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Read more on the author, ELLEN GABLE, here. BOOK OF THE MONTH! October 2005. Featured by www.catholicmom.com.
The pain in her abdomen became more excruciating with every passing moment. She sat on the sofa and dialed the number of the high school. It seemed like an eternity for the line to connect. One, two rings. Please, someone pick up, she silently begged. Hearing the secretary's voice, Emily could barely speak, but she uttered enough to make it clear that she needed her husband. She dropped the phone and tried to take a deep breath. Feeling an overwhelming need to vomit, she rushed to the bathroom just in time to spill the contents of her stomach. She gripped the cold, hard toilet, as if in some way, it would make her pain bearable. Disoriented, she thought of her baby and quickly glanced over at his smiling, inquisitive face, oblivious of his mother's pain.
I've got to stay conscious for my baby, she repeated over and over in her mind. She moved back to the floor next to the sofa, trying to sit upright with her young child next to her, while drifting in and out of consciousness. Keeping a death grip on him, she woke up as the paramedics were prying her hands off her son and placing her on a stretcher. It all seemed like a dream. She overheard the paramedics talking about what a "little thing she was."
Too weak to make a sound, she wondered where her young son was. She caught a glimpse of her husband holding him at the back doors of the ambulance.
His right arm cradled their son's little body but his left hand clasped his small head to his chest as if to shield and protect him from the turmoil that surrounded them both. But her husband's face ... his face was so broken and distraught that Emily felt the anguish of a wife and mother abandoning her family. Tears welled up in her eyes and for a moment, Emily forgot her pain.
Then his eyes caught hers, and he realized that she was watching him. Everything changed. His chin lifted, as if for courage, and penetrated her being with a look of tenderness and confidence. Whatever happens, I will be strong for you and for the sons we both love and for God, who has asked so much of you. He seemed to say all of this with his eyes, all of this and more. As his love and reassurance reached out to her through the shouts of the paramedics and their frantic procedures, the beeping of machines and the overwhelming wail of the siren, its light already flashing, her terror began to fade and her heart surged within her. Now reassured, she allowed herself to fall back asleep.
Emily's eyes opened again this time as the paramedics were inserting an intravenous needle in her arm. It felt as if they were stabbing her with an ice pick, but all she could manage was a wince and a small moan. It seemed as if every ounce of energy had been sucked from her very being. This is what it feels like to die.
Then she imagined her little boys' faces, and suddenly the possibility of dying weighed heavy on her heart. Please God, I can't die, she silently prayed. I don't want my little boys growing up without a mother. All of a sudden, a feeling of warmth surrounded her, then she felt at peace. There was no bitterness, only acceptance, a calm that was huge enough to quiet an ocean. She silently recited a Hail Mary ... now at the hour of our death. Amen. Those last words took on powerful meaning with the possibility that this could be her hour. She knew that whatever happened would be God's will, and she would submit to that, whatever it was.
Drifting into unconsciousness, the last thing she heard was, "... we're losing her ..."
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