By Brenda Cannon Henley
In all these long years of writing, I have tried to be honest with those that follow our columns and news coverage in various media. I have taken the advice of a faithful teacher who first pointed me to this adventure of putting my words on paper. “Write what you know best,” said Erma Nowell in the classrooms of the old Clarkston High School in DeKalb County, Georgia. Her students were young, idealistic, green, and somewhat timid, but we well remember, “Your best work will reveal truth as you see it, as you feel it, and as you want others to experience it along the way.” And, so, Mrs. Nowell, faithful friend and earnest advisor, I am doing again today what you instructed me to do some 60 years ago.

My heart feels broken into pieces and it seems to me that it will never be whole again. Most of my readers know that my sweet husband, Ted J. Henley, was diagnosed with a difficult form of two cancers, esophageal and stomach, as quite a surprise to us in February of this year. We went from cutting and trimming nine lots of grass on our property on the Gulf of Mexico to a local restaurant for dinner to the hospital and a surgical procedure that revealed the extent of the damage. Ted was brave. He chose to undergo chemotherapy and radiation treatments and did fairly well with those until the last three of four where he began to experience the normal adverse reactions to the heavy assault on his body. He also agreed to the long and difficult surgery to remove the tumor that had unknowingly fused his esophagus and stomach together. He was a model patient and everyone in the medical field that he met admired his strength, kindness, and laughter.

The initial surgical procedure lasted 13 hours and 20 minutes with two master surgeons. They got the cancer and felt that his body would recover. Ted was sent to UTMB’s very modern SICU where he started encountering various problems. First a leak developed in the new esophagus that had been made from his small intestine. The medical team tried to repair that leak, but were unsuccessful. He underwent four additional procedures and then a second six and a half hour surgery. Family and friends stayed by his side every day and night that he was hospitalized.

We were moved to a wonderful room on the 8th floor where comfort and consideration was available not only for the patient, but for the family. We stayed eight days there and then it was decided he needed to return to the SICU for closer monitoring. We all knew Ted was very ill, but still thought he would make it. By this time, he was on a ventilator and had many tubes and other attachments. We stayed in the SICU for 36 days and nights and it was becoming apparent that Ted was fighting a life and death battle. His weary body lost that battle on the afternoon of Saturday, August 16, at 5:44 PM. My two daughters and their families, Judy Reynolds, a family friend, and I were by his side. He died sweetly and peacefully with one big smile and a quiet breath. He had been so ill that I knew he would not want to live with the machines doing the work for his body. We were so very tired that it seemed somewhat of a relief that he was not suffering any longer. Our family waited for the funeral home employee to arrive and we arranged to ride the ferry across for Ted’s last crossing of the Galveston Bay that he loved so very much. We planned two visitations and two funerals where we honored a good man that was well loved by many.

Those days were easy ones compared to the ones I am living now. I believe in God, trust Christ, and know the Scriptures. I believe Ted is in Heaven and that he will be waiting for me when my time comes. My faith is not shaken in the Lord’s plan and my Anchor still holds. However, I am grieving and am not sure I can ever stop. Everyone assures me this is normal and to get it all out so that I can go on living. But, I miss him everywhere I turn and I find it hard to believe he is really gone. I look for him to come in one of the doors at any minute and laugh and smile that big smile and say, “Oh, Honey, it was just a really bad joke. It’s over now.” I thought that the hardest thing I’ve ever done was to leave his earthly body in the ground in Amarillo, but I followed his exact wishes.

Ted was a blessing to my life and he loved me and I loved him. God joined our hearts and our minds, as well as our bodies. We had a dozen wonderful years and he really was the first true heart love I had ever known. We met needs in each other’s lives that had never been met. We went places, we had fun, we had great friends, and we helped folks. He was active in my career and enjoyed taking the photos that accompanied many of my articles. We fished, traveled, read, watched movies, went on adventures, planned surprises, and worshipped together. Our lives were blessed of God and I thank Him for these wonderful years.

I am learning that “the greater the love, the greater the loss.” I thank God for my family members and friends that have encouraged me and offered sound advice. May I urge you to do one thing? If you truly love someone, be kind always. Find ways of expressing that love and don’t let the thieves of time manifest as work, career, entertainment, other people, advancement, pride, greed, jealousy, selfishness, or anger keep you apart. There may be a day when it is too late when one or the other changes his permanent address.

Brenda Cannon Henley can be reached at (409) 781-8788 or [email protected].

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