Throughout These Forty Days

By PegE Heitzman

This inspiring story takes readers through an unexpected crisis following a promising retirement, which included high expectations of traveling in a motor home to unseen, exciting places throughout the United States. PegE takes you through the ordeal of an unexpected brain aneurysm and forty days of hospitalization in four different hospitals. A very long and difficult recovery followed, with uncontrolled anger, fear, and guilt plaguing her. She discovered the Lord's love and care and the many miracles waiting for her, deepening her faith. PegE's experiences have proven to be helpful to people who are going through their own crisis with fear and confusion, reaching out for answers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Apr 8, 2011
• ISBN: 9781449714468

PegE Heitzman

PegE Heitzman, raised in the Midwest, has celebrated fifty-five years of marriage with her husband, Ron, and lives in a rural wildlife refuge, where she takes pleasure in the outdoors and its four-footed residents. She also enjoys spending time with their three daughters, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

Book preview

Contents

Throughout These Forty Days

Chapter 1 High Hopes

Chapter 2 The Unexpected

Chapter 3 Surgery

Chapter 4 Home Again

Chapter 5 Reflection

Chapter 6 The Power of Prayer

Chapter 7 Anger and Guilt

Chapter 8 The Children

Chapter 9 Final Thoughts

From Robin: One Daughter’s Thoughts

About the Author

Throughout These Forty Days

- PegE Heitzman -

The cords of the grave coiled around me;

The snares of death confronted me.

In my distress I called to the Lord;

From his temple he heard my voice;

My cry came before him, into his ears.

He reached down from on high and took hold of me;

He drew me out of deep waters.

Therefore I will praise you among the nations, O Lord;

I will sing praises to your name.

Psalm 18:5-6, 16, 49 NIV

Great and glorious plans …

Then my forty days …

He was there …

He was in control …

This book is dedicated with love

To my husband Ron

And my lovely daughters

Lori, Robin, and Teresa

 - Chapter 1 -

High Hopes

What a winter we were going to have! After thirty-seven years, Ron retired from his general contracting firm in November, 1989. He had worked his way from an apprentice to president of his company. We had exciting plans. In January, 1990, we headed south in our ’76 motor home with no destination in mind but south—out of the snow and ice, into the warm and sunny south. Our only goal was to buy a bigger, better motor home. The two of us planned on spending six months at home, six months on the road.

Our first stop was Knoxville, Tennessee, where we answered an ad in our motor home catalog. Dissatisfied with that RV, we continued to Charlotte, North Carolina, to answer another ad. Ron and I kept moving south into Florida where there was a bigger selection of RVs. We loved it. The rays of the sun were warming our bodies and lifting our spirits.

We stopped at Woodlands Lutheran Camp near Orlando to see friends wintering there. The camp was beautiful—big live oaks, palm trees, palmettos, and rustic surroundings. Temperatures reached into the seventies and eighties in the daytime and dipped into the fifties at night. The decision was to stay all night, then a week. We stayed two-and-a-half months.

In Plant City just east of Tampa, we located a dealer, who sold our RV on consignment. After making a few phone calls, we decided to purchase a repossessed ’88 Foretravel Grand Villa in California.

Ron and I flew to California, fell in love with the RV, and drove it back to Florida almost nonstop. Arriving back at camp, Ron had to go to Chicago for a few days on a consulting job, while our black lab Molly and I stayed and enjoyed our new luxury. I met and talked to people, took walks to the lake, rode my bike, and went swimming. There was always something to do. Our eventful winter in Florida seemed to hold great promise for the start of an enjoyable and active retirement.

We drove home on April first. Teresa, our youngest, met us at the home of our oldest daughter, Lori, in Naperville, Illinois, for Easter. I returned to Geneseo the Monday following Easter to work on catching up after our trip, while Ron decided to stay and help Lori with badly needed house repairs.

When Thursday, April nineteenth arrived, I felt good! Ron was coming home from Naperville and our retirement fun would continue. With spring here, thoughts of going to Big River Camp on the Mississippi River crept into my mind. This would be our fourth summer in the Bob Marshall Wilderness in northwest Montana on horseback, and in the fall we’d travel again to Idaho for Ron’s elk hunting. It was fun for me too, for all the men who went hunting in the mountains had wives who liked to shop. As the saying goes, When the cat’s away, the mice will play, and we did!

Sandwiched between these trips were