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NEWS August 2024
“The Stars Will Still Be There: What my daughter taught me about love, life and loss”
The world mourned when young Laura Nuttall died of glioblastoma.
Her mother Nicola Nuttall bravely shares her family’s story in her book, “The Stars Will Still Be There: What my daughter taught me about love, life and loss.”
An excerpt (courtesy of the Brain Tumour Charity)
Falling through a trap door
November 2018
Being told that your child is going to die, completely out of the blue, is like falling through a trap door.
The natural order of your life, the milestones you took for granted – the 21st, the graduation, their first home, perhaps one day a wedding, maybe even grandchildren – a whole life story on flickering Cinefilm, but the celluloid lingers too long in the projectors, burns white hot and disintegrates.
That was the future you could have had. You can imagine it; you can almost taste the birthday cake… but it’s not for you.
I had always thought Laura would do something extraordinary, but then I had always thought she would live.
I would take ordinary now; I would thank you profusely and shake your hand, I’d be so grateful for normal and unexceptional….
For a parent, nothing can be worse than being told your child is terminally ill, but for a sibling, the loss is perhaps even more devastating.
Not that there’s a universal measurement scale for loss and grief – like the heat of chillies or the clarity of diamonds – but siblings, and perhaps sisters, will always have a unique and unbreakable bond……
They’re the ones who share all your childhood memories – the in-jokes nobody else will ever understand, the stories, the dramas, the plans, the obscure references. What happens to all those memories when you are the only one left to remember them?