Mom comes up the steps to begin the process of goodbye in the
early a.m. of Sunday, December 8, 2013, the day of dad's death.
Kim, the RN on duty on the night shift, 12-8, at Delaware Hospice, came in the early morning to provide some medical assistance to our dying father and husband. She couldn't do much but she provided support and just coming out was such a help.
Not a few minutes after writing my "dying" post in reference to my father's distaste of snow and the fact that on this gloriously blissful snowfall, he was leaving this earth, I took this pic of Dancer in the snow and made my "Daily Dancer" post.
Joelle Essombe, LPN, from Cameroon, was at his bedside with mom and me when he passed at 2 p.m. She was not able to pronounce him as an RN has to do that and Kim, from the morning shift, came back with her kids in the car (Joelle went outside to watch them.) to do the paperwork on his death, a required document for the funeral home to pick up the body.
We used wash cloths, soaked in cold water, for dad's head. He would open his eyes on occasion, as he appears to be doing here and seem to respond to our words. Mom was yeoman in her holding the damp, chilly cloths on his forehead. His eyes are slightly open. He is aware. Just shortly before he breathed his last, Lindsay and Nick got to speak to him. He didn't speak but he heard.
It was unmistakable just a few minutes after he passed.
The essence of what made my father was gone. He died
at 2 p.m. on Sunday, December 8, 2013, roughly 85 years
and 106 days after entering this earth on August 22, 1928.
They'd been busy on this snowy day and the funeral employees of Mealey Funeral Home had already picked up two bodies and gotten stuck in the snow before they arrived in the late afternoon at 4546 Pickwick Drive and left with the body of my father, who went from his home of 50 years for the last time. Mom got to say goodbye with the assistance of these marvelous providers and hard working grieving professionals. The body was wrapped in a cloth and in a device they use to take bodies down from mountains. It hugged him securely. He was safe. Mom got to kiss him on the forehead with the able help of the Mealey employees before they put him on the stretcher and wheeled him out making tracks in the snow, down the front yard and into the dark van. The snow had stopped.
1 comment:
Your father was my doctor when I moved to Wilmington in 1981, and bought a house on Twist Lane, just around the corner. He helped diagnose my mitral valve prolapse, which at the time was not well understood. I was digging through some Wilmington links and came across his name. The first site said he was still practicing at 85. I found this amazing. Then I came across his obituary, and this blog. My condolences to your family on your loss.
Paul Reed
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