Coming At Us From All Sides

My mom is finding it hard tonight to accept the idea that it's no longer an option to care for Gram at home. Mom has been caring for Gram for fifteen years.

The past few months have been really hard on Mom, as Gram was declining and Mom had to perform real nursing care for her mother. Though you'd imagine it might seem like such a relief to know that she's no longer tied to the house, to have to keep her ear listening for Gram getting up and shuffling off to the washroom with her walker - it's actually very distressing for Mom.


Luckily her two brothers flew here for the past few days, plus her brother that lives here has been sharing the visits at the hospital so that Mom feels a great deal of support from her siblings. I know it's meant a lot to Mom to be surrounded by her family for this dreaded transition in her mother's life.

I'll be getting up at 4:00am tomorrow to drive my uncles to the airport. It's been a short, emotional visit and I've so enjoyed seeing them. I'll share their trip here in my next Thursday Thirteen.

Meanwhile, after enjoying a family dinner quickly put together by Mom so my uncles could see all of us, Brad and I returned to our apartment downstairs to find this note on our Facebook pages:

'Say A Prayer For My Dad'

This was posted by Brad's brother Jeff this evening.


"I'm calling on all of my spiritual friends to say a prayer for my Dad. David Smith is 70 years old and has cancer of the pancreas. He's been fighting it for 8 months and recently he has been having a real tough go of it. He's taking chemo-therapy once a week and he's on pain medication the rest of the time, it either makes him so dopey he's zombie like or it doesn't properly control his pain and he just can't get comfortable. I know from my birthday that people will chime in and send best wishes. I'm hoping to harness a little bit of that good will and send it to my dad. If you're a part of a prayer group and can pass this along or if you've got a good connection with your higher power, please send out a prayer for him. We're doing all that is earthly possible for him. I'm hoping for some kind of holy intervention. Thank You."