GRAN’S HEARTACHE AS I had to keep telling dying daughter her 4 kids had been killed in petrol bomb horror
IT’S a hell no mum should live through – watching your beloved daughter die in agony before your eyes, after already losing four of your cherished grandchildren.
Yet for gran Sandra Lever that anguish was deepened by having to tell daughter Michelle Pearson her babies had died.
Then she had to keep repeating the terrible news every few days because her daughter’s memory had gone.
“She broke down in tears every time,” said Sandra. “Eventually she realised they were gone and weren’t coming back.”
She finally gave Michelle, 37, permission to die, telling her: “Darling – if you want to go and be with your kids you can.”
So Michelle died in August after a 20month fight for life.
She suffered burns to 75 per cent of her body after two killers petrol- bombed her home in a petty feud with one of her sons.
The fire in Walkden, Greater Manchester, killed four of her six children – Demi, 15, Brandon, eight, Lacie, seven, and Lia, three.
Michelle di e d clutching a photo of them and the sons who survived – Kyle, now 18, and Louis, 19.
Talking for the first time of the moment she allowed Michelle to die, mum Sandra, 58, said: “It was the ultimate sacrifice. Though I longed for Michelle to live I wanted her to be at peace. I knew she desperately wanted to be with her babies in heaven and I told her to go to them.
“I knew they were waiting for her. I imagined them running towards their mam, throwing their arms around her and showering her with kisses. It brought me some comfort.
Michelle had wanted to be a mum her entire life and her six children were her world.
“There was no doubt she wanted to die and be with her children the minute she knew they’d gone – but I was always willing her to fight.
“I’d beg her to carry on. I couldn’t face more grief and I think deep down she knew that.
“Michelle was selfless and despite her horrific heartbreak, she carried on for so long for me, her four siblings and her surviving sons, Kyle and Louis.”
Killers Zak Bolland, 24, and David Worrall, 27, threw petrol bombs into Michelle’s kitchen in the early hours while the family slept upstairs. Bolland had been in a feud with Michelle’s son Kyle over alleged damage to a £200 car.
Tensions grew weeks before the fire and Michelle called police several times.
Sandra said: “She would still be here with her kids today if the authorities had acted sooner and moved them. She would have seen her kids grow up. Lia was three and would have been starting school this his year. Brandon would have been going ng to secondary school. That has all been en taken from us. I will never see my grandkids ndkids grow up or my daughter grow old.
“All Michelle remembered bered from the fire is getting Lia into the he bath, putting the shower on and throwing a sheet over her to stop the he flames.
“Then she said it all went black. She didn’t remember member anything else, just waking king up in a hospital bed.”
When Michelle came round from her coma, mumof-five Sandra waited weeks to break the tragic news. ws.
“One day she asked ked where her babies were,” re,” recalled Sandra.
“She was hooked up to machines, still confused ed and in a lot of pain. I took ok her hand and said, ‘Oh h darling, they’ve gone. .