Amanda Jones mailed the Gazette a moving letter last week recounting the sudden death of her young daughter and the financial struggle she now faces to give her the resting place she feels she deserves.
‘On the 27th of June, 2011 my life changed forever,’ Ms Jones said.
‘I still remember every little detail of that day like it was only yesterday. We are still coming to terms with this as the day before she passed she was well; no runny nose, no cough.
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READ NOWA coroner concluded that Hayley, just five years old and an epilepsy patient in and out of hospital, had died from bronchial pneumonia.
The loss haunts the family to this day.
‘The funeral was, well, words can’t really explain it,’ Ms Jones said. ‘I remember as I looked out to the crowd, all I saw was a blur of faces.’
Now, with the two-year mark of Hayley’s death coming in June, the cross the family erected at Fremantle Cemetery must come down.
‘A wooden cross is only meant to act as a temporary marker,’ a spokesperson from the Metropolitan Cemetery Board said.
‘You can imagine that a wooden cross, over time, would become quite worn and damaged, so that’s why we require a headstone to replace the old marker.’
Amanda said the family’s financial situation means they cannot afford the $3000 it will take for a head stone to be placed at the resting site.
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