Sadie Coogler – Of Courage and Love

I never met Sadie Coogler....I didn't have to.

Sadie passed away last week at the age of 9 after a 9 month battle with brain cancer. 

Beautiful, spunky, optimistic, charming, courageous, exuberant...but most of all, loving.  I know all this about Sadie because of talking to people that know her and looking at pictures of her, specifically, looking into her eyes in those pictures.  I truly believe the old saying that your eyes are the windows to your soul, even in pictures.

In December 2012, Sadie was diagnosed with her cancer, just a few short weeks after taking this picture at the annual Rudolph the Red Nosed Pumping Unit Lighting Event.

She called Magnolia, TX her home, but she made frequent visits to Lufkin to be with her dad as well as with other friends and family.

In May of this year, we introduced Sadie's story during our annual KICKS 105 St. Jude Radiothon which raises funds for St. Jude Children's Hospital which fights catastrophic childhood diseases including cancer.  Sadie was being treated there as well as off-site with a protocol developed by their doctors and researchers.  The students and staff at Pineywoods Community Academy in Lufkin signed well wishes onto a KICKS 105 St Jude t-shirt and sent it to her.  Many of our listeners donated to the St Jude Radiothon because they were touched by Sadie's story.  Over $100,000 was raised in this past year's event.

When a child dies, it's a natural human reaction to try to understand why.  Of course, we never will...not fully anyway.  Only God knows the true reasons and answers.  However, there is one thing in my mind that gives me solace and reassurance, and that is the following:

Sadie won.

Some may say that she lost her battle with cancer, but Sadie has won eternal life.  The joy and happiness she is experiencing now is profound and beyond our comprehension.  There is no greater reward and she has achieved it.

We grieve, and rightly so, but do not grieve for Sadie. She is the happiest she has ever been and is truly soaring above any pains and sufferings that she ever had on this Earth.

She's also probably keeping many other souls in heaven laughing out loud.

We miss you Sadie, but we will meet again.