A Promise is a Promise Read online

  One evening after a long day of writing and researching, I turned on the television to watch the evening news. I was not paying much attention to the broadcast since I was busy preparing my dinner, but then I noticed that Inside Edition with Deborah Norville had come on after the news. I had been interviewed by Deborah several years back, and I recalled how enjoyable the radio interview had been. Deborah was a concerned mother as well as a working professional woman. She reminded me of my wife, who was also figuring out a way to combine both of these inner longings.

  Deborah announced that Inside Edition would be featuring a story about a woman who had been taking care of her comatose daughter for 26-plus years, and they showed Kaye O’Bara reading to her daughter from Real Magic, the book I had just sent her. I had one of those synchronistic awarenesses that caused goose bumps and shivers to run throughout my body as Kaye read the opening line from my book: “This is a book about miracles.”

  Here I was, watching television, which I rarely did; seeing a show that I had never seen, and there was Kaye O’Bara reading to Edwarda from a book I had recently sent because I was so deeply touched by this woman’s unconditional love toward her daughter. To top it off, the chapter title I was writing in my new book seemed to be smiling at me from its place in my old portable typewriter: “Connecting to the Divine Source with Unconditional Love.” It was an overpowering moment. I watched the show and vowed to look up Kaye’s address when I returned to my writing sojourn.

  When I completed the book the following month, I arrived home to find a mound of correspondence waiting for me. The first letter I opened was a thank-you note from Kaye. I immediately called her, and she invited Marcelene and me to visit Edwarda in North Miami at our convenience. This was the beginning of a relationship that introduced me to the world of miracles and unconditional love on a level that I had only read and written about up until this time.

  When we entered Kaye’s modest little home, we were greeted by a woman who was full of life and devoid of self-pity. Her focus was exclusively on her daughter’s well-being. She had devoted over 25 years to caring for her child, and in the process had forgotten how to be selfabsorbed.

  As we entered the room where Edwarda was resting, Marcelene and I both felt an immediate sense of peaceful energy that infused the room with love and gentleness. This seemed to be a sacred place, and we both commented, on our way home, that it felt similar to our experience at the chapel in Assisi. We had journeyed to Italy and the little chapel where St. Francis had conducted his services and had died in the 13th century. The divine sort of presence we encountered in that chapel was what we had both felt in Edwarda’s room.

  I had a feeling as I talked to Edwarda and held her hand that she was listening to me. I felt that in some mysterious way, she was responsible for our presence in that room, and that Kaye had played a key role in getting us there. I knew that Edwarda was connecting with me in some way that I could not elaborate or explain. Both Marcelene and I felt that we were making a conscious connection.

  After an hour or so had passed, and we told Kaye that we were leaving, a small tear came to Edwarda’s eye, and she appeared restless and agitated. Kaye immediately told Edwarda that we would be back, and her daughter seemed to return to her more restful posture.

  This was the beginning of a growing love relationship between our family and the O’Baras. We began to visit every few days, bringing anything that we could to help out.

  Kaye had been faced with enormous expenses over the years, and she was living under a mountain of debt that tugged almost violently at her fragile heart. She borrowed to the maximum on many credit cards, and then she would get more credit cards to pay off the old credit-card debts. She mortgaged and remortgaged her home many times, and she took out bank loans and borrowed from anyone willing to help. Over the years, she conducted charity auctions, and urged newspaper reporters to tell her story to help elicit funds to pay for the ever-expanding expenses for food, medicine, and health care for her daughter.

  Dr. Louis Chaykin, Edwarda’s doctor, was an angel, treating her for years without taking a cent for his services. While other expenses mounted, Kaye, with Dr. Chaykin’s help, managed to keep Edwarda in the best possible health under the circumstances. Kaye’s attitude and the reality of the situation are best described in Kaye’s words:

  I figure that it costs over $3,000 a month to keep the house going. We keep the air conditioning on year round. It keeps the germs out. Edwarda’s baby food runs $9 per day, and my drugstore bill for her medicine is over $1,000 a month.

  There was a time when I had 32 credit cards. No matter what she needed, I’d borrow it. Her nurse was $42 a day, and when you don’t have that coming in, it adds up fast.

  I had to do this behind my husband’s back while he was still alive because he couldn’t take the strain. But I always knew that Edwarda’s care came first and that God would help me to figure out a way to take care of the money issue.

  When I heard this, I knew that there was one thing I could do. I could help Kaye remove this burden of debt from her life. I made a commitment to write this book and to have all the royalties paid directly to the Edwarda O’Bara Fund. I could tell this story to the world and receive a triple bonus in the process.

  First of all, I would help alleviate the strain of enormous debt and allow Kaye to turn her attention exclusively to getting Edwarda the care she required. A second benefit is how this story will affect readers. I believe that it will help others reach into their hearts and extend compassion and love, which our world sorely needs. The third aspect is for my personal growth. For the first time in my life, I can turn all of my writing energy into something that will benefit another human being without bringing any financial remuneration to myself. I have the opportunity to replace my ego’s interest with concern for others. As I write this book, I feel blessed in a multitude of ways, and I feel that Kaye is responsible for the feeling of grace that I am experiencing in connection with this commitment.

  After several weeks of visiting with Kaye and Edwarda, I made a trip to Los Angeles to tape a television show. Marcelene called me while I was out there to tell me that I should make a special effort to see Kaye the following day, as Kaye had asked that I be at her home when the Oprah show was scheduled to interview her. I agreed, and was able to get on an all-nighter from Los Angeles to Miami.

  When I arrived at Kaye and Edwarda’s home, Oprah Winfrey’s staff was filming the visitors throughout the day. I talked to Edwarda as I was now accustomed to doing, and I said a few words for the show, which aired a few days later.

  Several people who had been involved with comas appeared on that particular Oprah show. The feature story was about a policeman who had been in a coma for eight or nine years and who had suddenly started talking. In addition, there were people on the show who had been in comas for shorter periods of time and who had returned to a waking state. The emphasis seemed to be on how difficult it was for friends and relatives who had witnessed their loved ones in a coma, and the struggle of their return to waking consciousness.

  The doctors who were interviewed did not want to discuss the possibility of miracles. They preferred to give a pessimistic, scientific explanation of what life in a coma does to the victim as well as the loved ones. The families seemed to be in a state of despair over their inability to communicate with their newly awakened loved ones and the “damage” that had occurred as a result of the comatose state. Everyone on the show shared a frustration over how the comatose state had adversely affected their lives—that is, until Kaye O’Bara, the last featured guest.

  Here was a woman who had been caring for her comatose daughter for two-and-a-half decades, and she was upbeat, positive, and full of hope as she spoke. “It is my privilege to be able to serve in this way,” she said. “God doesn’t give you anything that you can’t handle. I am honored to be of service. I know that Edwarda is there, that she is not that body that is dysfunctional temporarily, and that she is a divine
soul who will wake up some day.”

  When I asked Kaye how she reacted to that show and all of the pessimism that she heard, her response was:

  I would love to call Oprah and get the address of the doctor. I think he crushed a lot of people’s dreams. But he didn’t crush mine. I think he is too scientific. I mean, science has its place, but God gives science knowledge. That’s right—and you have to realize that God can do anything He wants. Even the brain of that scientist came from God. I don’t want to think bad of the man, but he broke the dream of that guy on the show, and a lot of people were watching. As I sat and watched, I thought my heart was crushed for him, but he didn’t crush my dream.

  Kaye O’Bara was the highlight of that show. I was privileged to make a brief appearance with her and Edwarda to put the focus where I believed it ought to be. This remarkable woman and her equally remarkable daughter had shown us a side to unconditional love that most of us cannot even imagine. Kaye showed the world that day that despite what scientific prognostication says about a woman in a coma for so many years, her faith and belief in being positive and viewing her life circumstances as a gift from God is very much alive.

  Kaye has an unshakable internal knowing that Edwarda will come out of her diabetic coma and that there is a spiritual lesson in this long saga in which she is participating. Her faith gives her the strength to serve without a moment’s concern about her own personal struggles. She thinks like a saint. She gives of herself tirelessly in the name of unconditional love. She has taught me and shown me first hand what it is like to tame the ego completely and to live in the pain and bliss of serving.

  This is something that I have written about and something I have worked at achieving. But in all honesty, it is not something that I have come close to accomplishing when I see how it works in this woman. And now, she has given me this great gift of the opportunity to write for someone else…the gift to speak without thinking about how it will affect me…the gift to be able to serve unconditionally.

  In Kaye’s mind, this is the lesson of Edwarda’s long sleep. We have the opportunity to learn about a new kind of compassion and to help spread it throughout the world. This is Edwarda’s holy mission, according to Kaye, and the spiritual guidance that she has been given by the Blessed Mother (which you will read about in the third chapter). I am grateful to be a participant and to give you a book describing unconditional love in action.

  Kaye O’Bara has been challenged and has met that challenge for a large portion of her adult life with nothing but awe and love in her heart. Her story is worth knowing and remembering. It can teach us all a great lesson in a multitude of ways.

  Kaye is the former Kathryn McCloskey whose father, Eddie, was the mayor of Johnstown, Pennsylvania. She was destined to become a care giver early in her life. Her mother died at the age of 58, and Kaye and her father took care of her right up to and including her passing.

  Kaye’s husband, Joe O’Bara, was a football star at the University of Pittsburgh and a boxing champion in the Navy. Two years after Edwarda lapsed into her coma, Joe had a massive heart attack, and Edwarda’s total care became Kaye’s responsibility. Joe was unable to do anything that required heavy lifting. Essentially, he was relegated to a position of observing his daughter in her comatose state. His heart was heavy, and it finally broke completely when he died four years later.

  While interviewing Colleen, Edwarda’s younger sister by 18 months, I learned the circumstances of their father’s death. Colleen recalled, “I remember before my dad died—and this is what still keeps me going—he said, ‘If they take me, darling, I am going to heaven to find out what I can do from there. Remember one thing, Colleen. If I don’t take your sister with me, there’s a reason for it, and one day she will wake up.’”

  Joe also told Kaye a few days before he died, “I can’t help Edwarda any more down here. I’m going to go up to heaven, and I’m going to help her from there. But don’t you ever get depressed and think she won’t wake up, ’cause she will.”

  After Joe died, it took Kaye six years before she was able to cry and grieve. During all of those years, her focus was on taking care of Edwarda. The strain had proved too much for Joe. He left almost nothing in his will. All of their finances and insurance had been eaten up by medical expenses.

  The strain was evident on Kaye for a period of time as well. “I had a heart attack and fell onto Edwarda’s bed on Mother’s Day of 1982,” she recalls. The ten days she then spent recuperating in a hospital were the only days that she has ever spent away from Edwarda’s side. Her teaching career ended the day that she brought Edwarda home from the hospital in May of 1970. She has seen her mother pass away, as well as her beloved Joe, who could no longer stand the pain of seeing his daughter require so much attention while being unable to provide adequate financial help.

  Joe wrote a letter to his two daughters just prior to his death. I’ve included a short excerpt of that letter, which reveals his anguish:

  Edwarda,

  I just can’t find the words to tell you how much I love you. You mean so much to your daddy. I’m just sorry for not being a daddy, as a daddy should be. I just wish that God could find it to give you back your health. I want to hold you in my arms and tell you that you are the sweetest darling in the world.

  Colleen, I love you so. I’m sorry I haven’t told you more often how much I love you. You and Edwarda are very precious to me.

  I am so sorry that I hurt your feelings when you were a little girl, Edwarda, without cause. I’m so very sorry. I ask God to give your daddy another chance to make up to you for all the wrongs that I have done. You are both God’s children. Forgive your daddy for ever being unkind to you, and know that I love you more than life. My love for you is more than my heart could ever speak. I love you and Colleen very much. God will always be with you, honey.

  I love you.

  Daddy.

  Colleen was very close to her father, while Edwarda was closest to her mom. Joe’s death was more than Colleen could handle. She described her feelings at that time:

  My dad died, and I had my son eight days later. And then I got lost. I was so lost that I didn’t know what to do, and I was so lonely for my father that I took to drugs. I was almost in a coma like Edwarda. My mom was taking care of Ricky for me, and I still didn’t know that I wasn’t being a mom. It was like being out there, but I felt totally lost inside.

  For a long period of time, Colleen wavered back and forth between being at home for her son and then being out on the street living on drugs. Ultimately, she was arrested and spent a short period of time incarcerated. It was here that she found new strength and returned home to be with Kaye and Ricky. She knows about the love for a child, which she observed directly from Kaye.

  “I know that my mom would do anything for me, anything, even though we sometimes argue and disagree. I know that she would die for me. That’s just my mom,” Colleen said.

  Kaye took on the additional challenge of taking care of her grandson and the pain of knowing that Colleen was in her own waking coma, high and out of touch, and then in and out of the world of the street. Kaye’s heart ached for both her daughters, while the daily responsibilities of caring for Edwarda every two hours around the clock, and attempting to come up with some plan to finance the growing indebtedness, plagued her.

  The essential Kaye O’Bara is a woman who has lost her self-absorption, tamed her own ego, and turned her life over to the service of those she loves. She has been tested over and over, and she remains a positive role model for all of us. Her modest home is full of the love that she has radiated to her children all of these lonely, trying years.

  That love is evident in Edwarda’s appearance. She is sparkling clean, her gray hair braided, and her clothing always crisp and feminine. The care that has to go into making sure that Edwarda is always fresh and clean invites one to try to imagine Kaye’s routine.

  There is a chair by Edwarda’s bedside, where one can only visualize the
number of nights over a quarter of a century when Kaye has fed Edwarda: waking at midnight, 2:00, 4:00, 6:00, and 8:00 A.M., to pour the specially prepared baby food and vitamins into the feeding tube that is her daughter’s life support. After the food, Kaye gently pours in water, then takes her place alongside Edwarda to suction out any phlegm that might be caught in Edwarda’s throat. She will not tolerate any discomfort for her precious angel.

  Kaye has a special, symbiotic relationship with Edwarda. She intuitively knows what is needed, and she keeps up a constant stream of conversation with her. She will play her positive self-help tapes, read to her from books about miracles, turn on the television when her favorite programs come on, and play meditation tapes and prayers for her. All of the time, she is also tracking Edwarda’s progress.

  Edwarda has her menstrual cycle every 28 days like clockwork, which is unusual for someone in a coma. When she is cramping, she is able to let her mother know, and Kaye then administers medication to relieve her pain. She can move her eyes across the room, smile in recognition, and cry in despair.

  Over the years, Edwarda has moved from being in a deep coma to being able to blink her eyes in response to a question from Kaye. When an unfeeling visitor once remarked that Edwarda was a vegetable, Kaye immediately responded that she’d never seen a vegetable smile.

  Kaye shaves Edwarda’s legs and bathes her daily, explaining, “Everything goes on, but she is just not talking and not walking. And remember, in over 26 years, she has never had a bedsore.”

  This, of course, reflects Kaye’s determination that Edwarda’s body will be moved around and will always be made comfortable, regardless of how much work is involved. She will not permit bars to be placed on her bed for fear that it might make Edwarda think she is back in the hospital, where she experienced terrible pain back in 1970. Moreover, no one is allowed to wear white in Edwarda’s room because it might make her think that the person is a nurse. Kaye is taking no chances that Edwarda might think she is back in a hospital setting. At all times, Kaye thinks of her daughter and what might be going on inside her. She keeps track of the little improvements that tell her that Edwarda will one day awaken.