Sunday, April 29, 2007
Faith & family
In March, Extra asked women to write letters to their younger selves about what they've learned from life's experiences. We received more than two dozen heartwarming letters, and now it's time to share the wisdom.
In a four-part series, Extra will profile four of the women who responded and publish several of the letters we received. The series will run throughout May.
-- Kathy Lu, features editor
Sam Dean | The Roanoke Times
Sue Ellen Tyree returned to Roanoke from Florida after her husband died at 36, leaving her with five young children.
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The letters
Sue Ellen Tyree was in labor.
The mother of three was familiar with that sensation, but this time she wasn't ready.
She still had a lot to do that morning. She had to choose her husband's burial attire.
Twenty-four hours before, 36-year-old John Fritz died unexpectedly of a massive heart attack in their Jacksonville, Fla., home.
He left Sue Ellen with their 14-month-old daughter, Gretchen, and her two children from a previous marriage.
Just weeks before her husband's sudden death, Tyree found out she was having twins.
The morning of Sept. 16, 1977, the grieving widow worked through her labor for at least an hour, laying out her husband's clothes and writing a letter to her preacher about funeral arrangements.
After Tyree got to the hospital, Adriane Darleen was born within 20 minutes.
Thirteen more minutes passed -- a bit too much time between twins. Doctors readied for a Caesarean section.
"Please," a nurse reportedly said. "This lady has been through so much. Please try just one more time."
And that's when 3-pound Rebecca Diane curled up in a little ball and plunged into the world, just one day after her dad left it.
Little time to mourn
When John Fritz died, he became the third important man Sue Ellen Tyree had lost in her life.
The first was her father, who died when she was very young. Her first marriage to her high school sweetheart ended in divorce after 10 1/2 years and two children, Melissa and Steven.
Tyree, 64, still remembers what went through her head when she left the hospital as a widow with twin newborns almost 30 years ago.
"I didn't have a lot of time to mourn," she said. "I said, 'I need to get home.' I had to start concentrating on how I was going to take care of these children."
A friend rented her a house in Roanoke, where Sue Ellen is originally from and where her mother still lived. But the newborns could not be moved for six weeks, so Tyree's church hired a nurse to help at home.
Church members also sent more groceries than the family could eat, bought everyone plane tickets to Roanoke, hired a moving company and paid for a marker for Fritz's grave.
An acquaintance in politics pulled strings so Tyree could get Social Security for her family in a timely fashion. She wasn't able to work until the twins entered kindergarten.
These days, Tyree is heavily involved at Oakland Baptist Church in Roanoke and has a strong network of friends and family.
"She is the one who really works harder keeping up friendships," said Lois Romero of California, who has known Tyree since grade school.
It wasn't until almost five years after the twins were born that Tyree began to date again. Once, she was asked to dinner by a man who made it as far as her living room. There, he got one look at her crowded family portrait and realized he'd forgotten another engagement.
"I had long decided I wasn't going to hide my kids," Tyree said.
She met Matt Tyree at a cookout. He asked for her phone number, but she left without passing it on.
One month later, she ran into him at a Crossroads Mall restaurant and he asked again. This time she gave it to him, and the hard-working plumber with a gentle demeanor and a trusting heart became the love of her life.
"The only thing bad about it is that I wish I'd met him a long time ago," she said. "He has been the best dad of these three [youngest] girls in particular. And they love Dad. They love him to death."
Matt Tyree is a calming influence on his wife. When Sue Ellen gets worried and wound up, her husband is as soothing as her prayers to God.
Combining their families means the Tyrees have a total of eight children, 13 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. Among the children are a minister, a medical assistant, a school teacher, a stenographer and a veterinarian's assistant.
"They are very, very close to her and they go to her for everything," Romero said. "She is just a great mother."
Like any proud mom and grandmother, Tyree brags about things such as her daughter winning teacher of the year or her grandson putting on a serious face for T-ball.
"He can knock a ball over the roof of our house," she says with a laugh.
When she talks about the past, it is with a light voice. The conversations are peppered with laughter.
"She's got a great sense of humor," Romero said. "She's got a strong belief, and I think that has carried her through."
