Marshall &Kay Family  Histories

B. VAUGHN MARSHALL

1992 - 1997

Group Leader in the Church

(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints)

In 1992 he was “called” asked to be High Priest Group Leader. This was a position that he enjoyed a lot. There was always a lot of work involved of course. It seemed that there was always a service project he was working on or someone that needed some help. Sometimes it would get a little burdensome but he was always ready for the next assignment. It meant a great deal to him when a brother would come to him in need of uplifting or counseling. I know he felt very close to his Father in Heaven as he received inspiration in helping those brothers.

Heart

It was about this time that Vaughn had another bad episode with the pain between his shoulder blades. He had continued to have the back pain every so often but never as severely as the first time. He kept treating these pains as anxiety attacks. I worried about it though and I think he did also even though he did not like to discuss it. However, he decided he would talk seriously to his new doctor about his heart again. His new doctor ran all kinds of blood work and did an EKG and gave him a pretty good physical. He did not order any stress tests this time though, because he said he could not find a reason to think there was a heart problem. Again, Vaughn felt embarrassed and frustrated that what he thought was a heart problem, was not. From that time on I had the feeling that our time together here was a special blessing to us. I felt that Heavenly Father was extending to Vaughn a little extra time to be here. I remember often thanking God in my prayers for that extra time. I never spoke to Vaughn about my feeling but I had a sense that he felt that way too.

Vaughn’s Mom (Irene Jones)

In 1995 a difficult decision had to be made about Vaughn’s mother. I haven’t written too much about all the things that were happening with her as yet so I’ll try to fill in a little here. Shortly after we moved into our new home in Washington she began to have some major health problems. The move away from California had been hard for her and as her arthritis became more painful she became increasingly more unhappy. She depended heavily on attention from Vaughn. Vaughn loved his mother and was always very sweet to her, which she needed a lot. Her needs however far exceeded the time he had available. He tried to introduce various activities to her but, probably due to her age, she didn’t want to do any of them. She was often quite negative. I don’t say this to be critical, but only to explain why that was so difficult for Vaughn. As I mentioned earlier, the medication he was taking helped the depression he had, but he found that he also had to work hard along with the medication to keep the depression at bay. He found from experience, that the time he spent in company with negative people and situations was very draining on him, so he tried to limit that exposure as much as he was able to. He often felt guilty about not spending more time with his mother. However he made time to take walks with her or to read to her and sometimes to play a game with her. Her mental health began to deteriorate more rapidly after she almost died and had to have major surgery for a bleeding ulcer. As time went on it became increasingly harder for her to understand what was going on around her. Still, Vaughn tried to spent time visiting with her or taking her for a ride or something. By 1994 she had to have someone with her most of the time. We hired nurses aids for a few hours each day and that helped. But the time finally came that she lost track of reality. She would often be angry with Vaughn. Sometimes she thought he was her husband, (Vaughn’s dad). She would say some very hurtful things to him. She became very paranoid and often hallucinated. It was difficult to know what to do because sometimes she would be very lucid also. Vaughn finally made the decision to have her cared for in a nursing home. It was a hard decision because he knew that she had always dreaded that. 

Health

Vaughn’s health was worrying me more and more now. He often had me check his pulse which would be very irregular.  It was a worry to me because he knew when his pulse was not good. His heart would feel “not right”.  Once in a while I would suggest he see the doctor about it again. He hesitated because he thought the doctor would say it was just anxiety again. He began to lose weight and was often exhausted. It was a type of exhaustion that was very different from the fatigue he had felt with the ADD.

 Computer

For a number of years Vaughn had encouraged me to learn something about the computer. I never really wanted to until I got serious about doing genealogy again. I realized that in order to share information I needed to put it on the computer so at last I needed to learn about it. I was dumber than dumb about computers when he started to teach me. I think I drove him crazy with all my questions. And I kept trying to learn at the same time he needed to use the one and only computer we had. He decided that I needed my own computer and that was a very good decision. Due to his patience I got past my fear of the computer. Wisely though, I got a very good, easy, simple, book on Windows 95 and began to learn how to use the computer. I still had questions from time to time and Vaughn patiently helped me out. I need to use the computer quite a bit now. If Vaughn hadn’t encouraged me to learn about it I would not be blessed to be able to use it now and go forward with my genealogy. 

Reunion

One of the things Vaughn had wanted to do for a long time was to attend one of the Marshall reunions in Utah. It seemed like every year something kept us from doing that. Finally in July of 1997 we made it. Vaughn had called ahead and talked to his uncle, John Marshall. Johnny was so glad to hear that we were coming at last. Vaughn enjoyed this trip very much. We drove and tried to not make it a rushed trip. We stayed at our youngest daughters place for a few days. We were able to go to the temple with them and spent some time at the Family History Center before we left. We drove to Huntington Canyon and after some searching found the Marshalls. It was interesting for Vaughn to see this whole area of Utah again. He hadn’t been back to visit his “roots” since he’d been in high school. We stayed with Johnnie in Price for a few days while Vaughn was able to visit with some of his mother’s family also. We spent a number of hours copying the Marshall genealogy on a copy machine one day. His aunt Lea had loaned us her information. We returned home in time to work at the temple for a special twenty-four hour marathon. We stayed on duty for the whole twenty-four hours. We both were very tired for days after that.

That July turned out to be a very busy time because the following week our third daughter came for a visit. Then our youngest daughter and her husband arrived. Then our son, his wife and their boys came up to be with everyone. Our fourth daughter and her husband joined in also. Vaughn enjoyed seeing everyone but he was very tired. It was so good that they were all able to come for a visit at that time though.

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