Elizabeth Hugo

Today is my 55th birthday. Five is the number of grace. Double grace, I will take it as a great gift. My birthdays have become a sobering and somewhat sorrowful time for me and not because I am getting older 🙂 This is the month we heard the terrible news of my mom’s pancreatic cancer on February 7th, 2010 and the month she died just 3 weeks later on February 23, 2010.

My last two birthdays that my mom was alive were spent with her and my papa. The first of those two I spent taking my papa to the VA for a doctor’s appointment and to arrange for some additional help in the aid of his care in Toms River, New Jersey. I remember my mom feeling badly that I was away from home spending time with them. “Why shouldn’t I be with you?, I said, I was with you the day I was born!” The second year was just eleven days before she died.

I remember my husband came and surprised me with beautiful flowers and his presence (not presents) which was the greatest gift. It was a very cold, snowy February in more ways than one. We took a walk in the neighborhood on that cold day, and I poured out my heart to him on the events and emotions taking place during that trying time. I so needed his support, and his visit strengthened me. He returned back to New York to take care of things on the home-front.

When I look back at that whirlwind, I stand amazed at the grace we had to navigate through all the medical decisions and emotions of losing my beautiful mother so suddenly and arranging for my papa to move in with us along with all his medical needs. That grace continued for two and a half years of Papa living with us. Amazing grace, empowerment to walk in this life with divine help and never alone. I’m excited for the completion of my 55th year of life and the double portions of grace available to me in the days ahead.

2 Corinthians 12:9 
⁹But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 
¹⁶May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, ¹⁷encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.