Yeah, you read the title right. But we’ll get there.
My grandma Marilyn Disbro, my mom’s stepmom, passed away on All Souls Day this year. She was in the hospital for a whole week beforehand, and that Saturday morning, my dad called me to come home and say goodbye. She was gone just three hours after I arrived. I imagine God brought her soul straight up to heaven, that she was giving an express pass for leaving on such a night.
Her funeral service is this Tuesday, and I still feel like I haven’t processed that she’s passed. I try to remember her in all the times I’ve spent with her — during all of the major holidays, the birthday parties and the Sunday lunch visits. I hold these memories so close to my heart, but I just can’t help that when I think of her, I laugh.
For context, I have a pretty severe tree nut allergy. Several times I’ve ended up in the hospital and experienced near-death, life-flashing-before-my-eyes type allergic reactions. They’ve all ended up as (I think) hilarious ‘lore’ I like to drop in conversation from time to time. The one that will always stand out to me, however, was the Christmas of 2020.
My grandma Marilyn loved to bake, but she baked things like pecan pies or walnut-chunk cookies, pastries I didn’t quite have the immune system for. This Christmas, however, she came through the garage door with a box of cookies with my name on it.
“I’ve baked them just for you,” I remember her telling me. “I cleared the whole kitchen of nuts to make sure you could eat them.”
I, of course, was very excited to finally taste my grandma’s famous tasty confections. So, after we finished our Christmas dinner, I went into the kitchen to find the cookie box with my name sprawled in Sharpie. I stacked a few cookies onto my plate, making a show of appreciation, and sat back down at the table.
The first bite I take, I bite into a fully intact walnut in the center of the cookie.
Trying not to embarrass her or make a scene of the situation, though completely freaking out on the inside, I quickly excused myself back to the kitchen. I promptly tried to wash out every bit of cookie from my mouth with a glass of water. When I began to feel my lips tingling, I rushed to my room to brush my teeth. But it was too late. My lips and throat were beginning to swell.
I hurried back to the dining room and very calmly and politely asked my dad to meet me in the kitchen (again, trying not to embarrass my poor grandma). I told him the situation and he immediately flipped out. He did not feel like acting calm or polite at the moment, which was fair.
You have to imagine the whole house suddenly going all up in arms, from zero to 100. My family of six and all three sets of my grandparents, 11 of us in total, were suddenly yelling and freaking out about how I suddenly started having a reaction and who was going to take me to the hospital. My family’s four dogs all began barking, too. They must’ve wanted to be a part of the sudden pandemonium.
As my dad grabbed masks for us (#COVID) and pushed me out the door, I could hear my mom scream from the other side of the house, “MARILYN, YOU PUT WALNUTS IN HER FU — ?!” The door slammed shut.
The drive to the hospital was increasingly worrisome with the Christmas traffic, and, with each passing minute, I was struggling more and more to breathe. Hives had now covered nearly every inch of my body. By the time we reached the ER, the nurses had us sit in the waiting room, already full with COVID patients. Because of the mask and my heavy coat, they couldn’t tell how dire the situation had become, and I couldn’t speak up to tell them.
We were ushered into the back after just a few minutes of my dad desperately trying to explain the situation. I vividly remember the stark contrast between the relaxed and steady stroll of the nurse and my rapid, straining gasps for air behind my mask.
The moment I sat down and the nurse allowed me to take off my mask, revealing the truest extent of my condition, another round of chaos ensued. Within seconds, six doctors flooded into the curtained-off room. The next thing I knew, I was laid down, had tubes in each arm, and an oxygen mask over my face. I felt terrified as tears ran down my face, and then everything was bright and then I was asleep.
For the next several hours, I was well-sedated with Benadryl and epinephrine and who knows what else. I also had to complete breathing treatments to bring my lung capacity back to normal. I feel sorry for my dad in hindsight, as I had made him restart the audiobook we were listening to together every time I had fallen asleep (it was several times).
When I was finally ready to be released from the hospital, one of the doctors came in to wish me and my dad a Merry Christmas and, “Oh, by the way, if you had come in even just a minute later, you wouldn’t have made it. Close call, huh!” My dad and I glanced at each other and gave a very nervous laugh. We were glad to be leaving then.
My grandma never officially apologized, at least with words. Rather, she gifted me a $20 Visa gift card and a head nod on New Year’s a few days later. I found the entire interaction quite amusing, honestly.
I believe my grandma and I both understood each other in some kind of unspoken way. Sure, it was frightening to nearly die on Christmas, but she didn’t mean to feed me my potential death. I knew she was sorry, so she didn’t have to say it. There was nothing that could be said or done to change what had happened, and so I was happy to take the $20.
As I sat with my grandma during her final few hours, now in her own hospital bed and also heavily sedated, I struggled with what to do or say. We were never big talkers with each other to begin with; we both would much rather sit together on her porch swing and complete word puzzles on our phones.
I tried for several minutes to tell her that I had forgiven her, and in that moment realized I had never said anything either that day. But I just couldn’t find the words; and so we sat in silence together, like we always had. Finally, frustrated with myself, I squeezed her hand and, through my tears, I told her I love her.
In the same way, I believe God gave her an express ticket to heaven, I believe she heard me, that she understood what I meant. Though the words were never spoken aloud, she already knew I forgave her, just like I knew she was sorry four years ago. I now only wonder how I’m supposed to send a $20 Visa gift card up to heaven.
