I was 31 at the time, and the richness of ironies still rankles, a little. In all the tests they ran, they never x-rayed her head-- she had been born with it. Or so the pathologist claimed. If she had not had her neck broken in a wreck ( which, among many other things, caused chronically low [ 60/40 ] blood pressure ) it probably would have burst long before that, since prior to becoming handicapped, she was quite the athlete. Archer, runner, swimmer, horsewoman.
I can't imagine how hard that must have been for both of you.
Carolyn