Sad Times.....

Sunday, August 24th Dad texted me and said Mom was doing really bad. He said she was breathing  poorly and really out of it.  He thought that she was really going to die soon. So I felt like I should get up there.  When I got there, she truly did look like she was dying. Every time before this when Dad said he thought she was going, I would go up there and see a bright, blue eyed Mom smiling back and me and think, "She is not dying". But not this time.  Her eyes were clouded over and she was breathing with a death rattle. O2 sats were low.  Earlier on Sunday she had really been agitated and upset and the hospice nurse had to come help Dad get her sedated and settled down.  So when I got there, she was quite sedated and stayed that way until 6:15 Monday morning when she woke up screaming!

Dad, Kathy and I ran to her room and she was screaming for her sisters and her Daddy!

She started kicking us and trying to get out of bed.  It was pretty ugly.  Something I would desperately like to forget.  For over 2 1/2 hours we tried to get her calmed down.

Help from the hospice nurses and lots of drugs later, she finally calmed enough that she could rest.  Dad had had all he could take. So we arranged to take her to the care center.

I hated so badly to do this.  But we had no way of knowing how long she was going to go on like this and Dad was beside himself.  He was so tired and so worn down from the months of caring for her. When the care center people came to get her, it absolutely broke my heart to have them load her into a wheelchair and take her out of her home.  It was like unloading a piece of furniture we no longer wanted.  As we took her out into the sunshine she just laid her head back like she was drinking it in!  I rode in the van with her to the care center. The second we went through the doors at the center she looked at me longingly and said..."Plllleeeeaasssse!" and even though for the past two days she hadn't known who any of us were or where she was.... she most definitely knew where she was at that moment and she didn't want to be there!! It broke my heart.  I told her that if she didn't want to be at the care center she needed to go to heaven!  It was hell getting her into bed and I just cannot express how awful it was for me to leave her there.  She has never turned her back on me or left me... How could I leave her there???  But we did and as soon as we walked out of the room, she fell (or got out of) her bed!  We heard her fall and went back in to find her on the floor.  I know she was trying to go with us.  She just so badly didn't want us to leave her there!  But we put her little skeleton of a body back in that bed and put pillows around the front of her and left her there.  I knew when I left I would never see her again. I will forever

be haunted by leaving her there.  I wish so badly I would have stayed!

As haunting as this picture is... it reminds me that no matter how bad
things get I can make it through them cause this tough little ladies blood
run threw my veins!! I can fight like she did to the bitter end!
Dad called Wednesday morning to say she had passed away.
I hate that she was alone!!! I so wanted to be with her when she left. 
But I think she must have wanted to be alone. 
Oh how I will miss her!!

After she died, Kathy and Emily and I went to the funeral home and

fixed her hair and painted her fingernails and put on her temple clothes.

It was a special experience!  I hated, again, to leave her!! Just wanted to stay

with that mother of mine that held me, taught me, loved me, forgave me.....
She looked so beautiful but she looked like she was gritting her teeth which made me laugh cause she can't even relax in death... Oh how I wanted her to wake up!

These are her $600 red roses that she requested for her flowers...

Dad said she was worth it!

Flowers sent by the Frischknect family!

Lexis and Gavyn putting flowers on her casket!

My dear kids at the cemetery in Franklin.

Me, Cortnie, Ira, Clay and Brandon

Mandy couldn't come and I sure felt her absence!!

Tyler and Tyson

Her casket was a beautiful thing to ride home in...

Kathy and I putting on her veil and giving her a kiss good bye..

Dad and I just before the viewing on Saturday morning. 

I am wearing Mom's clothes.... didn't have anything to wear so I went

shopping in my 81 year old Moms' closet!!

She always has been a snappy dresser!

Flowers from my American Fork Radiology family

We spent all day on the Monday after the funeral cleaning out the house

for Dad.  We took out all her "foo foo" and "fluff".  Dad didn't want to take care of it all and have to dust it.  He just wanted it simplified a bit.  So we took everything out in the garage.

Neighbors and friends and family were all asked to come look and take what they wanted.

What was left we sold at a yard sale for Emily to raise money for her cancer treatment costs.  Among the treasures we found in her house was the carousel horse I painted for her years ago.  I had no desire to keep it but did want it to be photographed and have the memory of it. I was proud of how great a job I did on the painting and Mom really loved it.

Hard times! Sad times!! I will miss her so much. But she truly is in a better place.  I have never been so grateful for the atonement in my life as I am now.  To know that she will be resurrected and so will I and that we will be able to live together again and continue our relationship for eternity is the most precious gift I have ever been given.  I am grateful for my knowledge of this and for my Savior who made it possible.