Jade Latoya Graham

Hi Everyone. My name is Karl Graham.

My heart breaks as I sit here to write this… I'm setting up this page in hopes of giving my Sister the send off she deserves, by helping raise money towards her funeral expenses.

At only 32 years old, my little Sister Jade sadly passed away with her whole life ahead of her, but Jade wasn't just my little Sister, she was a caring daughter, a loving girlfriend but most importantly, she was an extraordinary mother to her 10 year old son Tobias.

Growing up as a foster family, I was used to seeing little children come and go throughout my pre-teen and teenage years, but when my Mum came home with Jade in April 1992, my life changed forever. I opened the door and there she was, tiny Jade, only 19 days old wrapped in so much swaddle it took me a while to see her beautiful little face, but when I finally did my heart melted at the site of her and that very moment we knew we wanted to adopt her.

Jade’s life was hard from literally day one...

She was born with a heart defect, several weeks prematurely and abandoned. Despite these and other obstacles she faced, she never stopped fighting. Watching her grow up into the woman she became, was truly an honour and I will forever admire her strength.

On Mother's Day, Jade unexpectedly collapsed at a restaurant with her boyfriend Andrew. It was the first sign of the terrible events that would transpire. Jade spent the final four weeks of her life hospitalised, receiving care and awaiting her open heart surgery on the 4th April at 8am.

It was supposed to be a 10 hour routine procedure to repair her damaged heart valve, however the surgeons faced unexpected complications. Nevertheless the surgery was a success but her heart was too weak to beat on its own causing her to be placed on life support.

My little sister slipped away from us at 11:30pm that very same day never having the chance to wake up from the general anaesthesia.

I've cried many tears and to say I'm broken is an understatement. I spent several hours with her the day prior, even video calling her an hour before the operation, to help reassure her as best as I could. My very last memory of my little Sister was just how happy she was for us to be together, smiling, hugging and taking photos. Jade was really scared of dying but she was content knowing that I was there for her before the surgery. Sadly, due to a cruel twist of fate, I never got the chance to be there for her after… but what really hurts me the most is Jade had finally found peace, happiness and joy within her life, the best of her was still yet to come, she was taken from us before her time...

My little sister was cheerful, funny, and simply just a pleasure to be around, she was a beautiful person with a beautiful heart but no amount of words will ever do her existence justice. She will be missed dearly.

Please forward this link as it would mean the world to me and my family at this extremely difficult time. Any and all donations will be gratefully received and much appreciated.

Thank you very much in advance for reading and sharing this on.

-Karl Graham