Aunt Nancy

My beautiful Aunt Nancy passed away on Sunday evening. She'd had lot of health and mobility issues in the last few years, especially after a car accident last year. She went on hospice care back at the beginning of December in a facility and was later able to go home on hospice. I'm so thankful that I was able to go back twice by myself to visit with her and on Christmas vacation with Daryl and the boys.

Aunt Nancy was a bright shining light in this world. She was a healer - a nurse by trade and heart. She poured herself into her family and into making a difference in the world around her. After years as a hospice nurse and trainer, she and my Uncle Sparky helped found the Center for Neurosomatic Studies almost eight years ago in Largo. This is the school which teaches the methods my cousin Randy and his business partner use at the St. John-Clark Pain Treatment Center. A scholarship fund has been set up in her memory at the school.

There are so many lessons that I learned from her example over the years, a lot related to marriage and raising boys (she and Sparky celebrated 50 years of marriage last year and they raised 3 boys into amazing men and fathers). But one of the lessons that has stuck with me the most has to do with being really present with people. You felt like you were the only person in the world when you were with her and she was always always so proud of you and your achievements.

Here's some of my favorite photos of my mom with her mom and her siblings. The only one left now is the youngest brother, Roger.

And this picture was me with Aunt Nancy and Uncle Sparky at lunch after my mom's graveside service on her birthday in 2014.