Mary and Linsey 2006

     20 years ago my SWEET LINSEY JEAN was born at the  Brockton Hospital, Brockton Massachusetts around noontime.  She was born crying and suffered from colic almost instantly.  Some babies develop that almost instantaneously.  She was a happy baby in between periods of colic but as long as one of her parents was holding her she was content.  At 9 months old, she started to have periods of normal development mingled with some apparent setbacks.  This is how we discovered that she suffered from an incurable brain disease called Leigh's disease.
     Leigh's disease is also considered a mitochondrial disease.  For all of you astute high school or college biology students you will remember that the mitochondria is the power house of the cell.  It is where energy metabolism takes place as well as the synthesis of ATP.  As a result of her body's inability to produce energy, her brain slowly deteriorated.  It was a slow progression which lasted 14 years.  She and her brother Ricky suffered the same rare fate.
     It has been 5 years since her death and I am still trying to make sense of it all.  Watching 2 of your children die is not only heart-wrenching but it put's one's whole faith and meaning of life into question. How could this have happened to our sweet children?  Why did God allow them to suffer such horrible, painful and slow deaths?  These were the questions I had and still have.  But, I have never ceased believing in my God.  I have felt his strength bare me up so many times.  I don't have all of the answers and some of the questions I have for God may never be answered in this life.  I just KNOW that having LInsey and Ricky led me to my career path in nursing and now as a Nurse Practitioner.  They were my greatest life teachers.  I learned from them about the true meaning of unconditional love, laughing at your own mistakes (They did a lot of laughing) and to give life everything you have by trying your absolute best.  Linsey and Ricky despite their physical limitations whether it was at home or school tried so hard at everything they were faced with and they did it with a smile on their face.  How many of us need to learn to smile adversity in the face and just keep trying.  Not a day goes by that I don't think of the both of them.  I feel them in the warm sunshine on a beautiful beach day or in the wind as I run through the fields.  Sometimes I imagine them running through the fields on either side of me yelling,"Go mom, faster, faster, you can do it."  I will do it.  I must do it.  I must carry on without them and keep them close to my heart and the life lessons they taught me.  I can still see their smiles.  Happy Birthday to  my LInsey Jean, the sweetest daughter a mom could ever have asked for.  Until we meet again my Cape Cod Queen, my hero.