My patient, Rita H., has just suffered a mini-stroke. Her husband, a retired doctor, has gone with her in the ambulance.
Details are still sketchy--I don't even know which hospital they're taking her to!

Rita is a long-time Alzheimer's patient, but her decline has really happened in the last two years of her care. This is one of the loveliest, sassiest, God-fearing, and most family-oriented woman I have ever known.
Rita is mother of four, grandmother of 16, and the generations just keep blooming on this matriarch's family tree.

My fear is not in Rita's [potential] passing away, but her pain.
I fear possible disfiguration in palsy from her stroke; possible immobility of her limbs; loss of speech. I'm afraid that the stroke could be the final blow that helps Alzheimer's sever Rita's spirit from all who know and love her...including me.

So I will pray for Rita to recover as best she can. May she be without pain, without lasting effects from her stroke.
And if it IS her time, Lord, please send Your angels to bring her safely and swiftly Home.
Amen.