On Saturday, March 1, 2025, Irene Judd Wolfgram departed this life with her son and daughter-in-law by her side. She was recuperating from a recent pacemaker surgery when she passed suddenly yet peacefully at Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas just minutes after laughing and joking with them. Her final breath in this life was taken in room 328. Her first breath was taken on 3/28 in 1944.
Irene was beloved by her family, friends and fellow church members and community volunteers.
Irene’s work ethic, commitment and dedication were present in everything she did including her decades of work at GMAC Mortgage and her happy retirement years volunteering at her church and in the community through Saint Rose Hospitals.
In keeping with her devotion to her lifelong Christian faith, Irene lived life with a servant’s heart always helping others. She humbly recognized the gift that God granted her as a listener and shared it daily. She listened as a loyal friend and trusted confidante to all those who regularly stopped at her door to talk and get a treat for their doggies. Irene will be dearly missed by her many friends at the Horizon Senior Apartments and her fellow parishioners at Victory Road Church of Christ.
Her family feels her loss as profoundly as they have always felt her love. In that, there was a ready and never-ending supply. Irene was a rock and anchor in the family and in her friendship circle. She will be dearly missed; yet, the seeds of love she has always planted will continuously grow.
Irene was a joyful gardener in this life planting both seeds of love and endless growing plants and flowers around her ~ from her years growing up in Kentucky, to her decades living in Iowa and then to her retirement years in Henderson, Nevada. She was forever happy to be planting and tending to growing things, both plants, people and pets. Irene’s gardens always flourished and animals of all kinds came to her readily, especially her favorite hummingbird friends.
All the people in her life benefited from her steadying presence, her plucky spirit, her feisty humor, her keen mind, her wisdom, her constant help and her heartfelt depth of love.
That love will continue to encircle us all. We are wrapped in it forever just like the warm, cozy blankets that she continuously knitted, crocheted, sewed and quilted throughout her life.
Irene lived her eighty years with faith, devotion, love, courage, resilience, wisdom and humor. Those gifts continue within all whose lives she so generously touched.
The family is honoring Irene’s life privately and yet we all encourage you to celebrate her in whatever way calls to your hearts. We know she has a place in so many of them.
June 18, 2023 ~ Our Hidden Inca Tour: Peru & Bolivia guided tour began with an early morning bus ride to the airport and our flight from Lima to Cusco.
Our personal experience of the tour began with some very strange happenings. After breakfast, we discovered that we were locked out of our room with all of our luggage still inside. New keys, a visit by the manager and a review by the maintenance person didn’t resolve the problem. We were beginning to get stressed and nervous as our tour group was to be loading onto the bus for the airport in minutes.
Meanwhile, my intestinal tract was feeling off. We didn’t just need our luggage in the room. I needed a bathroom. While Brian learned that our lock mechanism on our room needed a new battery and was resolving that with the hotel staff, I made a dash for the restroom in the hotel lobby.
Brian made it downstairs with our luggage just as everyone began loading onto the bus. I was still in the restroom with the intestinal issues. Then, as I went to leave the bathroom, I couldn’t get the door open. OMG! I was locked in the restroom. After a minute or two of trial and error, I finally got the door open and we sprinted out to the bus.
For the first time in Brian’s life, he was the last one to arrive somewhere. We were the final two people to get on the bus.
Our flight to Cusco and arrival there had more happenings and a sacred experience as well….
We were relieved to be on our flight and excited for the journey ahead.
Brian settled into the flight and took a nap. I had a little more adventurous trip. As I gazed out the window with our plane cascading over the Andes Mountains, I was suddenly overcome with emotion and this deep soulful feeling. Somewhere inside of me I heard the words, “I’m coming home…. I’m coming home…” In that instant, tears began to stream from my eyes.
Not long afterward, I felt a strong surge of energy and an accompanying sense of nausea. Luckily, the woman seated next to me had asked for sick bags for her teenage son who is prone to motion sickness. Thinking that preparedness was a good idea, I had asked for two as well. Thank goodness I did.
For the first time in my life and out of the clear blue nowhere, I got sick into that bag on the airplane. I was so subtle about it that Brian kept on napping and didn’t notice. He only awoke when I attempted to go to the lavatory and was turned back due to turbulence as travelers were asked to take their seats.
My sickness continued as we arrived into Cusco on Day One of our Hidden Inca group tour. Once we landed, I headed straight to the restroom as Brian collected our luggage. A kind former teacher from Canada who was on our trip asked after me and kept an eye out on me in a nurturing motherly way for the rest of the day.
Once on our bus ride, I continued feeling unwell. By that point, my hubby was keeping a keen loving eye on me too. Astonishingly, once again, I grabbed for another sick bag that I had tucked into my purse and emptied my stomach. Then, I learned how much my husband really does love me. He actually offered to hold my bag filled with the contents of my stomach. Yes, he is a former fire captain and advanced EMT, but still…. that is a next level kind of love offering. I thanked him and held it myself.
Once we got to the hotel, I again headed straight for the restroom after receiving our tour headphones and putting my full bag in a trash can. As I sat on the throne, I listened to the opening remarks of our group gathering that was transpiring in the hotel meeting room.
Thankfully, I soon felt well enough, just in time, to join our group for the sacred ceremonial opening of our Peruvian experience. Our shaman Wilco dressed head to toe in Incan priestly regalia spoke of the significance of Cusco. Our tour host and author Brien Foerster (who has been a presenter on the History Channel show “Ancient Aliens”) had told us about Wilco at the orientation and shared that Wilco is a ‘rare individual.’ He is part of an unbroken line of Incan shaman going back to the 15th century before the Spanish conquered Peru and annihilated much of the Incan and pre-Incan culture. Those Incans, who had lived, had quietly kept their wisdom alive for generations. Wilco was the latest in that line of wisdom bearers.
As I took my seat in the semi circle surrounding our tour’s shaman and the special altar he had created, I listened to Wilco speak (via translation by our tour manager Gustavo). Wilco shared with warm reverence and emphasis that “Cusco is the womb of Mother Earth. In Cusco, each of us connects our umbilical cord to the womb of the earth.”
Again, emotion welled up in me. Each of us were asked to share why we were here, in Cusco and on this trip to Peru. With tears streaming down my face, I said, “Cusco has called for a long time, and I feel like I’m coming home.” Wilco looked at me with one of those gazes that feels like someone sees right into your soul. I humbly, tenderly smiled and then listened as each person took their turn sharing.
Incredulously, the only other person to have tears arise was our tour guide Brien Foerster. He had not seemed an especially emotive person, but when he spoke of his desire to right the wrongs done to the Peruvian people by the Spanish his heart was keenly pouring out through his words. As I listened while staring at the back of his head, I took note that only he and I had cried, and he was sitting directly in front of me as my heart resounded in my chest. That connection formed a quiet, simple bond that seemed to continue though much of the Peru experience.
After our sacred opening ceremony, my loving Brian and I went to our hotel room. At first, I immediately shifted into my common resiliency mode and thought I could join the first walking tour of our trip; however, after several minutes, I realized that self care was my priority. Brian offered to stay with me in the hotel room, but I encouraged him to go on the walking tour of Cusco on behalf of both of us.
And so he did, lovingly taking photos to share with me. While he was away, I reached out to a dear friend who was right there messaging with me as I went through a poignant heart opening and energetic clearing experience.
Yes, I seemed to be in the midst of a Montezuma’s revenge sickness, or given that I was in Peru rather than Mexico maybe I should call it an Athaulpa’s revenge experience. In any case… I was genuinely sick, likely from eating a quarter size piece of lettuce with my ceviche at a local coastal restaurant the day before. Still… this truly felt like more than a food issue body clearing.
My keenly intuitive friend validated my sensing and encouraged me to ground myself by putting my bare feet on the floor. As an enormous cascade of tears poured forth, she lovingly held space from her home in Montana as I went through this experience in Cusco, Peru. We both knew this was a potent clearing on many levels. She quietly continued holding space from a distance while I went through my process on my own.
This clearing would open me up to the energies of Peru and its ancient places. I had longed to come to Peru for over two decades. Not only was my prayer answered but the land was obviously preparing me for a more authentic, genuine energetic experience. I slept for fourteen hours in our hotel room.
The next day, I would share with Wilco and Brien individually that it felt as if I had an Ayahuasca experience without taking Ayahuasca. They both understood me. Brien remarked that Cusco calls deeply to some people. Quietly he recognized my calling. By the end of our Peruvian journey, I had more sense of our gentle shaman’s understanding as well.
Qoricancha – photo via Peru Hop
My beloved husband had returned from the walking tour of Cusco as the sun set. Brian shared what he remembered of the heart of Cusco ~ Qoricancha, and the roads through the city as well as the presenters’ discussions of pre-Incan megalithic construction and Incan stone building.
My love warmly shared the photos he took for me and what he had learned from the local anthropologist, our tour guide and more. Though I hadn’t set foot in the heart of Cusco that day, my heart felt full and so very grateful. It was the beginning of a meaningful and long awaited adventure, and I am so grateful for how we shared it together
How does one return to life after being visited by death?
For me, that answer has been gradually… sometimes messily then at moments abundantly or sporadically but at all times feeling that something has dramatically and inalterably changed about my life. Those who have navigated deep grief ~ over any type of loss ~ understand.
Several times, I had thought to write more fully about my journey and experiences of the past three years, but it seemed daunting, and I thought, “Later.” Now……. feels like later. So… this is my beginning Now to share some of what I could not begin to share until Later. New life is emerging in earnest now and yet it isn’t too late to share about death.
Death and grief, that tandem duo have danced through my life and the lives of those I love over the past three years.
Like everyone’s story in recent years, it began in 2020….. The shock of a global pandemic and the fear-filled collective uncertainty placed us all in the cross hairs of grief. We were shot through the heart with it, all of us. Personally, I was feeling all of that, AND it was augmented by a complete uprooting of my home and life simultaneously. My previous share “Moving Through This” speaks to that.
As I gain a wider perspective now, I see the continual and ongoing persevering that we have all been doing for years… that I have been doing for years. It seems that we have been adapting to and navigating through one traumatic event and pivotal change after another. It has been a gauntlet.
For our family, that year of 2020 concluded with our adult daughter moving out on her own in September and my husband’s mom undergoing open heart surgery in early November just a few weeks before we would complete the building of our new home. During our home building, I was still grieving the loss of the prior beloved house we had built together and just left after 15 years. Now I was also grieving the loss of having my daughter at home, as all empty nest moms know too well.
Life was in flux everywhere it seemed. Still, my resilient self was at the forefront. On November 2nd, I sat in the hospital waiting room as my mother-in-law was in surgery while her son diligently worked on crucial final details of our home build. Days before Thanksgiving 2020 we brought mom home to the rental house we were in, and the day after Thanksgiving we moved her into our newly built home to stay with us until she was recuperated enough to live on her own at her apartment. Home building and coping with an empty nest amidst a global pandemic while helping our mom through her health crisis was A LOT…
We had no idea how much we would get used to “a lot.” And as I offer that, I am certain that ALL OF US can say that!! We had no idea how much we would get used to “a lot.” Everyone I know has been through so very much in recent years. It really has just been “a lot!!!”
Being in our new home was a genuine blessing, but I couldn’t use the common phrase of “settling in.” There wasn’t a settled feeling about life then and wouldn’t be for a long while. Death and grief would knock on our door… again… and again.. and again……………….
Three months and three weeks after moving into our new home, my dad died suddenly, wrenching my world apart on the inside. One year, two months and a day after that, my husband’s father also passed. The impact would be with him everyday. Their nearly daily phone calls had come to an end. Together, my husband and I held continual space for one another’s deep grief.
In between the bookend deaths of our fathers, my last maternal uncle made his transition less than six months after my dad. Two months and a day after my uncle’s passing, his lifelong friend, his brother’s best friend and my much loved honorary uncle died as well. Two months and a day after my honorary uncle passed, his sister-in-law, my lifelong cheerleader and my kindred spirit, honorary aunt also made her transition.
My dad’s sudden death was a seismic, high magnitude earthquake in my life (and in the life of my brother and so many family and friends.) That earthquake was followed by aftershocks galore as it seemed one death after another came. It felt like dad had opened the door and one loved one after another had followed him, until my husband’s dad closed it gently behind him (for a while.)
Grief IS all that love we want to give to the one we’ve lost. Grief IS immense love with no place to go. Where there is grief, there has been great love. Grief, then, truly is love in a different expression.
After all, “It can’t all be sorrow can it?….. What is grief, if not love persevering?”
(Vision from the WandaVision television show.)
I could go on… and on… about the impacts of all these deaths and my journey through the grieving process. If you’re a friend of mine on Facebook, you’ve experienced that of me already. Still, this is not anything to be minimized or glossed over.
Coping with grief, death, profound losses of any kind and dramatic sudden change are all important and significant. Our society as a whole is ill-equipped to do so well, and we are ALL greatly in need of genuine care and support in navigating the grief strewn mine-field of life that we are living through now. We all need compassion and care, for ourselves and others, as we continue to return to life day after day with so much ongoing uncertainty, grief, loss and change. And so…
May we find that what has been heart breaking can be heart opening and connect us with one another anew. My belief is that it truly can. It is our shared humanity in earnest.
In time, I sense that I’ll share more of my personal journey of grief, grace and growing through it all.
For now, I simply wanted to share this glimpse of my own landscape of recent years. There has been so very much that has been meaningful and to be celebrated as well… and that even includes death’s knocks at our door. Through it all, love perseveres.
DeAnne Wolfgram 