I did not proof read this so forgive the mistakes.     

Today is March 8, 2023 and for some reason I decided I needed to revisit Michael’s Caring Bridge Site.     I don’t know why but I was compelled to do so and so I did.

As I read thru the entire site I just couldn’t help but relive some points of it and it was hard to believe I was the one writing the updates.    It was like I was reading someone else’s caring bridge site.    It was like that really happened to us?  Our little family actually had to deal with all that?    I also read some things I didn’t remember and a friend said it was during a point in my life where I was so stressed and so tired it isn’t surprising that I didn’t remember some things.     

Then I read some “hints” that stood out on what happened.  I thought to myself that God really does give us hints and lets us prepare ourselves but I think I was just so in the moment I either didn’t really want to believe it or I just was so caught up in it that I didn’t truly realize what was happening. 

So, what AM  I talking about?     On March 25, 2019 my honey went to be with the Lord.   Yes, it’s been almost 4 years since my last update here on his caring bridge site but I feel like I need to actually make this post on here.    

As my last post on March 21, 2019 said the cardiologist told us Michael was in stage 3 of congested heart failure.  I now believe it was more stage 4 or 5.    No matter what we did his chest never stopped hurting.   I couldn’t make him comfortable at all.   His heart just couldn’t keep beating and decided to finally stop on the 25th of March 2019.     It was the day my world stopped.

I do want to talk about how the last four days of his life were to you now, please be patient with me.   

After his “big” appointment with the cardiologist and the diagnosis and new plans for everything we just decided to live life the way we could.    He was happy.   He was not manic he was him again for just a brief second in time.      His big appointment was on a Thursday and it was either Friday or Saturday which I remember the best.     It was a day I will NEVER EVER forget.     It was a very nice day for March and I think I mentioned in the post about hoping the days would warm up so we could start going for walks.   Well, God answered and we were able to go for a walk.    It was still a little chilly and he got cold easily so I put on his hat, gloves, coat and brought his blanket with us.    I wanted to go to Walmart for a few things and so we made the walk to Walmart.     There was still snow on the ground and when I was trying to get from the road to Walmart there was a sidewalk but it was covered in snow.  I needed to get thru that snow and so we just plowed our way thru the snow in his wheelchair.    During this time it was a little shaky and Michael was a little scared but we were actually laughing at how funny it all was.  Then a spoke from one of his wheels of the wheelchair popped off.  We just started laughing harder and just making jokes about if his wheelchair actually fell apart and what we were going to do.   He was actually LAUGHING!     We went thru Walmart and purchased what we needed and I asked him if he was hungry.    He was always hungry, it seemed.     He loved Mexican food and right across the road from Walmart is a Mexican restaurant so I took him over there.   He ordered a huge burrito and had many nachos and we just thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company.      He couldn’t eat all his food but we did take the rest home with us.     It was such a glorious day and like I said I will NEVER forget that day.    

Then Sunday came, March 24, 2019.    It was a day from hell.    I believe it was this day his brother called to talk to us about their mother.  I can now say the very sick person was Michael’s mom.      I couldn’t talk to him about her when he was in the hospital and I don’t truly know if he understood the extent of her sickness.    While he was fighting for his life in the hospital she was also fighting for her life.     Anyway, I believe it was this day his brother called to talk to us about his mother and how it was going with her…not good.    Once we got off the phone with his brother Michael insisted we must go to Mississippi so he could take care of his mother.     I kept explaining to him that even if we could go there he wouldn’t physically be able to take care of her like he would need to.    He was so mad and so upset because I wouldn’t listen to him and I wouldn’t take him to his mother.    I just kept explaining that he was still healing himself.  He didn’t even have his stitches out from his leg bypass and amputation of his toe.      He just worked himself up and kept working himself up.   He ended up complaining about his chest and he wouldn’t go to bed and…and…and.    Then the hiccups started again.   He was just working himself up so much he was making himself sick again.     All I can say is that was a night I relived EVERY. SINGLE. SUNDAY for weeks maybe even months.   It was horrible.     I ended up getting a migraine because of the stress and the whole situation and I couldn’t get to sleep because he was manic again.    He was trying to find anything to try to end his life which everything there was he could that with had already been hidden from him.      He was finding things to break so he could take the shards and try to hurt himself.     At one point he was falling asleep because I had given him some sleeping pills that were prescription for him.   Most of the time they wouldn’t work for him but thank goodness they did this night.    I decided I would try to sleep also and as I was laying in the bed I said this prayer, “Lord, it’s time.   Please take him home and end his suffering.   I’m ok with it now.”      I don’t know if those are the exact words but you get the gist of the prayer.      For a long time I felt that prayer right there is why he left the next day but I know now I’m not that big.   It was just confirmation to God that I was now ready to let my honey go where before that I wasn’t ready.  It was like God was preparing me for letting Michael go the past few years because He knew if He would have taken Michael before all this I would have never made it through.    I digress…not too soon after Michael started in again.   Pills didn’t work that long.     He was screaming that I needed to give him his nitro and even when I did give him the nitro he said it didn’t work and I needed to give him more and the doctor told me I could give him as much as he wanted.    It was just such a terrible night.    Our oldest daughter lived in the town next to ours and I called her when I knew she was awake and asked her to come get her dad when she got the boys off to school and take Michael to the E.R. because I just couldn’t do it.  I was spent.  I was emotionally spent, I just couldn’t do it.    She reluctantly did come get him.     I told her I had a migraine and that I was going to go to bed and try to get rid of my headache.   

Now it’s Monday, March 25, 2019.    Our daughter took Michael into the hospital and I remember my best friend decided to go up there with her and sit with her so she wasn’t alone with her daddy.     At one point I know she called me and asked me about how they usually got an I.V. into Michael and she said that Michael just kept asking for me and asking for me.     I had gotten a few good hours of sleep in and even though I still had my migraine it was more tolerable so I told her I would come up there.    My best friend left after I got there.    They had to call in a nurse from the cities to come and put in a pic line for him because they just couldn’t get an I.V. in him.     When our daughter had brought him there they said his lungs were filled again and water was around his heart and his oxygen was in the 70’s.   Once they gave him oxygen his sats started going up and our daughter said he finally fell asleep.  He also didn’t have the hiccups anymore.     It was like when his body was under stress it just hiccupped.    When I got there he woke up and he was so happy to see me and he was just so sweet and nice to me.    He even smiled.     Once the pic line was inserted I told him I was going to go home and sleep some more and try to get rid of my headache.  He took my hand in his and said, “If you go home now you will never see me again.”    I told him to not say such things and I told him I would leave when our daughter would leave and by then he should be in a room.  She had to leave about 3pm.     I stayed and they got him in a room and it was nearing 3pm so I told him I had to go.    He grabbed my hand and he looked like he wanted me to give him a kiss but I didn’t.  I regret that.    I don’t know why I didn’t but I didn’t.    I remember the sad smile he had on his face when I left.   We had this saying to each other and I said that when I left, “Love you, no bullshit.”   I went home and went back to bed.   

I got a call from Michael about 7pm or so and he said, “They won’t give me my meds.”   I asked him what meds.   He told me his nitro.  I explained to him that the nitro wasn’t working for him so that’s probably why they weren’t giving it to him.    He said he was just going to open the window and jump out into the lake then.   I told him to not talk that way.  He asked me to PLEASE come to the hospital so I could tell them to give him the meds he needed.   I told him that I couldn’t do that because I still had a bit of a headache.    He got mad and then hung up on me. 

I’m a genealogist and I was helping my best friend’s brother to find his biological family.    I had accomplished that and he had sent me a pic of one of his half siblings and so I called him and was talking to him and was so happy for him.    Then I called my friend who helps with finding biological families and as I was on the phone with her I got a phone call from the hospital.    They basically told me I needed to come to the hospital.     I remember calling our son, who was an hour away.  He has played the phone call I made to him that night and I was screaming so loud and crying so hard I could barely be understood.     I then called my best friend and screamed at her.    I then got to the hospital and went upstairs and turned to go to my honey’s room and as soon as I turned the corner and looked in his room I can never erase that image from my mind.   The machine that was on top of him giving him compressions.   It was so terrible I fell to the floor and I was screaming.  I remember a male voice saying, “Who let her in?”    I said, “He is my husband and I dare you to tell me to NOT be here!”    I remember, I guess, a nurse came over to me and was trying to get me up off the floor and I couldn’t.   She kept telling me I needed to get up off the floor and I just told her to leave me alone.  The next thing I remember is my best friend being there.    She bent down and tried to get me up off the floor but I just couldn’t.  I just couldn’t get up.  Then the next thing I remember is my dad was there.  I heave NO idea who called my dad to tell him what was going on but between him and my best friend they were able to guide me to the family room.    My best friend said when she walked into the hospital she could hear me and I was on the second floor!     I remember the doctor coming in and asking me to make that decision and I just couldn’t, not at that moment.     A lot more things happened during that time like my best friend making all the phone calls that needed to be made.   She got my kids there, she talked to Michael’s family, she talked to our friends, she did SO much that I can never ever repay her for.    My dad stayed with me the whole time.     I finally told my dad to tell the doctor to stop everything because I knew, I knew he was gone and he was gone when they told me to come to the hospital.   I knew, I just knew.  

All the family came to the hospital and everyone was able to say good-bye to Michael.    We all had our alone time with him.    I remember going in the room by myself and sitting with him and I actually opened his eye just to make sure he really truly wasn’t there anymore.     I remember looking at his stitches and just bawling because he hadn’t even healed from that.   I remember just touching his cheek and running my fingers thru his hair and kissing his cheek and telling him how sorry I was.   Telling him how much I loved him and just telling him over and over how sorry I was.    

I remember too that while the family was in the family room my dad stood watch at Michael’s room.    Unless he knew them or I said it was ok no one was allowed in that room.     That was my dad’s way of showing how much he truly cared about my honey and that was so honorable in my eyes.    Truly beautiful that he was watching over my honey.  

I mourned and I still mourn to this day but it’s different now.    I tried for the first few days to join Michael because I just couldn’t bare to be without him.

I TRULY believe my honey went to be with the Lord so he could go and take care of his mother while she continued to fight for her life.   She is alive today, thank the Lord.  She didn’t find out her son died for quite a while but she did tell me once that she knew he had because Michael came to her.    He walked into her room and it was so real to her that she couldn’t quite believe he didn’t really do so.   He brought her flowers.    It still brings tears to my eyes when I think of how beautiful his love for his mom is/was.  Remember he worked himself up so much because he wanted to take care of her but couldn’t so he left, he did what he had to so he could take care of his mother and let her live.    I truly, in my heart, believe this.  Call me crazy if you will but I will never not say this.    He gave his life for his mama.   You know what?   I’m ok with it.   I’m ok that he loved his mama so much he would do that.  I’m ok with it because the Lord took him home so he could be with his mama.   I’m ok with it because it ended all his suffering.   I’m ok with it because it’s God’s will. 

Our family lost Michael March 25, 2019 but I know he is all around us.   He has given signs to his children and to me to show that he is still taking care of us.    I know he was able to let his mom know too and he was able to help save her life.  I don’t know how that all happened but I know it, in my heart.  

I see a lot of Michael in our grandchildren and our children.   It brings tears but yet joy to me to see how much he still lives in our family and how much he is still a part of us.   

I spent over 30 years with him and it just seems like yesterday that he asked me out.  

Our family has moved forward and we are all moving ahead in our lives.   I am a single widowed (there has to be better words than this) woman.   I know with the help of Michael, whispering in God’s ear, I will again find love but I will always cherish the 30 plus years I spent with him and cherish the children and grandchildren he left behind to carry on his traits, smile, characteristics, and love.

Even though it’s almost been 4 years it seems just like yesterday we had to say good-bye.   

Love you, no bullshit.