HeavenLeigh Escape

  A retreat for scrapbooking, quilting and more.
 

 

 

An Angel Watches Over Us

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Brandi Leigh Higgins
June 18, 1979 -  March 27, 1999

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In October 1998 we had just sold our house and were in the process of building a new one. Shannon, our oldest daugher, was 20 had graduated from high school and was living on her own. Brandi was 19 and on the Dean's List at Texas Woman's University where she was studying to be a nurse. She was also working part time for a doctor in Flower Mound and inseparable from her high school sweetheart. Kelly was 16 and in her junior year of high school. Alexandria, our youngest, would turn 3 in five months.

Earlier that summer, Brandi noticed a spot on her left thigh about the size of a dime. The doctor she was working for took a look at it and referred her to a Dermatologist. The Dermatologist was not sure what it was so over the next 6 weeks tried several topical creams to see what would help.

On November 7th, we began moving into a small two-bedroom apartment to wait for our new house to be built. Of course that weekend it began to rain but we continued moving late into Saturday night. We were all exhausted from the move but Brandi seemed especially tired. Dr. Long decided it was time for some further testing. The spot on Brandi's thigh was getting bigger and it appeared that other spots were beginning to develop as well. The following Monday Dr. Long once again sent Brandi to the Dermatologist but this time asked for a biopsy of the spot. Blood tests were also performed and they indicated A-typical cells present in Brandi's blood. We were immediately referred to an Oncologist. Six days after moving into the apartment, Brandi was diagnosed with cancer. It was Friday the 13th.

As we entered the Oncology office Friday morning we were met by a waiting room full of older people wearing caps and bandanas to cover their balding heads. Brandi was 19 years old with a beautiful head of blonde hair and just didn't belong here. She immediately fell to pieces and ran out of the waiting room. My husband managed to calm her down and the three of us sat in silence waiting to see the doctor.

The preliminary prognosis was good. Brandi was young and healthy and cancer treatments had come a long way. A very painful bone marrow biopsy was performed where the doctor entered Brandi's hipbone with a needle to extract bone marrow. As I sat in the room with her during this procedure, huge tears were streaming down her face. My job as a mother was to protect my daughter but I felt totally helpless. How can you protect anybody from cancer. And besides it never happens to you.

Chemo began in December and by Christmas Brandi had lost all of her hair and could no longer go to school or work. She still kept a positive attitude and never gave up. After several chemo treatments failed and a trip to MD Anderson in Houston left doctors puzzled, we were transferred to Baylor to schedule a bone marrow transplant. We waited weeks for a compatible donor and felt blessed when we heard that she was scheduled for the transplant on April 15th. She was in the hospital for 18 days as we tried to get her strong enough to handle the transplant but on March 27th, only four short months after she was diagnosed, Brandi's body gave up on her. She passed away four days before the new house was finished and never even had a chance to see it.

We had her funeral on Tuesday, closed on the house on Wednesday and moved through the next few days in a trance. In May, I finally got enough strength to go back to work. My life had been turned upside down and somehow a lot of things just weren't important anymore but with a new mortgage I could not afford to lose my job.

One morning I was running late for work and ended up on the elevator with a co-worker. I had seen Jo Anne Martinez around but we were not personal friends. As we rode alone in the elevator she began to talk to me about preserving Brandi's memories. She is a Creative Memories consultant and knows how important it is to properly preserve your pictures. She invited me to her house and asked me to bring several pictures of Brandi. Not only did she help me start my first photo album but she listened as I talked on and on about Brandi. Jo Anne and I have become great friends and I now know why God put us on that elevator together that morning. She had been asking God for a way to approach me about Brandi.

I believe this is the day the healing truly began.

As my love for scrap booking grew so did my desire to have my own retreat. When we decided that's what we would do, my family started thinking of different names for our place. We wanted it to represent Brandi in some way because she is the reason I started scrap booking. After much thought the name "HeavenLeigh Escape" was decided on in honor of Brandi Leigh. My entire family is involved in this endeavor but I feel the driving force behind it all was God's plan to take Brandi to Heaven. Although her life on earth was short, I feel her legacy lives on. And I truly understand the phrase: When one door closes, God opens another one.

HeavenLeigh Escape
720 CR 2644
Decatur, Texas 76234
940-466-9729
Owners: Greg & Tammy Gabriel