Dearest Friend

My dear friend

Today as I watched you sleeping I felt totally numb. It was so surreal to me and my heart was breaking for you or perhaps it was breaking for me.

We have been friends for over ten years. During this time we have worked side by side as co-workers, sharing lunches, helping each other to meet deadlines, shared stories of our families, laughed and cried together and always we encouraged each other through everything. I am the oldest so you looked to me for guidance and understanding and I tried to never let you down.

Later on we became neighbours when you and your family moved a few doors down from me. You cared for me the year after I had battled cancer and for that year each evening brought over a hot meal, you knew I wouldn't bother cooking for myself and you wanted me healthy so I would continue working. Your kindness and friendship was and is one of the best memories I hold in my heart. You kept my spirits high after my sisters had returned home and I had to live again on my own.

Today as I sit in your living room, I am remembering the day we chose the paint color for these walls and picked out the drapes now closed against the Spring sunshine, you were so happy then, full of life..... this was the first house you and your husband had purchased and would now call home.

I find it hard to understand what is going on around me now. The bed you sleep in is foreign to me in this room, the oxygen tank you breathe from, the many bottles of medication beside you and the tubes now a part of you are all so strange to me. I keep thinking of the words you spoke before you drifted off to sleep. I asked you if you were frightened and you said "no, I am to tired to feel anything." You have just come home after spending nearly 2 months in hospital. This is where you begged to come, you hated being in the hospital away from your family.

Your husband and daughters are at work, they seem to think you will be better soon and their lives will be back to normal. They only speak of when your better, but somehow I don't feel you will get any better than you are right now. No one speaks of your illness so it is hard for me to know what to do for you, what to say to you. You are unable to sit aside your bed, unable to even go to the washroom. As we looked at each other we both knew without speaking that this is not a good situation. Oh how I wish you would tell me what you are thinking, how you are truly feeling and more than anything I want to know why you don't talk to your family about what is happening, perhaps you have and this is the way you all want it to be.

Well my friend I want to tell you how much I love you, how much your friendship means to me and how I hold you in my heart and prayers always. Perhaps your family are right, you will get better and this dark sick room will once again become the bright living room it once was. Perhaps we will laugh together and share our days chatting over a cup of coffee......the way it use to be. Until this happens please know that you will be forever my friend and I will always stand beside you just as I sit beside you this afternoon. Welcome home my dearest friend, may God Bless you and the angels protect you as you journey through this horrible illness. I love you.

I began this post last night but was too tired to finish it so waited until this afternoon. As I read it over I realize I still feel the same and don't want to change my message to my dear friend. I ask you all to continue your prayers for her. I will update you all on her situation regularly as I see her almost daily.

I want to thank my dear blogger friend Cindy who helped me give my blog a fresh new look. Cindy your e-mail this morning was wonderful, so clear and easy for me to follow. I love the new look and love you for helping me achieve it. Oh I am so blessed with such wonderful blogger friends.

Have a wonderful day my friends, God Bless and ....... many, many hugs.