The long goodbye.
Like with many people around the country, the nationwide lockdown threatened to prevent a Texas woman from visiting her dying father before he succumbed to the coronavirus. Fortunately, Abby Adair Reinhard was able to bid her elderly dad farewell in a touching way: by talking to him on the phone for more than 30 hours until his death, which she chronicled in a heartbreaking Facebook post in early April.
“It feels so good to laugh and cry,” wrote Reinhard of speaking with her 76-year-old father, Don Adair, for the last time. Also on the phone were Reinhard’s siblings, who joined the call from Texas, Denmark and North Carolina.
And while the Rochester native’s children couldn’t see him or hold his hand, they were able to share memories, express their love and even sing Peter, Paul and Mary songs that their father had played on a guitar at family campfires, reports CNN.
Reinhard, 41, wrote on Facebook that she felt grateful “to be connected on the phone with you and my brother and sisters” and “to bring the images of us from earlier years back to life.”
Don Adair wasn’t just an important figure in his children’s lives. A former attorney with a law degree from Cornell University, the grandfather of five was a community pillar who helped people start their dream businesses, Reinhard tells CNN.
“He was one of the smartest people I ever met and he was also very humble and kind,” she tells Good Morning America.
Along with reliving the good times, Reinhard also made amends for past transgressions during the over-a-daylong convo. “I apologized for what I needed to apologize for, I forgave him for what I needed to forgive him for,” the small business owner tells CNN of the bittersweet session.
Unfortunately, the going-away party was especially difficult for the ailing Adair, who couldn’t talk and could be heard audibly suffering over the phone, according to his daughter. When he started to nod off, she and her siblings would try and bring him around by saying, “We love you so much . . . We’re here for you . . . Your kids are all here, Dad,” per the Facebook post.
“Just hearing him breathe, it was like our connection to him and how we knew he was still alive,” Reinhard tells CNN.
The devoted daughter wants her father, who died just before midnight on April 6, to be remembered as more than a coronavirus statistic: “When we humanize a tragedy we understand it better,” she tells Good Morning America.
Reinhard’s heartrending saga has elicited an outpouring of support on social media. “Your story gives me hope that my family and I will endure in similar circumstances,” wrote one newfound Facebook fan. “Peace, love, and hugs, Abby.”
“Your post is beautiful & courageous!” said another.
This isn’t the first time social-distancing precautions have forced people to bid goodbye to COVID-19-suffering family members from afar. Last month, an 84-year-old coronavirus patient from Pennsylvania said his final farewell to relatives via FaceTime, while a breast cancer survivor tragically bid adieu to her kids with a walkie-talkie.