ABSTRACT
On Christmas Eve, 1964, the youngest daughter, Claire, aged two-and-a-half, collapsed, and the parents were told that she had acute leukaemia and faced death. Claire, affirmative, and fun-loving, enjoyed the warm security of a long, happy marriage, plus well-integrated hospital and home care. Unfortunately, many children suffer incomparably in struggling against isolation, occasioned by family incapacities, excessive pain or overwhelming hospitalisation. All dying children are stretched on racks of physical and emotional endurance, yet they can surpass their potential, fulfilling shortened, brave lives, whose significance transforms experience and ennobles memory for parents who loved them, as her parents loved Claire. Claire enjoyed her ward Christmas, surrounded by family friends. Her brother and sister toured labs, had reassuringly positive blood-tests, and immediately regarded the hospital as a friendly place of healing. Thereafter, they visited Claire freely with her friends, so she retained home identities, unpreoccupied with her illness or other patients.
