God's Hand in JB's last day and Afterwards

I am Christian. Not a holy-roller type, pretty mainstream. I go to church and Sunday School most weeks. JB was a particular challenge to me. I know that you are supposed to love your enemies, turn the other cheek, try to reconcile, etc. My preacher said that some people are hard to love....

When she was in the hospital on life support and hubbie was there with her, I was left at home, not by his side where I thought I should be.

(1) The Sunday during that time, when prayer request time came around, I hesitated even mentioning her, because I was conflicted. I wanted her to die. I know that is not the Christian way. Finally I told the class her condition that I was conflicted. Her Dr. had said that there was no hope. But was my wanting her to go off life support because I wanted her gone or because it was the best thing? (I didn't say that much...) My Sunday school teacher then led us in a prayer with the various prayer requests. For JB, she turned that situation over to God.. She prayed that the family make the right decision and for me to deal with the "strained relationship". Not 5 minutes later, hubbie called my cell phone. With medical and pastoral advice, they had decided to remove the life support. To this day, my teacher and I both believe that God had a hand in that decision. The timing was too eerie.

(2)
Then later that afternoon, she died. I was scheduled to give blood that day at my church's annual drive. I knew that she would not last long off of life support, but since hubbie did not want me to go join him, I figured that I had might as well go on doing what I would be doing if the situation did not exist rather than sitting at home waiting for him to call. He called my cell while I was at the blood drive to let me know she had passed away. I was in the waiting area between registration and the couches. In fact, my number got called while I was on the phone with him, but I signaled the next person to go on. I doubt they knew what I was talking about on the phone. It turns out that there was a problem with his donation. His bag got busted and his was unusable. Mine turned out fine. Later, I found out that MIL JB had received blood and that she and I had the same blood type. I always thought that I would not want her to have any of my
blood, but she would not have gotten it anyway, we were in different regions. But I think that at least it is good that I was able to replace in some sort of way what she had needlessly consumed.

(3)
Everyone kept saying that they would pray for me. I felt that I did not need prayers, because I was not upset for her death. I even felt like a hypocrit. I did say "thank-you" to most people rather than "that's ok, we didn't like each other anyway."

It turns out that I did need the prayers. One of my preachers mentioned that often the death of one who you don't get along with is sometimes harder. But really, it wasn't. If you read my initial posts on this blog, you will see that my feelings were pretty neutral -- neither happy nor sad.

But I did have some needs. I did not want to sleep at JB's haunted and nasty house when in her town for the funeral.(you can read posts about that as well...) I did not want to sleep at my Mom's house 40 miles away either. My Mom would be barking judgmental orders and asking nosey questions. I just wasn't in the mood for my Mom. I also didn't want to do the extra driving. So, I told hubbie that I was getting a hotel. He objected. He wanted me to stay with him at his Mom's house or with my Mom or sister. I would have been fine staying with him -- at the hotel, but not at JB's nasty house. I wanted somewhere I cold take a shower that did not have visible mold. I wanted a bed to sleep in that was somewhat clean. Hotels don't always have that either, but I felt my chances were better than that. With him grieving, I couldn't say that to him. But I did have the excuse of that there was only a double bed and he hogs the whole bed in a double bed. He offered to sleep on a sofa.

My best friend from work found out that I needed support. Without question, she called her hubbie. She left straight from work and followed me to hubbie's home town. We stayed in a hotel room together. She stood by my side at the wake and spared me my Mom's criticisms and gave me someone to talk to rather than the Clampett's and the Darling's. (No, that's an insult, the Clampett's and the Darling's are rednecks. ILs are White Trash.)

I feel that she was my guardian angel, sent by God as an answer to all the prayers prayed for me. She enabled me to stay in a comfortable room that at least appeared cleaner and to have some support at the wake. When I called hubbie and told him that friend was coming and we were going to stay in the hotel together, he never objected to the hotel.

In my ladies group at church, we are supposed to keep an angel notebook. I had not had any "angel encounters" to list, until then. To me, my friend that night before the funeral was an angel, sent by God. Everyone agreed. I am still awed at what she did that for me.