Zacs Birthday Wish
Article from: Herald Sun (http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24006835-2862,00.html)
Grant McArthur
July 12, 2008 12:00am
In a few days, Zac Taylor will turn 12 and his only birthday wish is that the next year will be better than the past two. In that time, Zac's sister Annalise, grandmother Nancy and father Cecil Paganoni have died. Because his father did not leave a will, the family's finances have been frozen while a legal battle continues. Zac, his mother Sharon and sister Ally, 13, have been forced to leave their rented home in Albury and are living in emergency housing in Geelong. The family's two cars have been repossessed and their belongings are being held in storage.
But it was only after being bullied at school for not having a father that the strain became too much for Zac. Without his mother's knowledge, Zac made a desperate plea for help to late-night radio listeners during talkback on 3AW on Wednesday. He told the Herald Sun that he just wanted to know everything was going to get better. "I just thought it would be good to talk to someone because it hurts to keep it all barrelled up," Zac said yesterday. "It was all right at the start, but then I just lost it. "Now I am just trying to help Mum."
Today is a far cry from the life Zac was enjoying at the start of 2006. But in January of that year his grandmother Nancy lost her battle with cancer while being nursed at home. She used her last words to call for her favourite grandson. The next month, Zac's sister Annalise was born, but in May the three-month-old drowned in the bath at home - and it was left to Zac to call an ambulance and police as he tried to save her. In December 2006, his life fell apart completely when his 62-year-old father died while cutting trees.
After learning of her son's pleas for help, Ms Taylor said she was proud of the strength her children had shown. "We have only begun dealing with our grief recently because we have had everything else to deal with," Ms Taylor said.
|