How will you celebrate Christmas Day? It is less than a week away? Will you celebrate Christmas Day with relatives or friends? Will you invite guests to your home to eat Christmas dinner, will you go to their home, or to a restaurant?
I can’t help but think of my lifelong friend, Sharron, who is dying of pancreatic cancer. How will her grown children, their spouses, and her grandchildren celebrate Christmas Day? Do you have family members or friends who suffer from a life-threatening illness?
Sharron’s grown children will have her at their home to celebrate Christmas Day, but her appetite has dwindled. If she drinks something, she can’t eat. If she eats, she’s full and can’t drink the water she needs to stay hydrated. She lives in pain day and night and takes pain medication to manage the pain. Then she sleeps. The family members know the time with their mother is short.
Do you face the loss of a loved one? How does that affect your Christmas plans?
While Sharron is at home on hospice, her husband has been in the hospital for three weeks with complications. He received a diagnosis of dementia the week after her diagnosis of cancer and in time needed to move into a facility.
Sharron’s family faces the loss of both parents at the same time. Although their diagnoses are different, both situations are heartbreaking. Can you relate to that?
If your family and friends are doing well, make the most of Christmas Day. Bake cookies, go Christmas caroling, and see the lights. Celebrate the birth of Christ, read Bible passages about his birth, and pray for one another. Make special memories, and do all you can while you can.
Isaiah 9:6: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
Merry Christmas!
Copyright © by Yvonne Ortega XII.XIX.MMXVI
