Three days ago was the first anniversary of my retirement. It was also the first anniversary of my husband's diagnosis of inoperable hepatocellular carcinoma. As you know if you follow my blog, he went home to be with the Lord 5 months later.
I have looked back over events that occurred before October 28, 2011, in some cases years before. I now see how God was working to prepare me for what I would face. I would like to share some of these with you.
In early summer 2011 I began thinking about a childhood friend. I couldn't seem to get her off my mind. I had not seen or heard from her since the 1980s. I finally went on the alumni sight of the orphanage where she lived for 9 years after her mother died. Unbelievably, there was an article from a local newspaper posted there with her picture. I was able to get her e-mail address & contact her. We corresponded by e-mail through out the next few months. In September, 2011 she asked me to meet her & her sister while they were vacationing at a nearby resort. I was thrilled. During our visit my friend told me she'd had lymphoma and almost died of organ failure. She told me about her oncologist, who at the time of her illness was practicing at NC Cancer Hospital at Chapel Hill. She then said he had relocated to the town I live in. She told me she hoped I never needed an oncologist, but if I did to ask for him. When our doctor called me at work to tell me he was sending Al for a CT & was sure he had cancer, he also told me he was going to refer him to an oncologist. Like so many who have experienced it, when I heard "cancer" everything that followed went right over my head. After coming to my senses, I called back to tell the nurse I had a preference between two oncologists. The second was the oncologist my friend told me about. When the nurse called me with the appointment, it was scheduled with my friend's oncologist. We all loved him. Just as she said, he was so caring but always honest with us. Do you think it coincidence that I couldn't stop thinking about my friend, or that there was a newspaper picture of her on the orphanage's web site, or that she asked me to visit, or that she had been treated by an oncologist who now practiced in our town, or that my husband's appointment would be with him & not my first choice?
As I have posted previously, I gave a month's notice when I decided to retire on October 28, 2011. We didn't find out that my husband had cancer or even that he was ill until 2 weeks before my retirement date. But this wasn't my first choice of when to retire. I had originally planned for January, 2012. By the end of summer 2011, I was just tired and one day looked at the calendar & said, "I'm leaving here the end of October". Do you think it coincidence that I changed the date of my retirement from January 2012 to October 2011, the very day we received my husband's definitive diagnosis?
Several years ago our pastor's wife decided to begin a Sunday School class for ladies. This would be for adult singles, widows, or women whose husbands did not come to church with them. The pastor's wife asked me and a few other women to join the class to help her out. I felt led to do this even though my husband & I were already in a Sunday School class. He had no objection, so I joined the new class and loved it. Do you think it coincidence that my pastor's wife asked me to join a class for only ladies?
In 1991 I stood by the bedside of my mother as she left this world to join her Lord in the next. Mama was heavily medicated and slipped peacefully from us. She died of inoperable lung cancer at the age of 64. In 1993 I stood by the bedside of my father as he had a heart attack and left us to join my mother & his Lord. They barely got Daddy into a room before he was struck with the second heart attack within a few hours, so he was not medicated as my mother had been. Do you think it coincidence that God allowed me to be present for both their deaths?
Let me assure you that none of these events were coincidence. As God knows the day appointed for each of us to die, he began preparing me for my husband's death 20 years prior. I once was quite undecided about Hospice for myself or my husband, but when the need arose for him I had no hesitation. I had already been prepared for what was to come. When my pastor's wife started the Ladies' Sunday School Class, we had no way of knowing that in a few years I would truly become a member by becoming a widow. I tell you with no doubt what so ever that the decision to change my retirement date was impressed upon me by the Holy Spirit. As for the things that occurred with my childhood friend, I don't think they require explanation. They are beyond any explanation other than GOD.
