In April 2003, just after my Aunt Helen's husband was discovered dead in his house, I wrote a Rose Closeup of her longing to go to Heaven, and awaiting her turn.
Well, last week I saw her off on that Glory Train to the place where most of her family has gone.
Have you ever watched someone die? (Besides on TV)?
It's not pretty. But it can be a blessed event, and it is the only way to get from here to eternity, aside from the Rapture of the Saints.
If you've paused to read my profile of my Aunt Helen, you'll know that she pined to go to Heaven ever since her fall, aneurysm, and surgeries. Each time one of her siblings, or more recently, when one of her cousins passed on ahead, she would say, "Oh, but if only it was MY turn to go!" Aunt Helen was so ready and eager to go home to be with her Lord Jesus, and all her family who have already gone on before.
Just this spring five of her cousins died within weeks and days of each other. She felt left behind.
So often when we visited her in her small suite in the Home for the Aged, in Rosthern, just 15 minutes from our town, Aunt Helen would sigh and tell us the stories over again about when she was sure some bloodclots had slipped through her heart and she had nearly died. She was sure she had a weak heart, and one day we'd hear that she'd been found dead in her room.
Every time she said good bye to us, or her daughter June, who drove in from the city 45 minutes away, Aunt Helen treated it as possibly her last good bye this side of Heaven.
On Friday, June 18, as she reached to turn off the pole lamp behind her recliner, she lost her balance and fell.
The manager of the home phoned June to tell her, but said her mother did not want to go to the doctor or the hospital. June knew that, and because he said she had got back into her wheelchair and wheeled herself to the breakfast table, they agreed to watch. But if her condition got worse an ambulance would be called. By 2 pm the manager called again, and told June that it was definitely time to send her to hospital. He did.
The doctor on call over the weekend could not see any broken bones on the x-rays, but kept her in. On Monday her own doctor ran tests, and by Wednesday informed June that her mother was throwing up blood and bleeding from her bowels too.
Thursday morning June phoned me to say she was at the hospital. The doctor had said her Mom had lost three quarters of her body's blood already, and would not last more than 48 hours.
I went to visit that evening, not sure what I would do. Being there for the end was a possibility. Some other relatives were there, but left soon. June's husband Steve, and their children, Larissa and Andrew, came to bring June's overnight bag. June confessed to a headache.
With a growing knowing in my heart that it was the right thing to do - I offered to spend the night, and keep June company so she didn't have to do this alone.
She tried to curl up in a recliner the nurses brought in, but found it uncomfortable, so since I was feeling alert and awake, and kept giving Aunt Helen sips of juice, June finally went to lie down in the Quiet Room.
Around 2 am the nurses decided that her restlessness indicated pain, and started morphine in the intravenous drip. I believe I was able to give her the last drink of grape juice with a straw. Aunt Helen guzzled it down with a tremendous thirst. Shortly after that she wasn't able to swallow any more. I went to wake June.
Now she felt well, and awake, and I was beginning to droop, so she sent me off to lie down. I got a fitful rest until 6 am, and went back to see how things were going.
She said her mom had suddenly got restless about 4 am and struggled to rise up, but the nurse had increased the morphine. The doctor was to come at 8:30, so June went to lie down for a while before he came.
His rounds took longer than expected, but I waited until he came. He agreed that although my mother had often rallied from death's door, he could not see June's mother doing that any more. In fact, she could be gone in the next half hour or later in the day.
June and I both like healthy foods, so I went home to round up some good snack foods (neither of us wanted full meals), and realizing Dad had gone to an auction sale and was in good hands, I went back to wait out the arrival of Aunt Helen's Glory Train. It should pull in just any time now.
Another aunt and uncle of June's (other side) visited with us for a while, but all we could do was watch Aunt Helen's comatose breathing with her mouth wide open. We frequently moistened her lips with sponges, or sprayed some saliva from a small pump bottle the nurses gave us, and we told each other stories of our memories of Aunt Helen and the family over the years. We even laughed and had a good time.
Finally about six in the evening, her breathing got weaker and weaker. June and I drew up close beside the bed, she held her mother's limp hand, and we watched as the last little breaths came and went, and then there were none.
June turned up and with her shining eyes followed the flight of the angels as they carried her mother aboard that Glory Train. She was away at last.
And then we began to imagine the receiving line as Gr'ma and my mom and the other sisters and brothers gathered around to greet her and welcome her home.
When June phoned the next day, between trips to make funeral arrangements, she sounded so cheerful and said, "I saw the most glorious sunset when I drove home," -- and "I know Mom isn't finished hugging everyone yet in the receiving line up there."
I tear up because these a tender moments, but I'm glad along with June.
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