Friday, March 12, 1999

Family, faith help heal woman's wounded heart

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BY JOHN JOHNSTON
The Cincinnati Enquirer

        Before Bill Fuller died of cancer in December 1997, he was concerned about his wife of 50 years, Jane. She, too, was ill.

Everyone has a story worth telling. At least, that's the theory. To test it, Tempo is throwing darts at the phone book. When a dart hits a name, a reporter dials the phone number and asks if someone in the home will be interviewed. Stories appear on Fridays.

        “We promised him that we would take care of her,” says Nancy Fuller, the second of Bill and Jane's four children. “What she mainly needed was the emotional support of someone who was close to her.”

        The promise was kept. By the entire Fuller family.

        For Nancy, who is 47 and lives in Hyde Park, the promise carried special meaning. It brought her full circle. More than 20 years ago, when she needed the support of someone close to her, her parents provided it.

        She was in her early 20s, coming to grips with a failed marriage, and facing a new life as a single parent with an 8-month-old daughter.

        She needed time to get on her feet. And so for a year and a half, Nancy and her daughter lived in her parents' Hyde Park home.

        But more than a place to stay, she needed a nudge in order to become her own person again. So when the time was right, her mother gently urged her to find work and a place of her own.

        “That was a gift, (encouraging) me to become independent,” says Nancy, who balanced bookkeeping jobs with raising her daughter.

        Although newly independent, she maintained close family ties. Her father owned his own business, Fuller Manufacturing and Supply Co., but he found time to take Nancy and her daughter on day trips. And he invited them and other family members to a cottage he rented on Lake Michigan.

        In Nancy's living room is a photo of her parents, taken near a beach on the lake. Bill Fuller has just pinched Jane, making her laugh.

        “My parents were married for 50 years,” Nancy says. “My father was absolutely devoted to my mother. It's special to me, partially because . . . my marriage did not work.

        “It's an inspiration, to see the example they set, especially in the older years, when it's not easy (because of health problems).”

        Jane Fuller's health deteriorated in the last years of her life. She broke a hip more than a year before her husband's death. She lived in a nursing home.

        Nancy visited her there often. She took her mother on drives in the country, and to New Richmond, where they watched towboats push barges on the Ohio River.

        “She was so sweet and tender. She'd say, "Nancy, thank you so much for everything you do for me.' ”

        Sometimes Nancy sat by her mother's bed, and held her hand. They watched TV together. Tennis or basketball or golf or even football. Her mother liked sports, and the games helped relax her.

        Nancy was with her mother when she died Dec. 30. Just as she had been with her father, a year earlier.

        Nancy says her faith — she is Roman Catholic — has helped her deal with the loss of her parents. Indeed, faith and family have long been at the center of her life.

        “A lot of times you're in situations and you can't see God's presence, you can't hear his presence, you can't feel his presence, but you know ... he's there,” she says.

        “I know that God is present at the beginning of life, at the end of life, and all through life, too. You just know that he's really close to you at (the time of death).”

        She knows God was with her parents when they died; and they are with him now.

        The weeks since her mother's death have been a time for grieving. It's also “a time for pondering, a time for great change,” she says. “I've seen where I'll probably end up, in terms of age and health. It's time now to decide what it is I want to do with the rest of my life. I'm trying to be reflective about it.”

        Whatever the immediate uncertainties, Nancy Fuller enters the next stage of her life guided by the wisdom of her parents, and the enduring lessons they taught: Be responsible. Be grateful. Family is important.

       

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