Hi Friends,
I hope you are all happy, healthy and pain-free. If you have a little pain here and there, I hope it’s not too dreadful. I hope it’s the kind of pain that you know deep down in your heart will turn into joy before long.
Last Friday night, Jeff and I stopped by the Jewish Home to tuck mom in. Her dinner plate sat outside her room on the kitchen counter, 90% gone. Ninety percent! I was so happy. She had been eating well throughout the day but occasionally if she enjoyed a big breakfast (oatmeal, eggs), she’d likely not eat much lunch (which was the case on this day). Well, oh my, she was hungry when dinner arrived last Friday.
**Warning** -- An abrupt, about face occurs --
Flash forward to Sunday afternoon, less than 48 hours later.
Jeff and I enjoyed an afternoon at Ansley Golf Club. Pickleball, socializing, lunch, shower, the whole weekend drill.
---Suddenly, I received news that mom’s "medication would change, she’d stop receiving food and she’d cross in a day or two."--
Whoa?
Hospice doesn’t help people live. They help people die. Some people get out of hospice. I hoped for that.
Now I hope for mom to go home to eternal life, with Jesus.
A couple days ago mom asked if I’d bring her something from the restaurant Jeff and I were going to. I’ve heard when people are dying they often ask for a favorite food. Restaurant food has been mom’s favorite for quite some time. Until her recent fall(s), she’d been making three meals a day, on her own, for five years. That’s a lot of cooking in your 30s…but late 80s - 90s!?
I’m so unbelievably blessed to have these last days, weeks, hours with our Gam! The process is as incredible as giving birth.
Some out of the ordinary things she has said lately are:
I hope I fit in here
I don’t know if I’ll be in the group
I want to see my mother
I miss Lesley, I feel badly I was asleep when she left, tell her that
I want to watch you play pickleball
Time spent together in October '22 surpasses all other. Mom's thin and frail but her fight is still fierce. She loves to hold hands.
Another funny thing she said recently was, “I guess I can just sleep right here.”
I’m sad because I don’t want to lose her. But at the same time I know how lucky Jeff, Savanna, Diana and I are to have had her near us for 20 years. The girls adore her and she adores them.
But, for now, I look forward to giving her water, moisturizing her lips, wiping her feet with a cool cloth and putting lavender moisturizer on them, tomorrow. Tomorrow is a gift. Not a guarantee.
I look forward to helping her ease her pain (mental, emotional and physical). And helping her hang on another day, before being promoted to eternal joy with Jesus.
Thank you for reading!
Love, Shelley
“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away." Romans 8:18
