Chapter Nine
"No-body knows the trouble I see. No-body knows but Jesus." This old Negro spiritual which Ethel had sung many times expressed her feelings. She endured her pain in silence. Time after time I would hear her say when asked how she was feeling, "No use complainin'. It only makes the devil happy."
Ethel had been a fighter since the day she was born. It was obvious she wasn't about to leave this world without a struggle.
With her countless ailments, she often referred to herself as "damaged goods." When a new affliction would arise and I would suggest she see a doctor about it, she would reply, "Oh, no, I just talk to my Heavenly Father about it. He don't take no coffee breaks. He's always there."
Yet she could still smile at herself. "Just call me 'Speedy,' " she commented about her slow walking. "I get tickled at myself sometimes, walking like I had the rickets."
Time after time on my Saturday morning visits, we would each be in our chairs by the window as she would look me in the eye and say, "Twila, I don't know why the Lord doesn't take me home. I've lived a hard life and now I'm weary."
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The tears would trickle down her worn cheeks as she would continue, "I'm homesick for heaven."
In my simple way, I would try to convince her she was needed. God had a job yet for her to do.
"I can't let myself get down," she said. "I have to fight to stay on top of things and not let depression set in, or I would never make it. Satan never wants you to be happy. If I stumble and fall, I just get up and say, 'Devil, you're not gonna get me this time.' "
At other times and in better moods she'd say, "I'm sittin' on the edge of heaven, and His eye is still on me. I'm not afraid to die, in fact I'm kinda lookin' forward to it. I know the Lord has His arms wrapped around this big fat sparrow."
A week after Ethel had sung at the San Diego Billy Graham Crusade in 1976, she called me with her decision to be admitted to a hospital. I knew this decision had not come easy for her.
Her latest affliction — hemorrhaging — was making her extremely weak. On my previous visit with her, she grabbed onto the piano to steady herself as she started to black out. "See, this is what I go through all the time," she told me. I felt so helpless.
Before she had time to change her mind, I had made arrangements for her to enter City of Hope Hospital the next day.
As I arrived at the Bunker Hill Towers to pick her up, she finished packing her bag. Stuffed into a side pocket of her suitcase was her portable radio — she wasn't about to miss her soothing gospel music and her favorite Bible teacher, Dr. J. Vernon McGee.
I picked up her bag. She took hold of my arm to stabilize herself. "Well, goodbye, little apartment, I'll be back," she said as she glanced around what had been her cozy little home for the past six years.
An hour later we pulled up to the entrance of the hospital.
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With the minimum of details, Dr. Ralph Byron's efficient staff had Ethel checked into a private room.
Again, Ethel picked her favorite nurses. The others just couldn't understand how this woman could be so difficult.
Within days the doctors confirmed my suspicion. Ethel had cancer. Because of her age and the condition of her heart, it was too great a risk to operate. Daily radiation treatments were ordered.
On one of my frequent visits to her, I tried not to show my alarm as I noticed the IV's going into her arm, the guard rail on her bed and Ethel lying motionless on her back with the sheets drawn up to her neck. I tried to be cheerful, but I could not get a response from her.
Just then her doctor came into the room, and asked me to step outside while he checked Ethel. On his way out, I stopped him. "What's wrong with her?"
"She doesn't have the will to live," he responded. "Physically, she's no worse than when she came in here."
"Mom, you've got to fight," I told her when I went back in. "You can get better. We need you." Without a movement and in a voice barely audible, she said, "But Twila, you don't know how much pain I'm in."
That hit hard! There was no way I could know what she was going though. Why should she continue fighting? For years now she had longed to meet Jesus face to face.
I left the hospital that day thinking her battle was over. But I had been telling friends for years that she couldn't last long, no one believed me. And, for some unexplainable reason, the fight came back in Ethel. Eventually she gained the strength to walk slowly around her room. The doctors recommended she get some fresh air by taking a ride in a wheel chair. "I'm not about to go outside," she told me as she nixed their idea to get her away from her tiny bleak room.
Ruth Graham, on one of her visits to the West Coast, wanted to see Ethel. I phoned ahead telling Ethel I was
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bringing a special visitor. Ethel was anxious to see her baby girl, Ruthie, once again. However, our timing was off. Ethel could no longer postpone a trip to the bathroom and our arrival caught Ethel on her way back to bed.
That year as Ruth and Billy sent a Christmas card to Ethel, Ruth added a personal note: "It was so good to see you. Now I've been greeted by choirs, bands, bouquets of flowers, even silence, but never before by a flushing toilet. Leave it up to you to be original."
After Ethel's three-month stay at City of Hope, the doctors felt there was little more they could do for her. The radiation had controlled the cancer. But she was too weak to go back to her apartment alone, and she fought the idea of another convalescent hospital.
"I hate to burden them," Ethel said, "but once Julie and Paul DeKorte said I could stay with them." They had been friends of hers for over fifteen years. Julie was a nurse and could give Ethel the care and attention she needed. "She's a good cook, too," Ethel told me.
I couldn't think of any alternative, even though I knew what a huge responsibility it would be for Julie. But when I called Paul to see if the offer was still good for them to take in Ethel, they readily agreed. A week before Christmas Julie drove Ethel to their home in a borrowed camper (Ethel refused to leave by ambulance and wasn't able to sit up in a car.) Paul's study had been cleared and a rented hospital bed was set up. A Christmas tree was in the corner.
As the months rolled by, that little corner of the DeKorte's home became home to Ethel. Slowly their oil paintings came down and pictures of Ethel went up.
Ethel's recovery was slow. If she got out of bed, it was only to take a few steps to the bathroom. Only once during her entire stay at the DeKorte's did she venture out of her room. Christmas morning she slowly made her way to the family room. While the DeKorte family was having their breakfast
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Ethel softly began to sing, "I just want to thank the Lord." From the bottom of her heart she was truly thankful to be spending Christmas with a loving, caring Christian family.
It seemed doubtful that Ethel would ever be able to return to her "little nest" at Bunker Hill Towers. Yet she refused to give it up. To her it represented security, a place to call her own.
I was saving money for a study tour to Russia when my boss came up with the idea of subleasing my apartment and moving into Ethel's rent free. Even though Ethel and I were close, I was too timid to ask her for favors. Bill Brown presented the idea to her and she responded, "Why didn't you think of that months ago?" She was glad for another opportunity where she could be of help to me.
I was excited about moving into the swanky Bunker Hill Towers and was especially thrilled with the facilities it offered — tennis courts, Jacuzzi, sauna and gym.
Before I could move in, some of Ethel's things had to come out. Julie and I packed her belongings.
We soon discovered that Ethel saved everything — and I mean everything. "Do you think she'd miss this?" Julie and I would question each other. Yet we were scared to throw anything away. Ethel knew exactly everything she owned and where it was kept.
Julie and I laughed when we came upon tiny pieces of soap Ethel had collected in a plastic bag. Why would she want to keep these? It seemed useless to pack the bag so we agreed to toss it out. One of the first things Ethel asked was if we had found her Castile soap. They were keepsakes from World War II!
One of the things Ethel especially asked Julie to pack and bring to her room were her old classic records. She had told Julie, "I know Twila likes to entertain and the records are something her friends might walk out with." She trusted me but not my friends . . . !
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That Saturday we loaded up the DeKorte's station wagon until there was barely room for the driver. Yet we had hardly made a dent in Ethel's possessions. The closets were jammed with clothes and shoes, though she only wore three or four favorites. Dresser drawers were full with scarfs, purses, and bed linen still in the plastic wrappers. The kitchen was equipped with every gadget imaginable.
I moved my necessities into apartment #1502. Gradually we moved Ethel's belongings to the DeKortes. I enjoyed two and a half months of leisure living, yet to me it was always Ethel's place and I was just the visitor.
One typical Friday evening at home, I settled on the adjust-a-bed and turned on the remote control TV to watch the local news. The ding dong of the phone interrupted my quietness. It was Ernie, Ethel's mailman. He had just learned that Ethel had been taken suddenly to the Westpark Hospital. I called Paul who gave me the details of how to get there.
It was "stop and go" on the freeway to the hospital. I prayed, "Oh Lord, please let me see Mom one more time. Please keep her alive until I get there." I felt guilty I hadn't been to see her too often in Chatsworth. Knowing she had Julie to care for her, the responsibility did not weigh so heavily on me.
It took an hour to reach the hospital. The receptionist told me Ethel was in intensive care. I hurried through the maze of corridors to the ICU. One of the nurses told me to have a seat and Julie would be out soon. The moment she came through the swinging doors she assured me everything was okay. It wasn't a heart attack. I was relieved that it wasn't as serious as it seemed.
Julie explained to me that Ethel passed out and the paramedics were immediately called to revive her with oxygen. Ethel despised hospitals but agreed to go when one of the paramedics said, "She won't live through the night if we
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don't get her to a hospital." Her instinct of survival was strong. Within two days she was back at the DeKorte's home with her own oxygen tank nearby.
As Mother's Day approached, I made plans to spend the day with Ethel. This would give Julie a chance to get away without worrying.
Two days before, however, Ethel was admitted to the West Hills Hospital. This time it was blood clots in her right leg.
I drove the twenty-five miles in the pouring rain to spend the afternoon with Mom. I was there only a few minutes when she turned to me and said, "Well, kiddo, I don't want to hold you up." That was always my cue she was ready for me to leave.
Before I left Ethel said, "I'm running a close race with Job." But like him, she was not about to give in to the devil.
Ethel never quit being an actress, even in days of suffering. Bill Brown and Cliff Barrows spent several hours with her one afternoon at the DeKortes' home. She had them convinced her health was improving and she was going to sing at one more crusade. They wondered why I had told them she really was in such bad condition. However, what they didn't know was that she used up every ounce of strength talking with them. Immediately after they left, Julie had to give her oxygen, the penalty for overexuberance.
I teased Ethel I could write a book about the conditions and facilities of various hospitals in the Los Angeles area — I had visited so many. Her next trip was to the Motion Picture Country Hospital in Woodland Hills. Gangrene had started in her foot, causing it to swell and turning her toes black. She would wince in pain with every attempted step. Yet there was nothing the doctors could do but keep a close check on it as it gradually began to deteriorate. It was too great a risk to amputate.
According to Ethel, hospital food was always cold or not seasoned right.
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The nurses kept coming into the room whether you needed them or not. The doctor's probing only made her more uncomfortable. The repeated questioning, "How are you doing today?" by the cheerful staff was almost too much for her. No matter how hard they all tried, they couldn't please her.
Julie did all she could to ease Ethel's worrying. She would cook bacon at home and take it to Ethel for her breakfast. Every day she would stop by to visit. Several nights she slept on a cot in the hospital room, knowing her presence soothed Ethel's frustrations.
One of the few things that seemed to help her frazzled nerves was hearing God's word on her portable radio and talking to Him moment by moment.
"I don't understand it," Ethel would softly say, "I don't know why I have to suffer so." Yet she never blamed God for all her pain and agony. She only praised Him for being so good to her.
On one visit I recall she wanted to know if I had time to sit down and listen to a cassette recording of her which was made in 1954. Her old friend, Reggie Beane, had brought it from New York. I sat down and started the cassette hearing such tunes as "I Ain't Gonna Sin No More," "Half of Me," and "Bread and Gravy." She didn't have the strength to sing aloud but her lips formed each word and I marveled that she remembered every lyric. Occasionally she would wince in pain, but for forty-five minutes her own music from her one-woman show brightened her world.
Ethel refused to let the doctors increase her pain medicine. She was afraid of being "hooked" on drugs. Finally, when the pain became unbearable, she decided to risk surgery and have a colostomy. What did she have to lose? If she survived, the pain would lessen and if she died she would be completely out of pain.
The surgery was scheduled, and presurgery tests were begun when
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the doctors discovered Ethel's kidneys were failing. Surgery was now out of the question.
Ethel was becoming more and more miserable at the Motion Picture Hospital. We knew she would not be happy in any hospital, but Julie arranged for her to return to the Westpark Hospital, hoping her attitude would improve.
There, the doctors ordered a catheter for Ethel which immediately brought relief. Therefore, she refused to continue with her pain pills. But even though her dosage had not been strong, she still experienced withdrawal turbulence. She had her highs and lows and even hallucinations.
One Saturday as I walked to her bedside, she tightly grasped my hand and said, "Please, Twila, please, promise me you won't betray me. The people around her think I'm losing my mind. Tell me I'm not going crazy." I quietly assured her she was very sane and that I would do whatever I could to help her. She could count on me.
After several more weeks in the hospital, the doctors felt there was nothing more they could do. Ethel knew it wouldn't be long before she would be in heaven, and therefore she pleaded with Julie to take her home. "I want to die in my own bed," she said.
It was not an easy task for Julie to care for the bed-ridden patient, but she was determined to make Ethel's last days as happy as possible. Ethel was moved by ambulance back to the DeKortes'.
Her room was equipped with the necessities — the overhead bar to help her lift herself, the portable potty, the hospital scales, the bed tray, and the oxygen tanks in the corner to help her breathe and which she used around the clock. The pretty blue sheets and the hand-made quilt from the sisters at St. Theresa's monastery (a charity Ethel had given to for many years) perked up the room so it didn't look so much like a hospital.
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Ethel continued to get weaker and it became increasingly difficult for her to talk.
Her left arm and leg were swollen because of poor circulation, and her foot was black from the gangrene. She was regularly taking her pain pills again. It hurt to see her like that. Her pride prohibited her from allowing many visitors. I knew each day was so long for her as she lay on her back. It was even difficult for her to roll over to reach her phone on the stand beside the bed. Her only contact with the outside world was her color TV and the radio, as she kept up on the news events of each day.
A few months before she had told me to watch her movie, The Sound and the Fury, on the late show. I was not sorry I missed my sleep as I viewed this woman of over three hundred pounds running freely around the house and yard as she played the maid. It was hard to imagine her as the same woman now so helpless.
Ethel didn't like evening visitors, so I was limited to seeing her on Saturdays and Sundays. As I left on August 27, I tenderly kissed her on the forehead and said, "Well, I'll see you next Saturday."
"Maybe," she weakly said, "just maybe." I immediately wondered if that were a premonition.
The following Tuesday Julie called me at work and I volunteered to help by spending the night at the DeKortes'. Ethel was getting much weaker, and it was impossible for Julie to lift her. "I'll be glad to do what I can to help," I told Julie. "I would never make it as a nurse. I don't have the stamina to do what you do."
That night we propped Ethel up on the edge of the bed. Her back ached from lying still all day long. I gently began to massage it. I was amazed at how bony her shoulders were. Her thin white hair was fluffed around her face as she dropped her head and said, "O, dear Jesus, how much longer?"
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I struggled to conceal my feelings. I didn't want Ethel to see how difficult this was for me.
I rubbed her swollen leg which seemed to ease the pain momentarily. We helped her lie back down and tucked the sheets around her.
Julie picked up Ethel's Bible which had been given to her by the Billy Graham Team. It automatically opened to Psalm 71, Ethel's comfort in this time of trouble, as it had been many times before. It was underlined in pencil.
Julie and I perched on each side of the bed as Julie began to read:
In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion . . . . I am as a wonder unto many; but thou art my strong refuge. Let my mouth be filled with thy praise and with thy honour all the day. Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth . . . . Now also when I am old and greyheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come . . . .
Then Julie prayed for God's wisdom and comfort during this difficult time. After the Amen, Ethel weakly turned to me and said, "Wasn't that a sweet prayer?"
Julie spent that night sleeping in the recliner chair in Ethel's room. The past few nights she had been sleeping on the living room sofa to be near Ethel. Even the sofa was too far away that night.
The next morning I again helped Julie sit Ethel up on the edge of the bed and rubbed her back. I kissed her goodbye as I left for my office. I felt so helpless.
How much more could this woman take?
