This is Daphne Elizabeth on her wedding day in 1953. Newly wed wife of John O'Brien.
Daphne was the daughter of Jean and Arthur Skeer.
She was one of five sisters.
She was a mother of five.
She is the grandmother my girls never had the opportunity to meet.
She died in 1981, aged 51, from the effects of Motor Neurone Disease.
This week is national MND awareness week, May 5th to 11th, 2013. It is a week to acknowledge people living with the disease, and remember those that have died.
MND is a terminal neurological disease. Sufferers lose the use of limbs, ability to speak, swallow and breathe as nerve cells die. There is no known cure and no effective treatment, most dying within five years of diagnosis.
Each day two people die, and two are diagnosed with MND, it is estimated there are 1500 sufferers in Australia.
The symbol for MND Australia is the fragile, yet hardy, blue cornflower (Centaurea cyanus). It represents the strength people living with MND have, coping with such a debilitating disease.
