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Funeral for Overdose Victim Whose Obituary Poem Went Viral

SELINSGROVE — At Delaney Farrell’s funeral there were photos everywhere, but her beauty hid a painful truth: a battle with heroin that took her life...

SELINSGROVE -- At Delaney Farrell's funeral there were photos everywhere, but her beauty hid a painful truth: a battle with heroin that took her life July 1.

Friends and family packed a funeral home in Selinsgrove Saturday to say farewell.

"It's really hard. These kids don't deserve to die. Delaney was 23," said friend Christianna Morgan.

That deadly dance with drugs may have ended Delaney's life, but not her story.

Her face has now been seen by people around the nation, thanks to a brutally frank obituary that went viral and continues to make headlines, featuring her own words about her struggle.

"I think she would love it. If it helps one person, I think she would be proud," her brother Dillon Farrell said.

Friends and family say addiction couldn't hide Delaney's love of writing and her faith.

"Her soul was beautiful, and she knew how she felt. She wrote it all on paper," Morgan said.

Abbi Orrico and Jennifer Stack lived with Delaney at a halfway house in Williamsport. They say Delaney is their hero and believe her story will save lives.

"She was very close to God. There was one side of her that was the addiction side and another side of her that was very close to God," said Orrico.

"I truly believe that some people have to die so that others can live, and I just hope that people pay attention," Stack said.

While there has been an epidemic of drug addiction around the country, recently, the situation in central Pennsylvania has been especially desperate. Delaney was one of more than 50 people who overdosed over just a few days. Three of them died.

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