It has been a long time since I have posted anything. I will try to post more often. So much has happened in the last several weeks!
First off, we had a great time in Florida after Christmas. Very relaxing, saw a couple of alligators (one was 4 houses down in a little park and the other was in our backyard). Went to Disney world where Julie got to meet Mickey and Minnie. It was really cute, she was carrying around a Mickey sticker and as soon as she got to meet him, she handed him the sticker like it was some sort of currency ;) We also did lots of shopping and had 4 beach days at various local beaches. We had great weather – some days were as high as 30 degrees! Made it difficult to come back to the cold!
That’s the good news.
The bad news is that my Oma passed away on Jan 21st. As I mentioned before, she suffered a stroke on Dec. 18th and just when we thought things were looking good and they were talking about rehab, she complication after complication. Just when they’d get one thing under control, something else would come up. She had an irregular heart rate that they needed to stabilize with medication, she developed aspiration pneumonia, then jaundice.
We found out on January 15th that the jaundice was caused by advanced cancer and there was nothing they could do and they were moving their focus to palliative care and just keeping her comfortable for however many days she had left. The doctors were amazed that she hadn’t been in pain for the last several months given how advanced the cancer was.
On the Monday, January 17th, the hospital called the family in at 4:30am thinking the end was near, at that point they told us hours, and we were all at the hospital by 5am. We spent 4 days at the hospital round the clock and she passed away just after midnight on the 21st. She had a semi-private room with the other bed empty, so my mom was able to stay in the hospital overnight and slept holding Oma’s hand. We gave Oma the most beautiful sendoff to heaven and it was such a peaceful and beautiful experience. I didn’t know death could be like that! We will all miss Oma terribly, but we know we’ll see her again someday in heaven. Oma always said she wanted to live long enough to see Julie walk, and she lived 6 months longer than that. I am so glad we had a girl and named her middle name (Erika) after Oma. Julie still asks for Oma every day and while Oma was in the hospital for 5 weeks, I said “Oma’s not home right now”, but now when Julie asks, I say “Oma lives in heaven with Jesus”.
I can't believe Julie turns 2 on Monday! The time has flown by! She is talking in full sentences now!
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