~*~Our Angel~*~
~*~Ashley Blake Youngblood~*~
March 18, 1988 - September 17, 2001
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My son died after years of sickness. He was born a preemie and weighed 2lbs. 12oz. He had a lot of health problems. He had three shunts (tubes that drain the fluid off the brain), Cerebral Palsy, chronic lungs, acid reflux and was mentally and physically delayed. They said that he wouldn’t make it through the first year of his life. But Ashley lived to be 13 years.
He had 61 shunt revisions. The last 49 in the last two years. He had gotten Staph infection in the spinal fluid in June of 1998. After that his health went downhill.
He was a wonderful boy. He taught me all about love. No one could do wrong in Ashley’s eyes. He loved you no matter who or what you where. He was always laughing… smiling… and saying “love you.”
The doctors said he was mentally delayed. To me he held more knowledge than the doctors themselves. They said he had Cerebral Palsy, but I saw a beautiful, perfect body. They said he had chronic lungs. But those lungs took his life giving breath each day. They said he wouldn’t live. He proved them wrong again and again. They said he was weak. But all I saw was his strength.
He had many operations. Not just the shunt revisions. But he never complained. But it was a shunt malfunction that killed him. Because I had opted for him not to have another operation. He had enough.
A year before his death he had gone into a coma and when he came out, he had lost the things he could do. All he could do was lay in his chair or bed. The Staph infection messed him up. And we couldn’t really get rid of it. It would always come back every time they went back into his head. Each time we lost a little more of him. I loved him so much. But I had to let him go. I just didn’t want him to suffer. He had started having other health problems due to everything that he went through.
He was the best child that a parent could have. I regret my decision because it took him away. But the doctors said that it was really out of their hands now. They had done all that they could. They could continue…but it would only prolong what was going to happen. He would suffer more in the long run. So I made the hardest decision of my life! One that I hope that I will not have to repeat with my other son. Ashley was my world and I had centered my life around him. I am lost with out him beside me. But I know in my heart he is in heaven totally healed... no longer in pain.
Tabatha Sellers
Little Angels
When God calls little children
to dwell with Him above,
We mortals sometime question
the wisdom of His love.
For no heartache compares with
the death of one small child.
Who does so much to make our world
seem wonderful and mild.
Perhaps God tires of calling
the aged to his fold.
So He picks a rosebud
before it can grow old.
God knows how much we need them,
and so He takes but few
To make the land of Heaven
more beautiful to view.
Believing this is difficult
still somehow we must try,
The saddest word mankind knows
will always be "Goodbye."
So when a little child departs,
we who are left behind
Must realize God loves children,
Angels are hard to find.
