Morning Cuppas With Glenys : death

Showing posts with label death. Show all posts

Shipwrecked on Mondays?

How many times have you heard people say that they hate Mondays? How many times have you said it? I know that in the past I have often said how much I hate Mondays. But really in hating Mondays, have you stopped to think what you are really saying?

Monday is typically the start of the working week and it heralds the return of the everyday week day routine. We return to outside paid work, or our husbands do and with that comes the responsibility of getting to bed early so as to rise early and not be late for our boss.

For the homemaker, it signifies the rushed iron-a-shirt, cut-a-lunch, prepare-school-uniforms and pick-up-the-kids part of the start of our week. And it says that the more relaxed pace of the week-end has drawn to a close for another week. Misery.

But really we shouldn't be miserable just because it is Monday. Monday is just the start of a week. Each day is a day of unsurpassed beauty- if we take the time to see it. Just ask someone who is dying if they hate Mondays, and I am sure that they would love to have a whole lot more Mondays to live. I know this is true because I lived that for three long months of a misdiagnosis of a terminal disease. Every day is a gift and is special. Even Mondays!

It may be hard at first to be grateful and thankful for not only Mondays but all days, but seeking out happiness will make it easier. Joyfulness will bloom and Mondays will become a blessing and not a curse. A day a week is too many days to waste in a life to feel shipwrecked.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Psalm 90:14

Aging doesn't bother me!

Today is my 66th birthday and I am not phased at getting older. I do not get depressed about aging, but I do sense a certain urgency to live better and to make sure that I do not waste something that is irreplaceable and of great value - time!

It's sometimes tradition on birthdays to evaluate your life.... What have I achieved in nearly seven decades of living? What do I want to achieve? Where is my life heading? What things are key in my life in regards to importance and eternity? What changes can I make to live better and cherish that which I do hold dear? Quite a lot to think on really.

As I sit and reflect, I know that I have to make some changes in my life as regards growing closer to the LORD, and memorising scripture better. I have to seriously build myself up physically as well whilst trimming a lot of excess avoir du pois off my truly small frame.

I realise that I can only make changes by repenting of a lot of negative thinking and attitudes that have gathered like moss on a stone. And by clinging to the LORD, for I know that without Him as the foundation, I can achieve nothing of eternal value.

One thing to reflect on is one that makes me content. I am basically living a good Christian life. I found that out when I was misdiagnosed with a terminal dementia like disease 11 years ago. You have got to believe me when I say that a person who believes they are dying questions what is important in their life and tries to make amends where it is lacking! I didn't have to change anything! I believe our sanctification is ongoing...I am far from perfect and there are some weeds in my garden that need to be pulled. I have far to go in some things..

Yes, today is a day for reflection as well as thanks for the great gift of life! And I can rejoice, because aging doesn't bother me! Not having enough breath to blow out all my candles? Yes, I think that bothers me more! ~smile

So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom. Psalm 90:12

Lest we forget

Today is Anzac Day,

A day when we stop to remember

The brave souls who gave their all

For This Lucky Country,

Australia.

We are a proud young country,

Which many of various culture

Are now pleased to call their own,

Forever free and welcoming,

Australia.

For all we have and are to be

As time passes since that day,

We bow our heads and lift our hearts

To diggers who made her so,

Australia.

LEST WE FORGET

A.N.Z.A.C.

Australian New Zealand Army Corps

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

They helped every one his neighbour; and every one said to his brother, Be of good courage. Isaiah 41:6

A bitter pill swallowed in sadness

First the General Practitioner’s was sold. It had been a house that was revamped for him. We waited eagerly to see if a medical service would take its place…we sorely need dental surgeries and physiotherapy, rehabilitation centres or pain management clinics in our area.

There were months of extensions and electrical works. Concretors made ramps for the front entrance and a car park was enlarged from a small parking area to room for about 20 cars. Over the next few months, we saw medical equipment and treatment couches and trolleys brought in. Our excitement and curiosity mounted.

What was this wonderful service for us? The sign post had long been stripped of its sold sign but no new sign was forthcoming. Finally, the place was finished! But no news in the local paper or no new sign gave us a clue to our new service! During the week the place was not busy at all…sometimes deserted. Very strange. Saturdays were extremely busy with the carpark full. Still there was no word what the building was.

I did a google search of the area….you guessed it. Our taxes are funding an abortion clinic! I am so upset! I know that abortion will always be a sad fact of life- but it is vexing that one should be built so close to our home! A service that will line the pockets of the abortionists, funded by tax payers money and serving only one small facet of the community!It is so very sad and disappointing!

I will always feel a sense of sadness for the little innocents’ lives that are taken and the lives messed up for women who will have to live with their decision for the rest of their lives! As I wait for a place in a pain management clinic, I swallow the bitter pill of anger and disappointment in the spiraling sin of our hedonistic society. And I shed a tear for the little ones sucked viciously from the warmth of their mother’s womb. And I pray “Maranatha, Lord Jesus!”…and shiver as I pass.

"Lo, children [are] an heritage of the LORD: [and] the fruit of the womb [is his] reward". Psalm 127:3

A bitter-sweet day!

Today is my granddaughter, Ashleigh's 20th birthday. It is a day when our family will be celebrating her birth, but for another family it is a day of deep mourning.

My granddaughter's birth was a very complicated one. It was a very protracted labour as first deliveries can often be, and after 17 hours of intense labour, my daughter requested and was given an epidural. Her partner left the room when she fell asleep, but I as her doula, stayed. I asked the midwife what the graphs on the fetal monitor were supposed to read. She explained it all to me, boosted the Oxytocyn drip up higher and told me she would be in to check on her in 2 hours. They were rushed off their feet with every delivery room full.

I had noticed some meconium stain when I was assisting my daughter, and I had privately advised the staff. The baby was under some stress and to my mind, the stage was set for a possible emergency caesarean. I was proved right.

With my daughter sleeping on three pillows, exhausted, there was nothing for me to do but watch the fetal monitor. I am sure God had planned for me to be there, for things went horribly wrong with the babys' heartbeat dipping dangerously during a contraction and not picking up after. My daughter would have been alone but as I saw it, I ran to the nurses' station and told them to come urgently. Within 10 minutes the child was born.

If it hadn't been for me staying with my daughter instead of going for a coffee, I would not have noticed the dipping heart rate until the babe was flat lining. My daughter would have delivered a still-born daughter as they weren't even going to check on her for 2 hours. I remember seeing no staff around near the nurses' station and every door to each birthing room was closed. I had to grab a midwife as she came out with some dirty linen.

Ashleigh was touch and go for a while but recovered quickly. Not so for some poor woman and her baby in the long corridor of delivery rooms. There was a distinct pall over the maternity floor and to this day I wonder just which room was the final resting place of a young mother and her unborn baby.

As the mother of still-born twins, I know the pain of loss, but I can't fathom the loss that the young father must have felt. Not to mention any other children the couple may have had and the girls' parents who lost not only a child but a grandchild as well.

I am so grateful to God that we have a healthy young woman today, but I have to try not to dwell on the fact that somewhere a family mourns the loss of a mother and child. Life is full of tragedy... full of bittersweet days that herald a new life and see the passing of another.

Please join me in saying a quick prayer for that mourning family... it's all I can do for them. Oh, and happy birthday, Ashleigh!

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up [that which is] planted; Ecclesaistes 3:1-2

Guard your heart

I really hate hypocrisy. The world is full of it and it really gets to me. In particular I hate that a person can be the worst person alive, but when she or he pass, suddenly everyone cries crocodile tears and says what a great person they were at their funeral! In my thinking, it's hypocritical.

Another thing that gets me upset is people who gush all over you, then talk evil of you behind your back. We all know someone like this. Our love should be true-our friendship real and sincere.

I have learned to get over the hurt of people who say they love us and don't bother to keep in touch or visit us. I saw this with my own father and step-father who were both housebound with heart and lung problems for years before they passed. Everyone of their friends didn't bother not only to visit them, but even phone them- yet there were copious tears and utterances of regret and undying love at their funerals.. and I find the same thing is happening to me.

In 1969 I found myself pregnant to my fiance at 16 and decided to resist my parents' offer to get an abortion for me or bring up my child as their own, and I married. But my grandmother who was pregnant before her own hasty marriage, refused to attend mine because I was with child..it hurt.

People, even Christians are notoriously hypocritical at times, which is not only distasteful to me, but smacks of dishonesty and deceit. May we be women of integrity in our living and our living starts with attitude. Let us guard our hearts from hypocrisy at all times.

Illness can't take everything away!

Chronic illness has the power to rob us of joy, movement and motivation and can place such a s train on us and our families that we actually grieve for the life we once had. Yet, it is limited in what it can take, and here are some things it cannot take from us...

It cannot take our salvation from us
It cannot take our love for God or His love for us,
It cannot take our honour, or respect or strength of character.
It cannot take our courage, our motivation or our hope...
It cannot take our honesty, our faithfulness to God and family,
It cannot take our robe of righteousness or God's Spirit within us.

Trying as it is, chronic illness cannot destroy our walk with Christ, or preclude us from serving God in prayer and kindness, even from our bed... It cannot rob us of seeking communion with God or lifting our arms in worship or raising our voices in song...even if we are just mouthing the words...

Chronic illness can take our joy at times, and perhaps our life, but only on the day and hour that Christ allows it. And the day it does take our all, chronic illness will be replaced with unimaginable joy as God gives us our robe of righteousness and our eternal reward... another thing that chronic illness can't take from us!

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulations, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Romans 8:35

A heinous crime against humanity and God

heinous

/ˈheɪnəs,ˈhiːnəs/

adjective

(of a person or wrongful act, especially a crime) utterly odious or wicked.

"a battery of heinous crimes"

synonyms:

odious, wicked, evil, atrocious, monstrous, disgraceful,
abominable, detestable, contemptible, reprehensible, despicable,
horrible, horrific, horrifying, terrible, awful, abhorrent, loathsome, outrageous,
shocking, shameful, hateful, hideous, unspeakable, unpardonable, unforgivable,
inexcusable, execrable, ghastly, iniquitous, villainous, nefarious, beneath contempt, beyond the pale;

With the advent of the latest abortion law passed today in New York which allows abortion of a baby for any reason until its due date, I thought this word heinous described it to a tee.

To wilfully kill a child that is viable and days away from being full-term is murder, pure and simple. I cannot fathom the depth of depravity of the carrier of the fetus- I refuse to call her a mother, that she could nurture the life within her only to terminate it just before it comes to see the light of day.

Not that the length of gestation matters because a person is a person from conception. But to feel that life within, to endure any hardship socially, physically or financially until the final hours of that pregnancy and then to kill that child beggars belief. I simply can't fathom it. The darkness of the mind of that "mother" is perplexing to me.

Furthermore, the very act of abortion at any stage not only brings death to the baby, but potential death to its carrier, and a very real grief in most women at some stage later in their lives. There is also an increased risk of breast cancer in women who have had abortions..At a late stage like the third trimester terminations, surely it would be better medically if the woman just gave birth and relinquished the baby?

Surely having endured a pregnancy with or without social or financial pressures and having felt the child's movements and steady growth, there would be some interest in the baby's future, and well being? Sufficient to birth it and give it up for adoption? There are so many people longing to have a baby or adopt one, but sadly there are not enough children given the chance of life to meet that need.

I am flummoxed to understand how medical people can inflict such violence on innocents. Human life to them must be so cheap! And as they hold a new family member in their own arms, I wonder if the faces of suffering children they have destroyed come to mind, and if so, does it not move them? I suspect not.

I know I am not alone in feeling sadness, anger and dismay at the destruction of so many babies, and I also know that it strikes at the heart of most people, both saved and unsaved. But I cry for how Father God must grieve for each lost child and for their lost "mothers", for a woman who can destroy her child on a whim is lost until or unless she repents and seeks God's forgiveness.

I truly am in despair for the world right now. It has sunk to an all time low as the fires of Moloch on which innocent children were sacrificed reach an all time high.

Let us all pray for this law to be repealed and for the saving of the innocents. Let us pray for women tempted to utilise this heinous law that they are given a heart of flesh instead of stone. For make no mistake, this heinous law is a crime against humanity and God. Maranatha!

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

Thus saith the LORD that made thee, and formed thee from the womb, which will help thee; Isaiah 44: 2

God is good all the time!

Recently my mother lost her battle with dementia. I would like to reflect and share on the LORD'S goodness to both her and myself in her passing...

Mum was a busy no nonsense sort of woman and for one reason or another, she *never* once told me she loved me. It was something she had told others, but not me. All my life, I was known as "The Other One" and felt that Mum only loved my twin sister and not me...

I wondered what was different about me that she didn't tell me and unfortunately it coloured my self-image into a blue haze of self-doubt. I felt unworthy and unloved in general... except for my Chris that is...

Mum battled dementia for years and she finally lost that battle a week ago. We were called to her bedside for our final farewells. During the first few hours Mum was semi conscious and aware enough to clean her mouth out with the cotton buds provided and tell them a resounding No!.when they tried to do it for her.. She reached out to us and touched our arms or face. Then gradually she worsened into a struggle for each breath and morphine was administered....

She loved us near her and those of us who were able came to see her off, but eventually it was just my granddaughter, Ash and myself there. I held Mum close and told her we were all here, just as she wanted. I told her I wasn't going anywhere and I stroked her face and held her hand. She was breathing so shallowly that I thought she had passed but a nurse came in and said not quite yet....

Looking at the skeletal face and shrunken hardworking hands, I stood up and kissed her forehead and prayed for God to give her His peace and to take her gently Home, and being in pain with my back from so much standing, I went to sit down again. Suddenly Mum called out quite strongly, "Stay!" So I immediately went back to her and told her I wasn't going anywhere and kissed her and held her as tightly as I could without hurting her frail body. She stared at me and said, "I love you!"

She never took her eyes off me again, but stared straight ahead but the nurses said she was still hanging on, but barely. I got up again and I told her she was the best mummy anyone could want. I told her she was such a tired girl and it was OK to rest. Her eyes flickered and then stayed still. Ten minutes later she was confirmed as having passed...

I am grieving Mum's loss even though I am glad she's free at last and Home with the LORD. However, I am overwhelmed with equally healing emotions and gratitude that God allowed me to be there holding Mum's hand and comforting her in her last moments...

I am amazed that He allowed her to rally enough to say that which ended the pain of feeling unloved. I am grateful for that time together, when I was recognised as me, not The Other One.

God is good. All the time. His mercy endures forever.