We spent Mother's Day weekend this year at the beach. Not so much for fun, but it just so happened that we needed to go to the beach to secure things in order to prepare for the first storm of the year, Tropical Storm Ana.
Because the weather was supposed to be yucky, we took a little road trip to neighboring beaches on Saturday. We stopped and had dinner at Calabash.
Saturday afternoon when we got back we went to look at the ocean. It was really starting to get wild. That night the wind and rain were intense. In fact, the water in our toilet would swirl around when there was a big gust of wind.
Sunday morning, we decided not to go to church, because the weather was really nasty. John and the kids watched a movie while I cleaned the house.
That evening I spoke to my older kids on the phone. (Beth had been here a couple of weeks before and gave me a cute blouse.)
The next morning, Anna and Layne brought me Starbucks and a pretty hydrangea plant.
We then went to visit my Mom. This mother's day is quite special to me, because I came very close to not having my mom with me. When Beth was here, we went to the beach, and my mom and dad came for a visit. After a wonderful day of shopping and playing, my mom was watching Abbey, Elijah, and Evie play. I was cooking dinner. As I cooked, I heard Elijah say, "Grandaddy, Nana needs her oxygen, she's breathing funny." I peaked in a it looked like mom was asleep, yet something didn't seem quite right. I went back to cooking, and then for some reason, I decided to go and investigate. I went to my mom and tried to rouse her, which I couldn't do. I called to my dad and he came over. We were able to get mom to open her eyes, but she was talking unintelligently, then she shook as if with a seizure. At this point, I told Dad we needed to call 911. He agreed and I did. The policeman was at our house within 5 minutes! A few minutes later the ambulance came and evaluated my mom. By this time, she was becoming more and more coherent. They figured it was a seizure and would take her to the hospital to be checked out. As they were wheeling her out, she called, "Glenda, you go to the hospital to be with your dad." I got Beth situated with cooking and watching the kids and headed to the hospital, which is only about 10 minutes away from the house. As I pulled into the parking lot, I saw my dad. I thought it was strange that he was just getting inside. He rushed up to my car and told me, "Her heart stopped on the way here. They pulled over and the driver got into the back. I looked and they were just beating on her. They shooed me away and made me stay back!" We then went into the hospital, where they treated us with kid gloves. I knew things were grave by the way they treated us. Mom's heart had stopped and she had been intubated and waiting to be transferred. That was a hard few hours. I really thought we were going to lose my mom. They airlifted her to Greenville. Long story short: she recovered and it was determined that she had no heart problems. The cardiac arrest was caused by a lack of oxygen, maybe from sleep apnea? They inserted a defibulator in her chest and she went home after about a week.
While waiting in the ER, I wanted nothing more than to be able to tell her how much she meant to me and how much I loved her. I wanted to laugh with her and celebrate her weight loss more. I was so afraid I'd never get to do it again! But, God isn't done with my mom! I did get to say and do those things I was longing to do while in the holding area for very critical patient's families. I'm so very thankful to have my mom! I'm so very thankful that Elijah is such an observant little boy. I'm thankful that Dad and I decided to call 911. I'm thankful that the ambulance got there quickly. If none of those things had happened, it would have been an awful Mother's Day.
But, praise be to God, it was a beautiful Mother's Day!
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