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A mother soldiers on

After being thrust into public's eye when her son was the first LIer killed in Iraq, Cathy Heighter moves on - and away

BY CYNTHIA DANIELS | STAFF WRITER

October 31, 2005

Cathy Heighter has decided to take a time out.

In July 2003, her youngest son, Cpl. Raheen Heighter, 22, was killed during an ambush in northern Iraq.

Shortly after, the media descended on Heighter's Bay Shore home - shining bright spotlights and asking her for comment. There were news conferences, news shows, documentaries - all for Raheen.

Weeks later, Heighter decided she would fight for better life insurance benefits for soldiers. Hers became a well-known face prompting the passage of a bill in May that temporarily increased service member death benefits and permanently increased the death gratuity.

She also founded Raheen's Legacy Scholarship Fund, so far giving $10,000 to graduating seniors from Babylon, Bay Shore and Brentwood high schools, and worked to rename Pine Aire Drive in North Bay Shore, Cpl. Raheen Heighter Drive.

"You can get so consumed by it, so caught up in being everywhere and wanting to be there for everybody... that's what emotion does for you," Heighter said. "You could end up being on every front line, fighting for every cause because of emotion."

Now, Heighter said "the natural progression" of grieving has taken her to a new place.

She's more emotional today than two years ago, finding herself thinking more and crying more about her son.

She limits her media interviews to things, she said, that "are necessary" or "mean a lot to other families" who have also lost loved ones in the Iraq war.

In August, she closed her Bay Shore beauty salon, Beyond Images of Beauty, after 20 years in the business. And she plans to move to Florida's Palm Coast by December, hoping "to move on and kind of restart my life."

"I don't care where I go [in Long Island], there's always somebody that recognizes you," Heighter said. "You just don't want people feeling sad for you ... I'm proud of my son and what he stood for."

After she moves to Florida, Heighter said she plans to start a second Raheen's Legacy Scholarship Fund.

One thing Heighter still can't do is visit her son's grave at Long Island National Cemetery in Pinelawn.

"As far as I'm concerned he's still right here with me," she said pointing to her right shoulder. "I'm not ready to go and say that's final to me - because for me, it's not."

She said she'll never forget that day when she saw a chaplain and officer standing outside the door of her shop. She kept blinking her eyes, "trying to blink them out," she said. She started screaming, "No!"

"It was like something out of a movie," said Heighter's oldest son, Glynn, 30. "You never think it's going to be you. You never think it's going to hit home."

In December, Glynn will open Cpl. Heighter's Sports Barbershop on Union Boulevard in Bay Shore.

He'll offer veteran discounts, have more photos of his brother on the walls than basketball jerseys or sports paraphernalia and continue raising funds for the Bay Shore-area scholarship honoring his brother.

"The memory of my son is what drove me because his life was cut far too short," Cathy Heighter said. "To me, he was cheated out of life - that's what kept me going."

Toll in Iraq

American fatalities as of yesterday:

2,018

Total military

96

New York State

13

Long Island