Again, thanks to all who prayed and lent me your support. I am tardy in updating this, given how much you cared, but I can now fill you in.
My mom never did recover. The doctor confirmed that what she had was a heart attack, but graciously she never suffered any pain from it. She entered the hospital on Monday, December 29. I had my last conversation with her that evening. Thereafter she was essentially unconscious, though not in coma. The doctors didn't think she would make it through that night, and certainly not the next day, though as I reported she did. She had requested that we not use heroic measures, and so all we did was keep her comfortable and let God make the decision as to when it was her time. That time came early in the morning of January 1. I was there with are, as was my brother and my father. Though my parents had divorced years ago, they had remained friends. As we waited for the envitable my father told stories from when they had first met, stories I had never heard before. In the midst of the sadness, it was also a very healing time. It was a time for letting go, and commending her to God's care.
My mother had asked to be cremated and for her ashes to be mixed with the ashes of her second husband and interred together on the family farm about 15 miles from my house. This we did last week, with a memorial service attended by the whole family and a few friends. My brother and I sorted through old family albums looking for pictures with which to make a video collage representing my mother's life. Boy does that take one back. And, excuse me for saying it, I found out that my mom was pretty good lookling when she was a teenager. Looking at those old pictures with the prespective a few years on me that I didn't have when I would thumb through them as a child, I saw a whole new side to my mom. It was sort of neat.
Then this past weekend, my brother and I did the final thing we needed to do in cleaning out her trailer. It was work, but not as hard as we had imagined it might be. And again their were memories in some of the simplest and silly things. In the sink was the Huckleberry Hound spoon that had been mine as a little kid. I instead on having it when I ate my cereal.
My mom and I had had our ups and downs in our relationships over the years. I was terribly hurt by the divorce of my parents which my mom had precipitated by some of her actions. But I had finally gotten past that a few years ago, and was so looking forward to spending more time with her in these later years. We had a few, but of course it could never be enough, not when it is your mom. Still we were reconciled before the end, and in the end I was able to be there for her and do for her those things which she needed. And the last time I told her I loved her, I was able to really mean it. And when she went on January 1, she went peacefully. For all of these things, I am incredibly grateful.
And, again, I thank you all for your prayers and support. May God bless you and your relationships with your loved ones as well. I bid you peace.
