Our two children grew up in a sculpture studio, among clay, wax and molten bronze. We never pushed them towards art — we simply watched them bloom, like two small buds.

Then, in the summer of 2024, Panka came home from camp, and by nightfall an ambulance was carrying her to the capital. The words we heard there divided her life into a before and an after: type 1 diabetes. For half a year it meant six finger-pricks a day and insulin injections — at nine in the evening, at eleven, at three in the morning, at seven. Her skin was covered in tiny stings. At thirteen, she was quietly grieving the life she loved most: horses, diving, climbing rock faces.