Wow, it has been 1 year since I last blogged. One full year. There have been many many times I've wanted to update things, but just couldn't. For one major reason. I lost one of my readers. You may think a few things like; big deal, one reader, or how would you even know you lost one reader. Well, the reader I lost was one that was very very special to me, my daddy. The first man I loved. My earthly father. My kids grandpa, or papa, which is what they called him.
On April 14th, 2012, just three days after my last blog post, my dad was here, at my house. We had fun, we had a bonfire in the back yard (which is hard to believe, cause right now we have 5 feet of snow back there) we roasted wieners, and laughed, and he was his usual self. Considering he had open heart surgery in February, and had been suffering from depression. He just changed, overnight. We were all happy, and excited that he was getting back to his old self. Then there was the phone call, "Ara, mom is driving dad into the hospital, meet us there" What?!? What do you mean? "She thinks he's having a stroke" Oh my gosh, are you serious. No, this can't be.
After arriving at the hospital, and assessing him, it was determined he was NOT having a stroke, but loss of blood flow to his leg. Into surgery he went. A simple surgery we all thought. He'd wake up the next day, we all thought. Nope. The surgeon (whom I used to babysit for) came out at midnight to inform us that he in fact has
Aortic Dissection. Very serious. And not a very good chance of survival, but still a chance. Having JUST had open heart surgery in Feb of the same year, there was NO way for them to fix this. They told us that he would die from this, they also told us that he could wake up and live with this, some cases have. So they told us to wait. They would try waking him in a few days.
A few days turned into a week, a week on sleeping meds, a week in a coma. As they started to take him off the meds to keep him sleeping, they told us he would wake within minutes, or up to an hour. Well, after an hr passed, they seemed pretty worried, as were we. He wasn't waking. Over the next few days we could see signs of him hearing us, he would respond to us asking him to blink (his eyes were closed, but they would 'blink' without opening). We saw his fingers move, and some even felt a slight squeeze. But it wasn't to be. We waited 4 more days for him to wake up and after 12 days of living at the hospital the news came. They did an MRI and it showed very little to no brain activity. In other words, he was basically brain dead. We could keep him on life support, have him be in a wheel chair for the rest of his life, never knowing really if he would ever wake up, or we could take him off life support and say our goodbyes. We knew dad didn't want to live that way for the rest of his life. We knew he'd be in a better place. The decision was made, and on April 25th, 2012 at about 8pm in the evening, my dad took his last breath on this earth with all his family by his side. It was the most horrible thing I have ever witnessed. But maybe at the same time the greatest thing I've ever witnessed, his body passing from this earth into our heavenly fathers arms. I'm not quite convinced it was the greatest thing I've ever witnessed, cause I don't ever want to do that again.
He was a faithful reader of my blog. He was always a supporter of our decision to home school. He loved his grandchildren so much. He had a passion for antiques, and had a good eye for spotting a unique piece of artwork. He loved God, and was know to often ask his customers if "they had their spiritual bags packed" He did! I could go on. I am so thankful to him for my life. There are so many things I could list about him that I am thankful for. I miss him like crazy!! Life is so different when there is a piece of your heart missing. And you don't know what it feels like until you lose someone very close to you, I learnt that lesson for sure. I am so sorry to all those who have lost a loved one, and I wasn't there for you, or I never called you to let you talk. And to all those in the future, cause it will come, when you lose a loved one, please call me to talk. Please have Jesus in your heart, without him, I do believe I wouldn't be able to sit here and type this out, and do all that I have done in the last year. Get your spiritual bags packed so that you know if you should pass away, you will be in heaven with the ones you love. Another thing that I have learned from this, I am no longer afraid to die. I used to be. But now I'm not, because I have someone there waiting for me!! And I can't wait to see him all healthy and healed and whole!
Gone too soon, William Gustav 1947-2012
Forever will be missed
I love you
