I think that loss…real loss, of any kind, is excruciating at best. And there never really comes a time when you are reconciled to it.
When you lose a loved one---however that unfolds--- The devastation in the wake “of it” is probably the greatest grief known to mankind.
The walk through that unfathomable pain is a road we all dread to take.
When others have lost loved ones I have felt their pain deeply. Haley Ford and her mother were killed by a drunk driver. The father was critically injured, and Haley’s brother wasn’t injured at all. In an instant, everything changed because someone driving drunk made a fatal move at an intersection.
I reeled about Haley’s brother’s loss. His family unit of four was now two. And his father was clinging to life. I often thought to myself, “how on earth were the father and the brother going to survive this horror…salvage the remains of their lives… how would they ever, ever really live again in the face of this senseless loss.”
I thank God for sparing someone else that is very close to me who drove drunk, and turned their car over on a three lane freeway. They were moderately injured with no fatalities to anyone else either. I thank God every day for that intervention of intangible grace.
Haley’s days…her nights, her future, her hopes…her entire destiny wiped out because of a lethal combination of drinking and driving.
I briefly met Haley’s mom. Ironically, I never met Haley personally. She was beautiful. She was a dancer. Her mom was pretty special too.
The ripple effect of one person can literally slay the lives of so many…every relative, every friend.
I received a button with a picture of Haley and her Mom, which I still have to this day. It says, “Never to forget”---I won’t…I don’t…I can’t.
"I have an 11 yr. old niece whom I absolutely adore, as if she were my own. I tell her "we don't drink and drive". I tell her that alcohol is pure poison, and that it kills---to put the fear of God in her. The driver of the car that hit Haley and her Mom was 17 years old.
--- Dana Riley, Phoenix