by Brian Gott
News Archives
April-June, 2007
June 13, 2007
VIOLET JUNE GOTT
1933-2007
1933-2007
If I have erred on the side of caution in not divulging much specific information about this "family medical crisis" to which I have been alluding for months, I hope you'll understand. I wanted to strike a balance between protecting my family's privacy and explaining why I couldn't devote any time to Way of the Dodo anymore.
My mother has been battling pneumonia and its complications for most of this year. It has been a long and difficult struggle for her, fraught with increasing weakness, difficulties in breathing and swallowing, and a growing sense of confusion and anxiety as her sodium levels took a nose dive.
In May, she was doing badly enough to have to go back into the hospital. From there she was released to a nursing home to recuperate. But last Thursday, she started doing worse again. The attending doctor determined that she needed to be back in the hospital.
On Sunday, June 10, her long struggle came to an end. She slipped away in her sleep, quickly and quietly.
I take comfort from believing that she's in a place where she never again has to struggle to draw air into her lungs. She never has to ask if she can have another pain pill. She never has to wake up in a strange place, disoriented and shouting for help.
(Oh, and about that silly "June Dodo Drive" thing I was doing ... forget it. I really don't know if/when the comic's going to update again. But I'm not ready to commit myself to a fixed, firm update schedule for July. If you were thinking of donating, by all means thank you, bless you, and don't let me stop you. Just understand that it's not going to lead to Dodo comics in July.)