Sixtyfive Roses: A Sister’s Memoir by Heather Summerhayes Cariou

On her death bed, at the age of twenty-six, Pam implores her sister to write their story. To tell the world what they lived through. It is some years later before Heather puts pen to paper, to tell the story that “lies somewhere between truth and memory”. But the story she tells is powerful and insightful. Of the sheer determination on the part of her parents, who found the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation in an attempt to help Pam and other children who suffer with CF. Of her turbulent teenage years, where she finds herself torn between emotions of guilt for being healthy and anger and jealousy towards her sister. Of her younger brother Jeff, who is also born with CF, but lives in the shadow of Pam, whose disease is more virulent and life threatening.