In a moment...

Life can truly change in a moment in time and that change will last a lifetime. We have a sister that has been married 30 years and with her husband for 31 years and they were just here June 24th as our daddy was entering heaven. The day they returned home he started feeling bad and on Monday night when he coughed there was blood. He refused to go to the ER that night because it was late (I know, I don't know any other man that would do that, do you?). Tuesday morning he couldn't stop coughing and it was all blood. This time he agreed (like he had a choice) to go to the ER. Obviously with COVID she couldn't go in with him so she had to sit in the parking lot not knowing what is going on with her husband. Sadly it wouldn't be long before the dreaded news that he was in advanced stage 4 lung cancer. Oh, that's not all, it gets worse. It had spread to his throat, hips, right shoulder front and back, chest cavity, broncial tubes, and is in both lungs with the right one having the largest mass. With in 24 hours he had more tumors and they were growing. Basically they weren't giving him much hope for options. It was not operable and chemo in the traditional way was not an option. They got him stable enough, but they knew the news was bad so they finally let my sister join him in the hospital. That was scary because she had been told they would only let her in if he was at the end of life. Well, I guess he was/is. They finally completed the draining of the right lung and allowed him to go home, but since he didn't complain of pain they did not send him home with hospice. Needless to say, our sister is broken and terrified. The most time they have spent apart was when our daddy was in the hospital for open heart surgery and other than that they have been together every day and night. I cannot imagine facing that with my husband and we don't have 30 years of marriage (yet), but we are inseperable (well in my mind anyway). Seriously, I cannot imagine managing to live my life without him so I know she doesn't know how she is going to put one foot in front of the other when he is no longer here. What she isn't thinking about is that she is very strong and she will not know how strong she can be until that is all she has. Fortunately she has a son and daugher in law that love her and will do anything to help her through this journey and so will her family. If you are reading this I would plead with you to pray for her strength and for him to have little to no pain and not to suffer long. It is really hard to be in AR and her in TN and not be able to just be there when she needs us. I'm heartbroken over that, but we will get there and we will help however we can even if it is sitting on the deck with a glass of wine and cry, laugh, chat, or just be still and quiet.