08-10-2013, 08:41 AM
My mom passed away on August 1st at the age of 81. She had been fading away for the past 3 years, remembering less and less, but still maintaining a generally contented attitude, thanks entirely to my older brother, Steve, who was her caretaker for the past 10 years.
My mom was an RN, worked her way up from the ER to the OR, eventually becoming Head of Surgical Services at El Camino Hospital. Her gallows humor from her ER/OR days never left her, and she still enjoyed the occasional practical joke, also a legacy of her nursing days.
Mom had an interesting life, After graduating from nursing school in Chicago, she joined the flight crew of a small international airlines as the then required "Flight Nurse". A stewardess and RN, basically. While based in the Pacific, she met my dad. Later, based in Europe, they married. In the pacific, going from Hawaii to Japan was done via island hopping in DC-3's; she said that there were a couple of times where headwinds ran their fuel so low that they thought they may have to ditch the plane. Good times.
As a nurse and an administrator at a hospital, she saw that there was a real problem with how families of patients who died were treated and basically left to fend for themselves after a tragic event. She pioneered the first grief support and counseling service at the hospital in the 1970's, one of the first in the US. She worked with Elizabeth Kubler-Ross directly in setting it up.
Later, she went back to school and got a Masters in Organizational Development.
She was very supportive of her three behemoth children. It was her more than anyone else that is to be credited with how I live my life (the good parts, that is). When she saw that I was wandering after high school, she asked me what I really liked to do. I said "fencing" because that was all I wanted to do. Then she asked "can you make a living doing that, and if not, how can we make that work so it is mostly what you do?" Out came the flip-chart pad and sharpies and we hashed out a plan. That plan guided me until I achieved my goals at the age of 30: Fencing for a living, head coach of a top American fencing club.
My mom was really non-judgemental and genuinely kind, traits she did not pass on to me. Her declining health was checked by my brother's work to keep her in her own house for the past several years, which added happy years to her life. It was only when she very recently became too ill to stay home that she had to go into long-term care. We knew that she would not last long, and we were right. A month later, she passed in her sleep.
True to her wishes, there was no service and the Neptune Society is doing its.
I'll try to follow her example of graciousness and kindness, though I know I won't succeed. I've been missing her bit by bit for the past three years, but now more than ever.
Good bye, mom. I love you.
My mom was an RN, worked her way up from the ER to the OR, eventually becoming Head of Surgical Services at El Camino Hospital. Her gallows humor from her ER/OR days never left her, and she still enjoyed the occasional practical joke, also a legacy of her nursing days.
Mom had an interesting life, After graduating from nursing school in Chicago, she joined the flight crew of a small international airlines as the then required "Flight Nurse". A stewardess and RN, basically. While based in the Pacific, she met my dad. Later, based in Europe, they married. In the pacific, going from Hawaii to Japan was done via island hopping in DC-3's; she said that there were a couple of times where headwinds ran their fuel so low that they thought they may have to ditch the plane. Good times.
As a nurse and an administrator at a hospital, she saw that there was a real problem with how families of patients who died were treated and basically left to fend for themselves after a tragic event. She pioneered the first grief support and counseling service at the hospital in the 1970's, one of the first in the US. She worked with Elizabeth Kubler-Ross directly in setting it up.
Later, she went back to school and got a Masters in Organizational Development.
She was very supportive of her three behemoth children. It was her more than anyone else that is to be credited with how I live my life (the good parts, that is). When she saw that I was wandering after high school, she asked me what I really liked to do. I said "fencing" because that was all I wanted to do. Then she asked "can you make a living doing that, and if not, how can we make that work so it is mostly what you do?" Out came the flip-chart pad and sharpies and we hashed out a plan. That plan guided me until I achieved my goals at the age of 30: Fencing for a living, head coach of a top American fencing club.
My mom was really non-judgemental and genuinely kind, traits she did not pass on to me. Her declining health was checked by my brother's work to keep her in her own house for the past several years, which added happy years to her life. It was only when she very recently became too ill to stay home that she had to go into long-term care. We knew that she would not last long, and we were right. A month later, she passed in her sleep.
True to her wishes, there was no service and the Neptune Society is doing its.
I'll try to follow her example of graciousness and kindness, though I know I won't succeed. I've been missing her bit by bit for the past three years, but now more than ever.
Good bye, mom. I love you.
In the Tudor Period, Fencing Masters were classified in the Vagrancy Laws along with Actors, Gypsys, Vagabonds, Sturdy Rogues, and the owners of performing bears.
