Saying Goodbye is hard to do

It's Sunday night, a Sunday following a horrific week. Monday Kenny left for a week on a business trip. This was following an amazing holiday (which I will blog about later with pictures. I feel this should be said first). I remember throughout Christmas, Jack's 1st Birthday, Christmas with my best friends and our kids, NYE, and spending two weeks with my husband and Jack at home together thinking how blessed I felt. Truly blessed. All the bullshit doesn't matter and you really see that at that time of year. I also remember a lot of my family members saying that this was one of the most amazing holidays they had had. It was just felt all around.

Anyway, Kenny left and Jack and I had a fun week planned out spending some quality alone time together. I got a phone call from Kenny at 2:00 AM Tuesday morning that his Uncle Tommy had suffered a massive stroke. Kenny was beyond devestated, as was the entire family. It wasn't looking good.

Well, needless to say I had a sleepless night and got to work almost hysterical. I know I have mentioned before how amazing my principal and assistant principal are, not to mention my amazing friends and support from the staff. They sent prayers to the family immediately and had mass intentions for him. I got a phone call in the middle of the day and felt I needed to go see him while I could, see his wife and daughter and son-in-law and most importantly be with my mother-in-law. Of course my principal literally had me out of there in less than 5 minutes.

I was able to sit with Uncle Tommy alone and hold his hand and talk to him while the family took care of some paperwork. Tommy was on a breathing machine at that point.

I was also able to sit with the family and be there for my amazing mother-in-law, who is such a strong woman. 

I will spare the details but I will say that Tommy did not suffer. He was gone almost immediately and that to me is a blessing. He felt no pain. Kenny's company got him on the next plane home and he made it in time to say goodbye to his beloved Uncle.

Like I said it has been a horrific week. I can not describe the hole that is now on this Earth with Uncle Tommy gone. This was very evident by just seeing the amount of people that came to honor him. He was beyond an amazing man and consistently throughout his life did for others in huge ways.

After getting through this week I have to say that it showed me why we had an amazing holiday. Why Liz (Tommy's daughter) and I insisted on a family lunch (something they had not done in years) so we could do Christmas as a family again. And because of that Tommy was able to see Jack (Jack just adored him!). I also AGAIN saw the importance of family. We all truly leaned on each other. And my friends too. Thank you. You are amazing.

We will miss you Uncle Tommy, but we know you are watching us from Heaven Above.

Uncle Tommy and Jack, right before Jack laid some huge smooches on him!