Cherish what you have

Cherish what you have, because you never know how long we have.

A friend from work had her mom in a local hospital for 2 or 3 weeks.  The Tuesday after Labor Day they had an appointment in IC for additional testing.  The additional testing found cancer.  Her mom passed away on Thursday morning.

Today was the visitation, tomorrow is the funeral.

For some reason the visitation really hit me hard.  I didn't know her mom, only Jay.  When I left the funeral home I could barely hold the tears in.

I realize that part of it is the hurt I feel for Jay, she had her mom and in the blink of an eye she was gone.  She and her mom had a difficult relationship as mom always complained that she was in pain.  Looking back I'm guessing that the pain was caused by the cancer - WTF were the doctors doing around here that no one found it.

That's another thing that's pissing me off.  In one week I've heard of three patients who were in local hospitals who had DNR paper work on file and the doctors didn't take the time to figure out what was wrong.  Two of the three ended up finding out they had terminal cancer when they went out of town to a bigger hospital.

Since when does DNR mean we aren't going to figure out what's wrong with you? Especially when you're going in because your in pain - not a life threatening condition.  I'm tempted to have my mom pull her paper work, if she has it on file anywhere.

Events like this always make me sit back and realize what I have.  How I need to take more time to let the people I care about know that I care about them.  They remind me of the times I was to tired to go see my Grandma and today I would give anything to go see her.

Remember to hug the loved ones you have close and call the ones far away.