{"id":276,"date":"2018-02-14T22:11:31","date_gmt":"2018-02-15T03:11:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/?p=276"},"modified":"2018-05-01T16:32:16","modified_gmt":"2018-05-01T21:32:16","slug":"the-gucci-bag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/2018\/published-stories\/276\/the-gucci-bag\/","title":{"rendered":"The “Gucci” Bag"},"content":{"rendered":"

Therefore we do not lose heart.\u00a0 Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.\u00a0 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.\u00a0 \u2013 2 Corinthians 4:16-17<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was a serious and solemn time for us \u2013 the end of my mother\u2019s life on Earth.\u00a0 She had tried every drug and therapy known at the time to kill or stave off the cancer, to no avail.\u00a0 As it ravaged her body, she became unable to walk, even with the assistance of a walker.\u00a0 She had been such a fighter, but now she was telling us she was ready to leave this Earth, and that God was waiting for her.\u00a0 She stated that she didn\u2019t care what we did with her \u201cstuff\u201d.\u00a0 She made some suggestions and said she wanted to go \u201chome\u201d.\u00a0 She had no regrets with her life.<\/p>\n

So, we began what can only be called a \u201cdeath watch\u201d.\u00a0 We soon settled into a schedule whereby my brothers and husband took turns staying with her at night, and my mother-in-law (a nurse) and I stayed with her during the day.\u00a0 Movement was excruciating, and so repositioning was done only to reduce the bed sores and a morphine drip was given for the increasing pain.\u00a0 Going to the bathroom became an exhausting and painful chore, so she was catheterized.<\/p>\n

Mom began to separate herself from her earthly life, speaking less and less.\u00a0 She began dreaming or talking to people who had passed on before her.\u00a0 When she did speak, it was in short sentences or words.\u00a0 On one such occasion, she woke up and began pulling on her catheter tube, trying to pull it out.\u00a0 The chemo nurse, Linda, now a friend of my mother\u2019s, was staying on to assist us in her hospice care.<\/p>\n

Linda took my mother\u2019s hand and said, \u201cGloria, leave that alone.\u00a0 It\u2019s your \u2018Gucci\u2019 bag.\u201d<\/p>\n

My mom opened her eyes and looked down at the bag, and then straight into Linda\u2019s eyes and said, \u201cWell, darling, if that\u2019s my \u2018Gucci\u201d bag, then it better match my outfit because God\u2019s waiting for me!\u201d<\/p>\n

My mother was dying just as she had lived: embracing life and death with faith, love, and a sense of humor!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Therefore we do not lose heart.\u00a0 Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.\u00a0 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.\u00a0 \u2013 2 Corinthians 4:16-17 It was a serious and solemn time for us \u2013 the end […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"_oxygen_hide_in_design_set":false,"_oxygen_tags":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-published-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lorettaschoen.com\/v3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}