Passing of their parents Carrie Frost died in 1971 after a long bout with lung cancer. Frank took the above picture of Carrie holding a neighbor child at their home in South Bend very shortly before Carrie died. At a memorial service at a family reunion in about 1995, many of Mom's siblings spoke about their parents. Mom stood and told of the way that, when she was young, she felt that she was her mom's special child, that their relationship was something more or different from everyone else. And it was at her mom's funeral that she heard one of her siblings saying that Vic was their mom's favorite, and Mom thought to herself "no, it was me", realizing that every one of Carrie's kids felt like they were their mom's special one. "My mom was diagnosed with lung cancer in early spring, probably March 1971. She was hospitalized and they said that she might live 6 months but surgery was not possible. She lasted until September 25th, going down hill all that time. She was not as resigned to die as we children expected that she would be since she was a very holy and saintly person. She continued to look for cures and hope for them and she grasped at straws and promises of cures. Not that she did anything dramatic since they could not afford costly trips and things that would be required for such things. In about July my sister Mary took leave of her convent and went to stay with mom. She stayed until she died. My dad of course was there too but Mary and all of us felt he could not really handle all the details of care. She became bedridden by late August. All of us visited that summer, I went back three times and all but Bonnie came for her funeral. Bonnie had been there just before she died and really couldn't afford another trip from Seattle. And mom and dad had two foster children they had taken in (another whole story) and Bonnie took those two children since they were not allowed to live with a man alone. As you can imagine, was one of very mixed feelings, she had suffered long enough, though the six months seemed very fast and everyone who knew her agreed she was certainly a saint. Nevertheless, it was hard to lose her." Previous Table of Contents Next