To rewrite or not

If you would have told me three years ago one of my main characters would soon meet me in real life I would have called you a lunatic. This is a character I loved. Everything about her, from her laugh, to her step, to the sparkle in her eyes I dreamt. Agh but here I am post meet. More appropriate, post destruction. Now with a heavy heart I must decide will she live in immortality beneath my pen or will she die.
For those of you anxiously awaiting book 2 this is the problem. It is written but then my words came alive and my heart, my sweet beautiful brain child, betrayed me. So without giving anything away I must ask you, my readers, is there a character from book one you could not part with? Please comment help me out here. The sting of the real life event has left me incapable of even looking at the name again. Maybe with time.what are your thoughts?