Sometimes late at night, I lie awake and watch her sleeping. She's lost in peaceful dreams so I turn out the lights and lay there in the dark and the thought crosses my mind. If I never wake up in the morning would she ever doubt the way I feel about her in my heart if tomorrow never comes? Will she know how much I loved her? Did I try in every way to show her every day that she's my only one? And if my time on earth were through and she must face the world without me, is the love I gave her in the past, gonna be enough to last if tomorrow never comes? 'Cause I've lost loved ones in my life who never knew how much I loved them now I live with the regret that my true feelings for them never were revealed. So I made a promise to myself to say each day how much she means to me and avoid that circumstance. Where there's no second chance to tell her how I feel if tomorrow never comes will she know how much I loved her? Did I try in every way to show her every day that she's my only one and if my time on earth were through and she must face the world without me is the love I gave her in the past gonna be enough to last if tomorrow never comes? So tell that someone that you love just what you're thinking of if tomorrow never comes

Take care! Be safe! Drive Carefully! Loving words of care we all have spoken or received from someone we love. When you are the caregiver in a terminal illness, those words are insignificant.

You want to say I love you before you leave a room, for fear this may be the last time you see the person or they Hear those words from you.

Role reversal in caretaking is a sad experience, it can create guilt and resentment for both caretaker and terminal. Support in the family is essential. One person designated as caregiver is often more than they can bare.

Let the Angel hold you as caregiver, to renew your strength in the task. Let the Angel hold the terminal when it is time for you to let go of their hand.

Taking Care of things, after you have been the Caretaker

There are no easy answers, each person deals with taking care of things in their own way and time schedule. The most important thing is to NOT make any major changes for 1 year or at least 6 months. Do not sell or give away things during this time, the regrets are many. Do the paper work (the medical, the insurance, and social security are the things that are based on someone else's time) You have to face the paperwork and the responsibilities that have fallen to you in finalizing the details. The material things, like the home and possessions that can wait until you are ready to recall the memories, good and bad.

The hardest thing to face when losing a parent or grandparent is that somehow you have become and instant orphan, with no roots, no ties to a family. Many times what we do is forget that we have a future, a life that will now be changed. Keeping the love of your Mom or Dad alive for the future is what brings about the renewal of your spirit, and helps you plan a future that still includes that love. Share with everyone the wonderful love that brought you to such profound grief. Your grief does not always show that love, unless you can turn it into a show of love. You make the choice when you are ready, you make the choice to hoard the love and not share it, or to let the world know that the love is what made you the person you are now.

Sometimes we do not have the best relationship with a parent, and we feel that we can't do this. The truth is you CAN. You look to your parents life, find out what made them the way they were, and why they made the choices they did. You begin to understand how important sharing LOVE is, and that is what you pass on to your children and grandchildren, and begin a new cycle. This new cycle gives back to the family stronger roots in love, the unconditional type that does not require perfection or other conditions. Sharing that type of love brings out the best in you, and you then are the strongest memory of the Love.

This may all seem a little much right now, but keep talking and looking for those smiles, the memories that help you be the Memory of Love. The pain is a thorn attached to the memory of the Rose. Always there, and will prick you if you touch it, but the memory is still sweet.

May your angel hold your heart in warm and loving hands Randi