or an adult with brain cancer.
    Cazzie!!!

    http://www.neuroendoscopy.info/theoIntro.asp

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