New journey…

In the last few months my husband and I have been on a journey.

No, not one with luggage, like this…… A journey to the end of a life.

It has been scary, it’s been difficult, and it has been private. You see, my husband was dying, and neither of us had experience of this before. We were able to verbalise this to each other, and painful as it was, talk to each other about what was happening, and grieve together.

To begin with they thought he might have months.

I hope I never forget his answer to me when I cried about all the things he would no longer be able to do, (his oxygen needs were too great for him to be able to leave our home.)

“I am not looking forward to all I will lose, I am looking back to all that I had.”

Most recent were…

The wonderful time we had at the Feast of Tabernacles… then seeing Nos, Laura, Luke again… and meeting our ‘new’ granddaughter, Lana.

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We arrived home from the UK  late in October, and he went straight to hospital.

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Between then and his death, he had only one week at home, because he had to be readmitted, and then, after the news, he was moved to Palliative Care.

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In the past week, he has rarely been able to speak, but he has been able to attract my attention and make his needs known.

Another new journey.

I agonise that I might not have interpreted correctly, or  for where his thoughts were, and I prayed that God protect his mind.

The hospital chaplain had arranged for us to have a CD player for our Sabbath, but no one took it back, so for that last week, every day, over and over, I played the disks of our hymns. Even the nurses, when they came in to re-position him, remarked on how peaceful it was with the music playing. I read to him from his Bible because I know it grieved him that he was unable to study. His favourite, and oft quoted scripture was Rom 8:28 but I often read him the whole section, some of the psalms and other scriptures.

Then he was gone.

Strange how even though it is expected, it is a shock.

Although I grieved at the start, I know now I was numb. Two days after, and the grief comes in waves. All I can do, is take it to God.

Geoff was visited by his youngest, a lovely daughter from Victoria, who flew across the country, just to say ‘goodbye’. His son, still in remission from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma visited… as did my daughter and her three children. She was with me at the end, and as it happened, I so needed her support. (He died late on the day before her 40th birthday.)

His journey is over and he is sleeping. My new journey has begun.

The support from my daughter, all the emails, texts, phone calls,  and Facebook messages bring me comfort… in some ways they walk part of the way with me, but this is a journey I must take alone, with God and His Son.

I really appreciated a scripture one of our ministers read to me the day after Geoff died.

The righteous perishes,

And no man takes it to heart;

Merciful men are taken away,

While no one considers

That the righteous is taken away from evil.

 Isaiah 57:1

I also appreciated something my son from Edinburgh wrote… ‘Things I learned from Dad’. (It was so beautiful.)

I have a lot of love surrounding me, and I appreciate it. But as any new ‘widow’ will know, it is a strange journey, a lonely one.

In Geoff’s Bible was a letter to me. He said he wanted…

“to leave you something with my love, written words to look at in the lonely times and I know there will be lonely days and nights ahead.”

It is a very personal and loving letter, and he mentions that he knows this will be my hardest journey ever.

How right he is!

But it just a journey… a painfully sad journey.

• For all the support people are giving me

I am grateful.

 It is good to know that God is working His purpose out, and I trust Him.

I want to finish my race faithfully too.

Susan