Amber Lynn Svihl Memorial

Amber Lynn Svihl died with three years clean. Endocarditis. For anybody who doesn't know what that is - it's what years of IV drug use does to your heart valves, and it does NOT care that you quit. She did everything right. She got clean. She stayed clean. She raised her babies. And the dope came back and collected anyway. Amber died six years to the DAY after her husband died. He was incarcerated. He was clean too. Same condition. The exact same condition. Three kids. Both parents gone. Same disease, same date, six years apart. The picture is Amber walking one of her babies to the school bus. That's who she was. Not a statistic, not a cautionary tale, not a "former addict". A mama getting her kid on the bus. You need to know something else about this family. Her brother Joe drove down from Detroit on his own dime to paint Sparrow House for us. Out of his own pocket. Nobody asked him to. He showed up, he worked, he went home. Never mentioned his family was struggling. Never asked us for a thing. That's the kind of people we are talking about here. Salt of the earth. Their mother is raising all three grandchildren now. She can barely afford to feed them. And she just got handed a $5,000 bill for a cremation funeral - no fancy casket, no big service, just the bare minimum it costs in this country to lay your daughter to rest. She can't pay it. Obviously she can't pay it. So we are going to pay it. And then we are going to keep going, because those three kids are going to need a whole lot more than a settled funeral bill. Groceries. Clothes. School. Something put away for when they're grown and their mama isn't here to help them start. I say all that to say this. Clean time is not a receipt. It doesn't erase the debt - it just changes who ends up paying it. Amber paid hers with her life, six years after her husband paid his. Those three kids are paying the rest of it right now, and they never touched a thing. That's why we chase people so hard out here. We're not trying to get folks a chip and a pat on the back. We're trying to reach them before their hearts run out of road. Help us take care of Amber's babies I love y'all. Nobody is coming. It is up to us.