On Sunday, December 10, there will be a short memorial service
(panihida)
to commemorate the 40th day since Katya's passing according to the
Orthodox tradition.
The service will be held
at St. John's Orthodox Church
at 5:30 pm and will be followed by a dinner at 6:00.
Katya died on November 1, 2006, at 6:22 pm.
She passed away peacefully in her home in Eugene, surrounded by her family
members (parents Maria and Sasha, sister Anya, grandmother Natasha, aunt
Julia, uncle Arkasha and cousins Lizka and Mitka), Father David and hospice
workers Nancy-Diane and Dora.
A memorial service was held at St. John Orthodox Church
on Saturday, November 4.
The service was conducted jointly
by Father David and Bishop Maxim.
Several times during the last 15 months Katya
expressed her wish to become a nun
at
St. Paisius
Orthodox Monastery
in Safford, Arizona.
After her death, Katya's parents decided
to grant this wish by taking her there for burial.
They left for Arizona with Katya's body
immediately after the short trapeza following the church service
and arrived at the monastery on Sunday evening.
When we return, we will post here a detailed account of
Katya's last jorney.
Like so many other things in her life, it was truly remarkable.
Meanwhile, we invite you to watch a
slide show
which was played
at the service.
(It's a 27 Mb QuickTime movie file, so it may
take a while to load if you have a slow connection.)
On August 12, 2005, our four-year old Katya was diagnosed with a diffuse
intrinsic pontine glioma
an inoperable malignant tumor of the brain stem with a dismal prognosis.
After noticing that Katya's eye is turning sideways, we took her to a
pediatritian who immediately ordered an MRI. An MRI performed at the Sacred
Heart Medical Center in Eugene,
Oregon, showed a brain stem tumor. Katya was rushed to the Doernbecher
Children's Hospital at the Oregon Health Science University in
Portland, where after a second test (MR spectroscopy)
the doctors told us that she has a
diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma,
a brain tumor of the worst possible kind. Because of the location of the
tumor, surgery is not an option and the only possible treatments are
radiation or chemical therapies.
But even with all available treatments, the median survial time after
diagnosis, according to the doctors, is less than a year.
