Why life is precious.
Sometimes people say to me ‘ how do you do it? ‘ they have said they couldn’t cope if their child were ever as poorly as mine.
I’ve seen chins wobble when friends / family have visited moll in hospital and seen her oxygen mask and her tiny arms hooked up to drips etc. 
Frequently over the years i have had how do you cope? i would be worried sick all of the time. Well frankly i am! but you have just get on with it and do the best you can.
 So at my lowest times. whether i’ve been awake for days doing physio so moll could breathe, or the lonely nights in hospital worried sick because i literally have no idea why she is so poorly all of the time. 
or just those times when something extra curricular to your poorly child comes along. Like a humongous bill from the tax man or a credit card bill which looks  like mount Everest which you cant pay. 
Or simply those days when you have got no bread, and you can’t get to the shop because you are too tired to put your shoes on and put your poorly  11 year old in a pushchair to get there (that’s happened)  ..
What do i think of at these times? I think of this time the 9th of august 1996 20 years ago. It was the day my little brother died, he was 21.
Part of me died too that day. I will never be truly 100% happy ever again because part of me is still with him and the memories we shared. 
Death is one of the most awful things anyone will ever have to bear. Sudden death is also something which can never be coped with. Our bodies and minds are not designed for that kind of shock.
Darren was 19 months younger than me  and my first best friend. We were together everyday. We didn’t fight as some siblings do. We were like my kids are.
We laughed, we played, we built dens, we climbed trees, we splashed about in the river down the meadows.
 We had a radio station , granted it was only an air Vent grill half way up the stairs which broadcasted our show in to the living room . But we were happy.
As we grew up we went to school together, we sat in front of the cupboards together after school just staring at what we could eat next. We told bad jokes, sang bad songs and every night i had him and my sister in stitches clowning about on the landing between our rooms at bedtime … I got told off frequently but it was worth it.
 As we grew older we were still as great mates as we always had been. Id moved out by this time around 1993. But still went up to my parents when they were on holiday to make him eggs on toast in the morning. Generally after he’d had a ‘ my parents are on holiday party’ so laid back was he that he’d be in bed when i arrived … The lager cans and pizza boxes often just tidied up by me before said parents returned. He’d always stick up for me, had done since we were very small, he once was about to go punch someone  who had upset me. Until my dad collard him. he wasn’t an aggressive boy though in fact quite the opposite. He would often cry too if i was told off as a child … Even as an adult. We used to laugh a lot, he had a great sense of humour.
 And then one day he was gone.
He left for work one august morning and never came home.
They think a deer jumped out in front of his car. I’m still as heart broken about it today as i was then.
I miss him and i miss what should have been. So just the 4 of us were left. Me, Mandy, mum and dad. 
Mand is beyond the most lovely sister i could ever have. We too are the best of friends. We laugh a lot. Mum and dad aged 10 years overnight but they have kept going. I don’t know how.
So yes he should be here with us. He would have a family too now. Our kids would all play together. Christmases would be even more epic than they are because our family would be complete. As it should be. So as to my attitude for life i suppose this is why i believe it is so precious. 
What ever circumstances you find yourself in,  however hard it gets. Always remember that you have the gift of life. You simply have to make the best of it. Every day is  a precious one. Every life is precious and that is why you have to live it to the full or at least the fullest you can make it. 
No ones life is perfect but if you can make it as perfect as possible then do it. 
Treasure every moment. We as humans can all be better people if we put ourselves in someone else’s position.  Someone who has lost. 
Chronic illness and life is hard sometimes but its better than an empty nothing.
R x