When I close my eyes and think of her I don't see the ventilator, or the wires, or the feeding tube, or the incubator anymore.
I see her dark brown shock of hair, and her beautiful dark eyes, and her gorgeous skin and tiny feet.
When I think of her now I imagine she's still here and being sassy, wearing too much make up, and deciding where her life was going to take her, because, even after so long, it's too hard to think about her not being here anymore.
She was my first daughter, she was perfect to me, the xrays and tests and doctors said otherwise, but she was just my beautiful little girl.
The girl who I read to for hours a day in the 2 short weeks she lived, the girl who I sang to (and she rolled those beautiful eyes every time I did), and I played music to because good music taste starts when they are babies after all, the girl who loved Hey Diddle Diddle (just as her older brother, who also died did).
18 tomorrow, I can't believe it, the days have been so long, but the years have just been so short.
I never even got to hug her, just hold her gently on a board as she had brittle bones.
Asking the nurse to come and take her off the ventilator when I was ready was the most heartbreaking thing I've ever had to do, the last thing I wanted was for my beautiful girl to die.
And now, here I am, 18 years on, when I should be in the middle of party planning, struggling to get out of bed today.
I hope that her big brother is with her wherever they may be and they are planning a good old knees up together somewhere.
I really feel like I can't take another birthday, but I have to. And I'm not even being a good Mum to my other kids this weekend because I'm just struggling this year, which is making me feel worse still.