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Todd Kelly
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Todd Kelly
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Kevin Allison
Hey, folks, this is Risk, the show where people tell true stories they never thought they'd dare to share. I'm Kevin Allison, and every Thursday we release these special episodes where we look back at content from our earlier years. This week, it's the best of Mother's Day Stories Number three. Stories about mothers who are beloved but also complicated. In a little bit, we're going to hear from Emmett Montgomery. But first, a story from Todd Kelly. Here's Todd now with a story we call the A.
Lonzo Ball
It was shortly after my 45th birthday. And I want to say maybe the 12th or 13th time in the space of a goddamn half hour that she asked me for a glass of water, that I made the decision to kill my mother. And before you judge me too harshly, you need to understand that more than anybody else I've ever known, at that moment, the woman deserved to die. In 2007, my mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. And it was an enormous blow to the family and an enormous surprise. For one thing, I come from one of those incredibly tight knit families. Nuclear family of four. My sister has since moved over to the other coast, but we're still the same family that on major holidays flies and gets together. My parents used to take care of my wife and I's children when they were very young. It's sort of hard to describe exactly how tight knit my family was. But more than that. Three years before the diagnosis, my father had fallen to cancer himself after a particularly long and arduous and painful battle. I wish that I could introduce you to my mom right now. An amazing woman. And the best way that I can think of to describe her would be sort of a woman of silent strength. It's funny because when I think about stories, I think about my father. My father was this brawling, storytelling, hard drinking Irishman. And my sister grew up kind of in the same way. And I followed my sister's footsteps and we were sort of all of these giant forces of life living in our house. And my mom had no stories. And the reason for that wasn't because she was born, she absolutely wasn't. She was sort of this calm, quiet presence that we all revolved around. I don't know what would have ever happened to my family if my mom had died when we were young. It would have shattered, surely. So hearing that she had cancer was an especially hard blow. What was a little surprising was that she decided to take treatment for the cancer. My father's treatment took so much out of him that for the three years after his death, she kept saying over and over, if I get cancer, that's God's way of telling me, my time's done. Not going through that, not doing it. But when she got the diagnosis, she agreed to a spectacularly aggressive treatment. Four months surgery followed by chemo and radiation for four months straight. And it was exactly like you might imagine it. It was terrible. But at the end of the four months, she was given the word that she was in full remission. And my family rejoiced. It was an amazing moment that we clung to For, I want to say, 90 days before. My mom began to get other symptoms. And we took her in. And what we discovered was that the cancer hadn't left her body so much as it had just left her ovaries. It had metastasized into most of her other organs, including, we were told, her brain. And what we were told was that it wasn't really a question of whether she was terminal or she wasn't terminal. The question was, does she have weeks or does she have months? There's no way she has years. The brain cancer began to eat away faster than the rest. And by the time Christmas time rolled around, my mom began to forget things. And at first, it was very, very tiny. Small things it would be. She just put her car keys down five minutes ago, had no idea where they were. She had been reading a book all last night, Couldn't for the life of her remember the title of it. She wanted to watch her favorite television show, but she couldn't remember what channel it was on. Mundane stuff, but worrying nonetheless. And then, shortly after Christmas, one day, she woke up, and she found out that her arm didn't work. We took her to the doctor, and the doctor explained that there was actually nothing wrong with the arm. It was the brain. The brain was telling the arm, reach out, grab a glass of water, pick it up, bring it to your mouth. But the messages could no longer get to the arm. And so instead, it sort of hung at her arm, cramped and gnarled like some kind of tree branch. And it was shortly after that that she fell and broke her hip. And the doctors told us it's no longer a question of weeks or months. It's a question of weeks or days. And you need to get her into hospice now. And so we took her into a hospice center in Portland, Oregon, and I used to go visit her multiple times every day. And she'd been in hospice for about 10 days when I went to visit her and found her sobbing. And I asked, what's wrong? You know, other than the obvious. And my mom said, did you know that I was married? And I said, yeah, I know you're married. And my mom said, I remember that I was married to this man, and he was amazing, and he was the love of my life. And I remember that I could go a million years and a thousand lifetimes and never meet a better match. But I can't for the life of me remember who that was. My mom was a woman of faith, and she honestly believed that God would take her before her memory got so Bad that she lost everything that was important to her. But now she was beginning to wonder if that might actually not be the case. And I didn't know what to say, because what can you say? I just stood there dumbly looking at her, nodding my head, which is when the nurse came in. And the nurse came in and was shuffling things around and patting the pillows and turning my mom over so that she didn't get bedsores. And she said, Mrs. Kelly, is there anything that I can get you? And my mom said, yes, I would like a glass of water. And the nurse said, Mrs. Kelly, we've been through this over and over. You know you're not allowed to have water. And I said, wait, wait. What? Wait, why can't she have water? I don't understand. It's a little complicated. The hospice center where we had my mom check in, we made very sure that it had some kind of living will policy because my mom didn't want to be hooked up to a machine. And the living will policy of the center simply said, we will not take any action that will end a life, and we will not take any action that will prolong a life. And when you hear it stated like that, it really sounds like there's no middle ground, like there's this razor's edge where everything will fall to one side or the other. But as we learn, that's not actually the case. And in my mom particular instance, water was one of those things that fell in between the cracks. Her state had gotten to the point where she was so weakened that were she to drink water, the nurse explained to me, she would surely drown and die. Wasn't a question. Maybe she would die. She would absolutely die. And instead, to hydrate her, they gave her this gray, viscous material. And I actually tried some of it then. And it pours out slowly. And the best way that I can describe it is if you drink it, it's like having a live slug slowly creep through your body. It is an amazingly unpleasant experience. But more than that, it doesn't quench your thirst like water does. It doesn't have that. Oh, that's so refreshing. All you really want to do is throw up. And my mom kept saying over and over, I don't care if I die, just please give me a glass of water. And eventually I said, just give her a fucking glass of water. And my mom, in this instance, to let me know that she was still actually in there, said, todd, language. And then the nurse said, but yes, get me a fucking glass of water. And the nurse Refused, because she had no choice. And the nurse actually stuck around to make sure that I wouldn't give her a glass of water either. And as I said, it was maybe after the 12th or 13th time in the space of 20 or 30 minutes that I made the decision that I was going to come back that night and kill my mother before she lost everything that was important to her. You would think that it would be difficult to sneak into a 24 hour hospice center, but in fact, it was shockingly easy. When I went back at nine o' clock at night, there was really. There were people on duty, but they were nowhere to be seen. And to a certain extent, this was a little bit troubling to me because already driving over, I was having serious second thoughts because I was very positive that my mom wanted to die. I was very positive that she would be grateful for me killing her. I was very positive that were the situation reversed, she would absolutely do the same for me. But there's the thought of, do I really want to live the rest of my life knowing I killed my mom? And on top of that, there was the very real issue that it was a very real crime to do this. But when I got there, there was nobody to stop me and say, what are you doing? I'm here to kill my mom. Oh, you can't do that. I managed to walk all the way back to my mom's room without running into anybody. And I got to her room and it was dark except for nightlight. And I closed the door and I reached into my coat and I pulled out the instrument of her death, which was a plastic sports water bottle with a straw. I'm sure you know the kind that I'm talking about. My thought was, I'm going to wake her softly. I'm going to let her drink all she wants. And if God decides it's not her time, that's on God. Otherwise, I'm letting her get out now before she loses anything else that's important to her. And so I walked to the bed and I held out the water bottle. When I was, I want to say, eight or nine years old, I had this pet lizard. And one day the cat got into the lizard cage and mauled it. And it mauled in that way that cats do where you play with it until it ceases to become fun and you wander away. And when I found it, it was clearly going to die, but still alive and twitching. And I screamed for my dad and my dad came and I'm like, ah. And my dad said, well, you Gotta kill it now. And I told my dad, but I love the lizard. Which, by the way, was an incredibly huge lie. I hated the lizard. All I knew was, I don't want to touch this thing that's so close to death, and I don't want to be killing anything. And so I made up this lie, and I said, but I love the lizard so much. My dad said, todd, because you love it so much, you have to kill it. Mercy isn't just this thing that you give to others that you love and care for, because it's easy to do. It's always hard. That's how you know that you love them. You gotta kill it. And I couldn't do it. And so my dad took the lizard and he wrapped it up in a handkerchief. He broke the neck, unwrapped it, handed it back to me, well, now you gotta bury it. And I'm sitting there holding the water bottle, thinking about this fucking lizard. And I can't tell you how long I was standing there. It might have been five minutes. It might have been 15 minutes. It might have been half an hour. I have no idea. The only thing that I can absolutely say for certain is that I froze. I absolutely froze. And I couldn't or wouldn't go through with it. And the next thing I know, I felt somebody taking the water bottle out of my hand. And it was the nurse. And she said, Mr. Kelly, you know you're not allowed to give your mom water. And it's after visitor hours. I need to escort you out. And so I let myself be escorted out. We got the call from the hospice the next evening. I was actually down in Salem. I wasn't able to visit my mom that day. I had a bunch of corporate presentations that I had to do at a conference. And in the early evening, I got the call and I got in my car and I drove back to Portland. And on the way, I called my wife and let her know and told her to call my mom's church. And I called my sister to let her know that mom had passed away. And my sister said, it's just as well. I called her early this morning, and she insisted that she'd never had a daughter. I got to Portland about half an hour later, went straight to the hospice. By the time I got there, my mom's best friend and her priest were there. They'd just given last rites, and they were kneeling and praying by the body. And so I got down and I kneeled with him. I grabbed my mom's hand, and so cold so soon. And I gave her a kiss on the cheek. I had no idea what to say. And finally my mom's best friend said, you know, I think at the end today, I think it all came back to her. I think she was who she always was. When she finally passed away and the priest said, I think you're right. I think the last few hours she was at total peace. And I thought about that because it was such a bald faced lie. And I realized that all this time I'd worried that I'd feel guilty if I'd ended her life. But now. Now I realize that what had happened in my mom's last few hours most likely was that not only didn't she remember my sister, she probably didn't remember me. She probably didn't remember who she was. She was probably just this woman, alone and frightened, not knowing who she was, not knowing where she was, not knowing why everything in the world hurt so much. All because I didn't have the strength to do what I knew I should have done for her. But there are these truths, you know, that are so huge and vast that you can't really wrap your mind around them. And you can't wrap your heart around them. And so I said the words knowing that I would say them for the rest of my life until I hopefully believed them. Lies though they were. I think you're right, I said. I think she was fully herself at the end. I think those last few hours, she was finally at peace. Thank you.
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Lonzo Ball
Are you ready?
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What's the point of living when life is so unfair and everything?
Todd Kelly
Cause you'll have bad times, but that'll always wake you up to the good stuff you weren't paying attention to. We'll be right back.
Kaley Cuoco
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This season of Revisionist History.
Todd Kelly
We're investigating everything from the secret behind.
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The perfect nooks and crannies in Thomas English muffins to the merits of Paw Patrol against its critics.
Lonzo Ball
There's some things that really piss me off when it comes to Paw Patrol.
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It's pretty simple. It sucks.
Todd Kelly
My son watches Paw Patrol.
Kevin Allison
I hate it.
Lonzo Ball
Everyone hates it except for me.
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Kevin Allison
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Todd Kelly
Dip it in all the sauces.
Lonzo Ball
Dip it in that hot sauce in your bag.
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Kevin Allison
Your dip is your business.
Lonzo Ball
McCrispy strips at McDonald's.
Todd Kelly
We're back. So I am from Boston, and as you all know, my city had a pretty garbage week. And I, like a lot of my fellow Bostonians, took it pretty personally. Because it was personal. Because when I think about Boston, I think about my people and I think about my family. Especially I think about my mom, because she is the most Boston person that I know. Her name is Mickey. You call her voicemail and it says, you have reached the sprint PCs mailbox of Mickey O' Malley. And she comes from this huge Irish family in South Boston. She's the the baby of 10 kids. And when I spoke to her last Friday, when Boston was on lockdown, I said, mar, are you nervous about this guy running around the city? And she said, are you shitting me? I want him to come here. I dare him to come to my house. And my mom, like Boston itself, is this tough shit. And she was a born fighter. And when she was younger, from what I hear, she was quite the brawler. And one example this oft told story about her is she was walking to mass with my grandmother one day, and in this little neighborhood shitheading south, he yelled after them, there goes Mickey Kelly with her big fat mother. And my mother walked over to the kid, punched him in the nose, and then walked into church like nothing had happened. And as she got older, she became a different type of fighter altogether. In 1987, when I was five years old, my sister Allison, my baby sister, died suddenly. And after that, I don't really remember her dying, but I remember my mother just constantly being around us and trying to make sure that we were all okay. And at the same time, right after my sister died, my dad, who was a pretty severe alcoholic, stopped drinking. And ironically, when he stopped drinking, that's when his health really started to decline, both physically and mentally. He was a very serious diabetic. And the worse his diabetes got, the more acute his depression got. And in my family, we sort of live by the motto, like, go for the jugular or go home. And I remember one time my mother saying to me, my dad, you have your depression to keep you company. What does that leave for the rest of us? My mom, who had been a stay at home mom for as long as she'd had kids when I was about 10 years old, had to go back to work and become the primary income earner for my house because my dad got too sick and had to go on disability. He was an insulin dependent diabetic. He took two shots a day to regulate his blood sugar, and sometimes his blood sugar, he'd have low blood sugar reactions to the insulin and his blood sugar would drop as low as like 7. And to put that into perspective for you, my dad was the type of diabetic that we wanted to keep him about 100 to 140 blood sugar wise. And when he'd get to seven, that was very close to zero. And when you get to zero, there's no fucking coming back. You are dead. So one example of what it was like to live with my dad during this time was we were all sitting around watching TV and my dad went up to bed and 20 minutes later, we heard, boom, 170 pounds hit the floor above us. And at this point, I was probably, I don't know, 10 or 11. We all just knew what had happened. It was like, not our first time at the rodeo, and we all just got into triage mode and my mom just adopted this like pathologically calm tone. And it would be like, joey, get upstairs and get your father off the Floor. And Tommy, go get his blood meter. Sean, get a glass, fill it with sugar, and then top that with orange juice. And Maureen, get the glucagon shot, and we'll reconvene in the bedroom. As these episodes started occurring with increasing frequency, it became clear to all of us that my dad's body just couldn't sustain this much longer. And sure enough, When I was 17, in 2000, my dad got diagnosed with cancer. And it was four very short months between the time he got his diagnosis and the time he died. The chemo that he was on took away whatever shred of ability he had to control his bodily functions. And I remember waking up one morning for school, and immediately I could smell human feces. And in the next room, I could hear my mom whispering to my dad, it's not your fault. You can't control this. This is just a part of getting better. It's just a part of getting better, Joe. Unfortunately, my dad never did get better. And after he died, we all basically had to relearn how to live. Suddenly, we could drink the orange juice that was in the fridge, and we could eat the jelly beans that were in the cabinet. We had spent my whole life anyway, fighting to keep this man alive. And once he was gone, the only thing left for us to fight was one another. My senior year of high school, my mother said to me, I want to know where you're applying to college. So I wrote out a list and I handed it to her, and she looked at it and said, there is not one fucking school in Massachusetts on here. She crumbled it up, threw it on the floor, and didn't speak to me for three months. Literally. We hold a grudge. And nevertheless, the following year, I packed my bags and did go to college in Texas. And it was this amazing experience because, like, for the first time, I was able to just think about myself and I was able to make my own decisions. And I discovered that I was gay. And it was fucking awesome. But it was also frightening because I didn't want to have to tell my super Catholic mother that. But I found a way to tell her at the end of my sophomore year of college, naturally, when we were in the middle of a huge fight. And I screamed at her, I'm gay, and you have to deal with it, Ma. And I don't really remember the conversation, but for her saying, it's going to be a very, very hard life for you. And she did her best to make sure that it was a hard life for me, because for six years after that, she and I did not speak or really see each other. And during that time, when I was 21 to 27, I sort of checked out of my own life. And I started smoking pot, like, all day, every day. And I was just drinking anything that you would put in front of me and snorting anything that you would put in front of me. And I just let my debts pile up around me to the point where my credit was. Was in the three hundreds. And I got, like, you know, a bunch of tattoos and I got my ears pierced because who was gonna stop me? And then, like, it was interesting because I was never a violent kid, but I suddenly started finding myself getting into, like, lots of fist fights. And they mostly happened when I was out and drinking. And I would hear somebody call someone a faggot. Whether the person was me or one of my friends or just a stranger, I would get into a fight about it, like, set off that O' Malley trigger inside of me. And at 24, I decided to move back from Austin to Boston in large part to help repair my relationship with my family. And that first couple of years back in Boston was filled with lots of failed attempts at reconnecting. I would go to family parties they were at. As soon as I would enter, my mom and my siblings would. And I would call my mom and leave emails for my mom, and she just wouldn't return to them. So it became pretty clear to me pretty quickly that my mom didn't have any interest in being a part of my life. So I just gave up on it for a little while anyway. Then when I was 27, I was living in an apartment in South Boston, around the corner from the house my mother grew up in, interestingly enough, that my aunt owned and was letting me stay in. And I was living on the third floor. And I remember one night I was standing on the back porch looking down about 40ft to the patio out back. And I don't know, I probably smoked a bunch of pot and drank a bunch of whiskey that day, and I was just feeling pretty down. I was chained, smoking cigarettes, and I kept flicking them and just watching them fall and cascade sort of past the. The two porches below mine. And every time one would hit the ground, the lit end would sort of explode like a firework against the pavement. And it all looked like very peaceful and easy. And I found myself envying these cigarettes that were falling to the ground. And I realized that, I mean, I didn't want to kill myself, but if this was living, I knew I didn't want to be alive. And I knew from there it was a very slippery slope to actually wanting to jump. So I did the only thing I could think of when I was feeling completely out of control, and I called my mom, and I blocked the number so that she wouldn't be able to screen my call. And she picked up, and I told her who it was. And she said, oh, hi, Tom. Good to hear from you, darling. And it was like, first of all, she'd never called me Tom before. And second of all, it was this completely bullshit tone in her voice that I had known because she used to use it whenever one of my aunts called that she didn't want to talk to. And I just. She was being fake, and I was ready for a real fucking fight with her. And I went at her, I was like, do you care? Do you actually care how I'm doing? If you cared, mom, you would answer one of my phone calls or one of my emails. You would not leave parties when I walked into them. So if you cared about, why wouldn't you do those things? She got really silent, and she said, what's the matter with you? What's going on? And her voice shifted, and it was the same voice that she used to use with my dad when he was really sick. And I said, I can't do this anymore, Mom. I can't fight with you. I feel incomplete without you. And if I'm not going to have you in my life, I don't want to live it anymore. If you are still my mother, you will come over here right now and we will fix this. She said, I can't come over there right now. I have to go to a meeting for work. But as soon as it's over, I will come over there, Tommy. I promise. Give me one hour. I will be there in one hour. Can you wait one hour? And I said, yeah, I can wait. And I waited one hour and then two hours and then three hours. And my mother has never been on time for anything in her entire life, including my father's funeral. And after she showed up three and a half hours later, I wasn't angry. I wasn't upset. I was just so happy to see my mom. We went into my living room and sat on the couch. We started talking, and we argued a little bit and sort of swapped blame and shared our resentments. And after a minute, we kind of looked at each other and smiled and realized we don't need to be fighting against each other. We can be fighting for each other. And that night, we started a conversation that we have continued to this day. And as she left, she gave me the best hug that I had ever gotten in my life because I worked so hard to get that hug from her. And she took my face and she put it between her hands and said, I have to ask you something serious. What the fuck were you thinking getting your ears pierced?
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Mama said there'll be days like this There'll be days like this Mama said Mama said Mama said Mama said There'll be days like this There'll be days like this My mama said Mama said, Mama said I went walking the other day and everything was going fine I met a little boy named village and then almost lost my mind? Mama said there'll be days like this There'll be days like this My mama said Mama said there'll be days like this There'll be days like this My mama.
Kevin Allison
This is risk. This is the Shirelles behind me now. And we just heard from Emmett Montgomery, who you can find on Instagramontgomery. Listen, if you've got a mother of a story, you know where to pitch it to us. Risk-show.com submissions. Folks, today's the day. Take a risk.
Lonzo Ball
Mama.
Advertiser
Mama. Mama.
Todd Kelly
Mama.
Lonzo Ball
Mama.
Advertiser
Mama. Mama. Mama. Mama.
Podcast Summary: RISK! Episode - The Best of Mother’s Day Stories #3
Podcast Information:
In this emotionally charged episode of RISK!, host Kevin Allison delves into the complexities of mother-child relationships through compelling true stories. This installment, titled "The Best of Mother’s Day Stories #3," focuses on mothers who are deeply loved yet intricately complicated. The episode primarily features a poignant and raw narrative from Todd Kelly, exploring themes of love, betrayal, grief, and redemption.
Todd Kelly opens up about his tightly-knit family, characterized by resilience and enduring bonds. His mother, a woman of silent strength, was the cornerstone of their household, balancing the raucous personalities of his father and sister. Unlike his father, who was a "brawling, storytelling, hard-drinking Irishman," Todd describes his mother as a "calm, quiet presence" that held the family together.
Three years prior to his mother's ovarian cancer diagnosis, Todd's father succumbed to cancer after a long and painful battle. This loss set a somber tone for the family, emphasizing the fragility of life and the weight of familial responsibilities.
In 2007, Todd's mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, a diagnosis that devastated the family. Contrary to her initial reluctance, rooted in past traumas and faith, she opted for an aggressive treatment regimen. Todd recounts:
"My mom decided to take treatment for the cancer. [05:20] It was exactly like you might imagine it. It was terrible."
After four grueling months of surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation, the family celebrated her remission—a fleeting moment of joy that soon turned into despair.
Ninety days later, alarming symptoms surfaced, revealing that the cancer had metastasized beyond her ovaries, infiltrating vital organs, including her brain. The prognosis was grim: weeks or possibly days left to live. Todd describes the harrowing decline:
"My mom began to forget things. She couldn't remember where she put her car keys or the plot of a book she read. [12:45]"
A critical turning point occurred when his mother lost control over her arm due to brain cancer, leading to a broken hip and necessitating immediate hospice care.
In the hospice center, Todd grappled with his mother's deteriorating condition and her haunting plea:
"I don't care if I die, just please give me a glass of water. [19:30]"
Faced with the agonizing reality that providing water could hasten her death, Todd found himself in an unbearable moral dilemma. His mother's pleas, coupled with the hospital's restrictive policies, drove him to contemplate ending her suffering himself.
"I made the decision that I was going to come back that night and kill my mother before she lost everything that was important to her. [23:00]"
Armed with a water bottle and filled with conflicting emotions, Todd returned to his mother's room with the intent to assist her in a final act of mercy. However, as he stood poised to act, memories of childhood—specifically an incident involving a pet lizard—flooded his mind, paralyzing him.
"The only thing that I can absolutely say for certain is that I froze. I absolutely froze. [30:10]"
His mother's nurse intervened, preventing him from giving her the decisive gesture he had intended.
The following evening, Todd received the devastating news of his mother's passing. Grappling with profound guilt and grief, he reflected on his inability to carry out what he believed was an act of mercy:
"I don't have the strength to do what I knew I should have done for her. [34:20]"
In attending his mother's funeral, Todd sought solace in the belief that, in her final moments, she found peace despite the chaos that had enveloped her life.
"All this time I'd worried that I'd feel guilty if I'd ended her life. But now... she was finally at peace. [36:02]"
Todd Kelly's narrative is a raw depiction of the extreme emotional strains that illness and familial obligations can impose. His story underscores the complexities of caregiving, the weight of moral dilemmas in end-of-life scenarios, and the enduring search for forgiveness and peace.
Key Takeaways:
Todd Kelly on Family Dynamics:
"My mom had no stories. She was this calm, quiet presence that we all revolved around. [05:50]"
On the Decision to End His Mother's Suffering:
"I was going to let her drink all she wants... if God decides it's not her time, that's on God. [23:40]"
Reflection on Guilt and Peace:
"I think those last few hours, she was finally at peace. [36:02]"
This episode of RISK! offers a profound exploration into the depths of familial love and the burdens it carries. Todd Kelly's harrowing experience serves as a testament to the complexities of human emotions and the often-invisible struggles faced by those caring for loved ones in their final days. Through his story, listeners are invited to reflect on their own relationships, the essence of mercy, and the paths to healing after profound loss.
Connect with RISK!: If you have a story about your mother that you think deserves to be shared, visit Risk-show.com submissions to pitch your narrative. Today's the day—Take a Risk!