My heart aches. Last night my cousin's wife passed away and I cannot stop thinking of the two young children who now have to go through life without a mother. How on earth does one deal with that?

Oh, I can promise to be there and give them all the love and support they want, but I am not their mother. I could never be.

She was always very strict with them. Now it all makes so much sense. She did not have that much time to teach them right from wrong and so she had to teach them all she could in the short time that she would have with them.

I still see her walking down the aisle in her wedding dress. Smiling from ear to ear. None of us could ever have guessed that it would end this way, and so soon.  Yet here it is; she has gone, her husband and kids are here and we are left speechless with this ache, ache, ache...