An emotional couple of days

On Thursday we had a family meeting at the hospital with the Director of the Program of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, the Head Nurse, the Speech Pathologist, Physical Therapist and Occupational Therapist. It is their recommendation that my Mom will not be able to reside at home and that we seek long-term nursing home care. For her to be able to stay at home, she would need 24-hour, two-person assistance. There are a number of reasons for this physically which I won't mention here for dignity purposes, but also, some of it has been pointed out to us that it is the normal process of an elderly patient beginning to slowly let go. My Mom's Alzheimer's seems to have really taken control of her mind with this particular stroke. It is hard for me to even fathom that she was in Costa Rica with us four days before this massive stroke. While this, I feel, was a significant gift from God for my family, there is always the mindset of "had I known, I would have done things differently", like, I would have requested those two weeks off from work with my U.S. job to spend more time with her. It was a real shock for me to see over the past year that we have been living in Costa Rica, how much of the Mother that I am used too is gone from her cognition. Needless to say, when I arrived back in the States, and while I have been here in the hospital, it amazes me how one significant event like a stroke can also take so much away from a person. It has been a couple of days of processing "things" for me as our family begins the letting go process of the "way things were" to "how they will be". One thing I am thankful for are two long letters that I wrote before my family (Ken & I and the kids) moved to N.C. One was to my father and one to my mother recalling childhood and young adult memories, as well as intentionally thanking them for the impacts that they had on my life. I will never regret writing that to her when she was able to read it and comprehend all that I wanted to express to her. I have much to be thankful for in this life. God is a God of grace, of love and of care. I couldn't be more thankful or more indebited to Him for the role model of the mother that I have had. Please, pray for Mom. That in her confusion, she would have a sense of peace that God remains with her. And that when she is alert, that she would sense her family and our love surrounding her.