The mother of a tragic teenager kept a heartbreaking promise to her daughter, caring for the ‘Sleeping Snow White’ round the clock until her death at the age of 80
Edwarda O’Bara was a popular, pony mad 16-year-old schoolgirl when her life ended as she knew it.
Following a bout of the flu, the straight A student fell into a coma she would never wake up from. Edwarda was unconscious for 42 years until her death, with her family selflessly sacrificing their own lives to look after her.
Know as “Sleeping Snow White”, the youngster from Miami in Florida would become famous in her lifetime, with celebrities including singer Neil Diamond and former US President Bill Clinton coming to visit her. We take a look back at her heartbreaking, incredible story…
Edwarda had been diagnosed with diabetes in late 1969 and prescribed an oral insulin medication that was later banned due to its harmful side effects. She fell ill with flu during the Christmas holidays the same year, throwing up the medication which meant sugar gathered in her system.
Her family described her as waking up “shaking and in great pain”, with horrified dad Joe returning from a fishing trip to find his daughter in her room with “sugar lumps” under the skin. “My sister was screaming,” said Edwarda’s sibling Colleen, according to The Sun. “I remember it like it was yesterday. My dad started rubbing her legs to try to get the sugar to flow. He picked her up, and we just rushed her to the hospital.”
The family took Edwarda to hospital on 2am on January 3, 1970 and before she fell unconscious, she asked her mum to “promise you won’t leave me”. “Of course not, I would never leave you darling,” responded her tearful mum Kaye. Edwarda’s lungs collapsed, her kidneys failed and heart faltered, causing a lack of oxygen to her brain and she never came out of her coma.
The teenager’s doting parent kept to her word – Kaye didn’t leave her daughter’s side, foregoing sleep to turn her every two hours to prevent bedsores and feed her through a tube. Kaye died in March 2008, aged 80, an estimated £160,000 in debt thanks to her daughter’s medical bills.
Joe had died in 1977 for a heart attack after working three jobs to pay Edwarda’s medical bills and after the loss of her mum, caring Colleen quit her job to become full time carer. “I didn’t give it a second thought,” she said. “She’s my sister. And I love her.”
The real life Sleeping Beauty’s incredible story attracted celebrity visits and thousands of people flew to her home to celebrate her 56th birthday after Collen sent out 4,000 invites. But the high-profile nature of her tale attracted unwanted attention too – American right-to-die group the Hemlock Society spent time pleading with Kaye to let Edwarda die.
One phone call on December 26, 1981 threatened to put the unconscious woman out of her misery and a few hours later, bullets were fired into the family home. Edwarda was not hurt and she lived until the age of 59, when she died at home on November 21, 2012. She was buried alongside her mother and father.
