Losing a parent at any age is a traumatic experience- even more so for young children.
According to the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Psychiatry, studies have shown that children who lose a parent when they are younger than 12 years old are more likely to develop depression than those who lose a mom or dad during adolescence.
It has been found that bereaved children have higher rates of depression in the first two years after the loss, while they also tend to “to show impairments in functioning at school and at home, even 7 years later.”
Most of these children also suffer from PTSD, studies argue.
For Emily Hinchberger, losing her father when she was only eight years old was not easy to cope with.
The young girl, with the help of her mother, Rebecca Crawford, started writing a letter to him every year, updating him on her life, and sharing with him the highlights of each year for her.
At 11 years old, Emily was proud of her school grades, so she wrote a letter to her late dad, letting him know that she got all A’s in 6th grade.
“Dear Daddy,
I miss you so much. Guess what, I got all A’s in 6th grade and 1 B in P.E. I wish you were here to see how I was doing I love you, talk to you next year.
Love, Emily”
Just like she did each year, the girl wrote her letter, blew up balloons, and tied the letter on them. Then, she let them go, leaving it up to the air to do the rest of the work, taking her letter to the sky, where her dad is.
This time, however, the letter ended up about 100 miles away, where a woman found it.
“My heart just dropped when I read that letter. I just couldn’t imagine my child going through such a loss.” said Veronica Manzo, who was the one to find the letter.
Veronica felt that she just had to do something about the grieving kid. So, she went on social media hoping to trace the family.
Indeed, a friend of Rebecca’s recognized Emily’s letter and helped the two women get in touch.
Manzo, who wanted to do something to relieve the girl’s pain, organized private horse-riding lessons for Emily, an activity her dad grew up doing.
The girl was convinced that her dad somehow pushed the balloons in the direction of Veronica’s place in order to make Emily’s horse-riding dream come true.
But the miracle doesn’t stop there.
The woman who became Emily’s instructor was her dad’s high-school girlfriend. This made the whole encounter even more special for everyone.
“[This] will be very cool for her because I think she’ll learn a lot of different stories and things about Joe when he was younger as she goes into that age, which will be really nice,” Emily’s mother told ABC13.
This touching story is proof that as long as there are caring people around, nothing is impossible.
Head over to the video below to watch Emily and Veronica talk about this special encounter!
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