'Your Mom Is No Longer Here' Children Are Told When Visiting Mom for First Time at Nursing Home — Story of the Day

When Cindy Brooks' ungrateful kids dumped her in a nursing home and sold her house, she thought her fate was sealed. But when they came to visit her two years later, they discovered that someone had come to their mother's rescue and taken her home with him.

Cindy Brooks loved her job. She had worked at her antique shop for decades, but the time seemed ripe for her to retire and enjoy her years stress-free. She had saved up a good dime and was looking forward to her sunset years.

Only a couple of years earlier, she had suffered a life-altering event after she and her husband, Eric Brooks, divorced. She had been heartbroken! Eric had been more than just her husband but her confidante and companion for the four decades they remained married.

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Their marriage had been everyone's dream union. Unfortunately, they had grown apart over the years, with their dreams and life goals shifting apart after Eric left his job to try farming.

They decided it was best to part ways amicably before they started loathing each other. With that, Eric relocated to Texas, leaving behind Cindy and their two children.

"Whatever will I do without you, my love?" she often wondered whenever she would stare at her husband's old photos.

Despite the divorce, she always kept photos of him on the fireplace mantle in their home at the heart of the Oasis neighborhood in Louisiana.

She would often tear up whenever she remembered her husband. The pair married young and had children early. Often, Cindy wished they had waited for just a little before having children so their babies, Emily and Jonathan, could be home a little longer.

They were all grown and had long left home to start their own lives, families, and jobs, and she had the home all to herself, which, admittedly, felt pretty lonely for an aging woman.

Now, at 70, she was retiring and did not know what to do with her life. She had a close-knit community around her, but that was not how she envisioned her sunset years. She wanted to spend time doting on her grandchildren, except there was one problem.

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Her children did not visit her often, and the visits had gotten even fewer in the past few years. She hoped her new life would allow her to see them often and spend time with her grandbabies. She would soon face the surprise of her life.

One morning, Cindy woke up to the insistent ring of the doorbell. "Who could be visiting this early? It's barely dawn!" the disgruntled Cindy complained as she threw a robe over her shoulders and strutted downstairs.

As soon as she opened the door, she could not believe her eyes! There stood Emily and Jonathan! It was only hours after she had prayed that they would visit. "God does answer prayers!" she thought to herself.

She flew into her children's arms, tears flowing freely down her soft, blushing cheeks. Her joy would, however, soon turn into pain as she heard her son say: "We're not here for pleasantries, mother! We are here to take you to your new home."

"But..but...this is my home. What do you mean by my new home?" wondered Cindy, all the previous excitement quickly draining out of her face.

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"Now that you're retired, we want to take you to a nursing home where you can have someone looking after you at all times," said Emily, speaking for the first time since her mother opened the door.

"I don't need anyone taking care of me. I have taken care of myself all this time and will continue to do it without anyone's help," she bellowed at her children, even as Emily made her way into the house to start packing her mother's bags.

Cindy was beside herself. The one time her children visited, they were there to whisk her off to a nursing home. She felt frail from her disappointment in her children.

After screaming her voice hoarse and the futile attempt at fighting off her children, she gave up and slowly retreated into a quietly resigned mien as her children packed her up in their car and drove off to the nursing home, miles away from the place she had called home for decades.

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Unbeknownst to Cindy, her children had already put the house up for sale and received part of the payment for their childhood home. It was in an affluent neighborhood and had fetched them quite the dime.

The three barely spoke as everyone seemed occupied in their thoughts — Jonathan and Emily were obviously quietly planning holidays with the proceeds from the house, while Cindy, sitting at the back, questioned her parenting, letting out a defeated sigh every once in a while.

Once they got to the nursing home, Jonathan and Emily dropped their poor mother off at the reception and drove off, eager to return to their homes and celebrate their victory.

Cindy was devastated! During the long drive, she had hoped her children were playing a sick joke on her, but now, everything seemed so real. She was quickly escorted to her room and knowing that her fate was sealed, she closed the door and cried herself to sleep.

Life at the nursing home was not as hard as Cindy had imagined. After getting over her initial shock, she began making friends and enjoying the company. She especially loved walking the gardens and picking flowers with her friends.

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Days passed, then weeks, then one day, on her fourth month there, she was walking the gardens with one of her friends when she noticed a truck parking at the lot. For some reason, the truck and the driver looked familiar.

"I know that truck...and the driver!" she blurted out to her friend, who had been occupied picking the beautiful flowers that always brought color to their otherwise gloomy days.

"Is it your son?" the friend wondered.

"No, I can't quite tell from so far away, but it does not seem like it's Jonathan," Cindy replied, hurrying toward the truck.

A year and eight months later...

Jonathan and Emily parked their car at the nursing home's parking lot and rushed into the reception. "We are here to see our mother, Cindy Brooks," Jonathan boomed at Angela, the receptionist.

"Cindy...Brooks? Cindy has not been here for at least a year and eight months!" Angela said, opening a tab on her computer that showed her residents' release dates.

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"What do you mean she hasn't been here? Where is she?" Jonathan asked, raising his voice.

"Your mom was taken out from here," Angela said, cowering in fear.

"Taken where? By whom? And with whose consent?" Emily screamed as Jonathan shot an intimidating look at Angela.

Later that evening, the two knocked on a turquoise blue door of the address Angela had given them and waited with bated breaths to see who had taken their mother. They were shocked when they recognized the house's owner as their estranged father, their mother's ex-husband, Eric.

For years, Eric, an avid farmer, had delivered groceries to the nursing home. One day, as he did his deliveries, he noticed Cindy walking the gardens alongside other residents.

At first, Eric had thought himself mistaken because he could never have pictured a woman as agile and strong as Cindy in a nursing home, so he had gone to see Angela at the reception.

Angela had filled him in on how Cindy's children dumped her there and left and how in the time that Cindy had been there, none of them came to visit. Eric immediately formalized guardianship over Cindy.

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"I spent many happy years with her, so I will take care of her," he told the nursing home management before getting Cindy packed and taking her home.

Well into his 80s, Eric lived alone. After he and Cindy got divorced, he never remarried and moved a state over to start life afresh. And now, the two had found each other again and bonded over the years they had lost fighting.

"So, why did you come looking for me after abandoning me for so long?" wondered Cindy.

"We are sorry, mother," said Emily. "We are truly sorry for what we did to you. We were too blinded by greed to put your needs first."

"We came to the nursing home to apologize and pay you back for the pain we caused you," Jonathan said, retrieving a piece of paper from his suitcase. "We repurchased the house for you," he added, handing over the deed of the house to his mother.

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Emily and Jonathan begged for forgiveness from their parents, and Cindy, kind-hearted as always, answered, "Under one condition."

"Whatever it is, mother," Emily said.

"I want you two to bring your babies around often so they can spend time with their grandma and grandpa," Cindy cried in joy.

"Done and done!" Emily and Jonathan answered in unison.

Eventually, Cindy and Eric sold Cindy's home, remarried in a small garden ceremony attended by their children and grandchildren, and spent the rest of their days doting on their grandbabies, just as Cindy had imagined of her sunset years.

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What can we learn from this story?

We should always be grateful for our parents and remember their sacrifices in old age. Jonathan and Emily forgot all the sacrifices their mother had made raising them and wanted nothing to do with her in her old age.

Forgiveness is earned. If Jonathan and Emily had not come to seek forgiveness, they might have lost their relationship with their parents forever and ruined their children's relationship with their grandparents.

If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about a woman who receives an unexpected visit from a cat in her room at the nursing home, only to discover that it belonged to somebody from her past.

This piece is inspired by stories from the everyday lives of our readers and written by a professional writer. Any resemblance to actual names or locations is purely coincidental. All images are for illustration purposes only. Please share your story with us; maybe it will change someone's life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to info@amomama.com.