Missing Nancy

I can't believe that almost a month has gone by since Nancy passed away. I miss her so much. It still feels so unreal to me. I know that I saw her funeral but I think that my heart just doesn't want to believe that has happened. It just went so fast. When I think about this whole situation the words that keep playing in my mind are - INCREDIBLY UNFAIR!!! She was only 46 years old. The doctor's told her there was nothing more they could do on December 28th. 6 weeks later she passed away on February 8th. We weren't ready. She wasn't ready. I just don't understand!

Thankfully, we did get to spend 10 straight days as a family in the hospital with her while she was in hospice care. It was horribly hard because we knew what was coming but we did enjoy the close family time. I did get a chance to talk to her by myself one evening. Everyone had stepped out in the lobby to say goodbye to family members and I stayed with her while she slept. She woke up and reached for me to hug her. I hugged her and told her I loved her. I held her hand and she asked me to promise her to take care of her girls. I said I would be there for them no matter what. I asked her if she was scared or in pain. She said she was scared of not being able to breathe (the cancer had spread to her lungs and she was having extreme difficulty breathing), but mostly just sad that she would miss so much of her family's lives. She told me how much she loved us and that she was so proud of the family that Wes and I have made. We cried and together for a little bit and I told her I'm so sorry for her and that I will miss her so

much.

Her brother had purchased some recordable books from Hallmark so that she could record them for each of her children to share with her future grandchildren. I helped record two of them but she was on so much pain medication that it was hard for her to read the books. Thankfully, she had purchased one of these and did it for my girls back in September when she knew her cancer was back. It is something we will treasure forever. I am planning to bring it down there sometime and record the one she gave us into the books we didn't get to do. She even left a little message at the end that makes me cry everytime. She said "I just wanted to let you know that no matter where I am or how far away I am, I love you with all of my heart and soul!" She also got a chance to sit with two of her very good friends from the hospital and relay messages for each of her children. Jean and Barb took those notes and typed up letters for each of the kids. Another amazing keepsake! The letters told her kids how she felt about them and what her dreams are for them. As a mom, that would be so horribly hard to do.

Nancy's sister passed away 18 months before her. Cancer is so cruel! Nancy went through the grief of losing her sister and planning all of her funeral. She said she never wanted that for us so she took care of most of the plans herself. I cannot even imagine picking out my own casket, flowers, readings, head stone, etc. but she did all of that. She took a lot of the work out of it for us because she knew we would be so wrapped up in grief. All we had to do was choose what she would wear and make the video of photos for the funeral home. The video took us about 2 whole days but it was very therapeutic for us. Looking at pictures is so fun and it gave us something to focus on.

We have gone down there for every weekend since she passed away. If anything good has come from this situation it is that our family is so much closer. I am so sorry it took this for us to realize how important time spent together is. Family is really the most important thing in this world.