Susan Jane Riddering (Sue) was born on February 26th, 1955 to Constance and Calvin Foss in Pasadena, California. She was the youngest sister of three adoring older brothers. Her early childhood was a happy one, as her family was extremely active in hiking, camping, and water skiing.

Sue grew up in Arcadia, California, graduating from 1st Lutheran Grade School. She then transferred and graduated from Arcadia High school. While still a sophomore in high school, her parents bought a historic hotel on Catalina Island. She spent her high school years traveling between her high school studies on the mainland and helping her family renovate the hotel on the island.

At the tender age of 16, Sue met the love of her life, Mark Riddering, at a summer church retreat. The couple hit it off immediately, and, as Mark lived in Oxnard, the couple commuted to see each other as much as they could.

Sue received her R.N. nursing degree at Pasadena City College where she was the youngest in her class (19 years old). Shortly after graduation, Sue married Mark Riddering on September 27th, 1975. The new couple settled in Ventura County, an area they stayed in for 17 years. While her husband completed the Ventura County Police Academy, Sue supported the new family by working at St. John’s Community Hospital. Following Mark’s employment as a police officer, Sue gave birth to her firstborn Sara at age 23. In the next three and a half years the couple had three more children: Rebecca, Samantha, and Luke. Sue took care of and home schooled her children until they all graduated high school. She would always say that schooling and raising her children was her life’s greatest pleasure.

In 1992 the family relocated to the Santa Maria area, settling in Nipomo, California. Six years after they moved to the area, Mark Riddering was diagnosed with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease). Sue, very literally, never left Mark’s side for the 13-year duration of his disease–an exceptional, faithful, attentive, gentle, and long suffering caregiver until Mark’s death on November 27th, 2008 (Thanksgiving Day). The love in their marriage was a true picture of self-sacrifice and faithfulness, rare, beautiful, and inspirational to all who had the privilege of knowing them.

Sue will be remembered by her family as an extremely strong woman of Christian faith, trusting unwaveringly in God’s goodness, wisdom and love throughout her husband’s entire illness. She commonly said that she found the most comfort from “good theology, old hymns, and hard work.” She was the strong pillar that held her family up and made them smile through any situation. She joyfully, faithfully and selflessly served her family and anybody else who came into her home.

Sue is survived by her 4 children and their spouses: Sara and Ben Brigham, Rebecca Riddering, Samantha and Kevin Brandon, and Luke and Christina Riddering. She also had four grandchildren: Seth and Hana Brigham, Karis Brandon, and Mark Riddering. She is also survived by her mother Constance Foss, her older brothers and their wives: Ken (Jan), Andrew (Diane), and Richard Foss (Jan), her mother in law, Delores Riddering and her two in laws and their spouses, Wayne Riddering (Deanna), Lynn Mackereth (Jim), and numerous nieces and nephews.

Services to be held at First Christian Church in Santa Maria, Tuesday January 5th, 2009 at 1:30 PM, graveside committal to follow. In lieu of flowers, the family is requesting that donations be made to the Mark Riddering Fund at Rabobank, with the proceeds to benefit charities close to Mark and Sue.

Mark’s thorough enjoyment of his career led him to being a highly decorated police officer. While working in Santa Maria, he was instrumental in starting up the DARE program in schools. He worked in patrol and as a detective, but his passion was narcotics enforcement. His love for his work showed in his often having dreams of being on the job for years into his retirement. Even more than the work, though, Mark loved the people he worked with.

Mark and Sue had four children together. It was for his wife and children’s benefit that he moved the family to Nipomo, to enjoy the country life. As a father he was able to balance justice and mercy. He was also a great playmate, taking his kids to the beach and running around the backyard. Mark always put his family first and his children always knew how important they were to him. It gave him great joy to see who they became as adults.

Mark was raised in a Christian family, and he continued strong in his faith in Jesus until the end. He was a member of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Santa Maria. God upheld Mark and his family faithfully throughout Mark’s illness, which gave him the hope and the joy evident to all who knew him. Mark was passionate about showing people how good his God is. Mark’s confidence in going to Heaven to be with his God was based on his belief in Jesus to save him from his sins. Mark is now joyfully with the Savior he sought to faithfully serve.

Mark is survived by his faithful wife Sue of 33 years, his children and their spouses: Sara and Ben Brigham, Rebecca Riddering, Samantha and Kevin Brandon, and Luke and Christina Riddering. He had four grandchildren: Seth and Hana Brigham, Karis Brandon and Mark Riddering. He is also survived by his mother Dee, his older brother Wayne Riddering (DeDe), his younger sister Lynn Mackereth (Jim), his mother in law Connie Foss and his 3 brother in laws, Ken (Jan), Andrew (Diane) and Richard Foss (Jan), and numerous nieces and nephews. Mark treasured his friends and will be remembered by many.

The family is extremely grateful for the support of the entire Santa Maria community throughout Mark’s illness. Mark’s many family members, coworkers and friends helped tremendously with the special challenges presented by his illness.

The family requests that in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the Mark Riddering fund at Rabobank (effective Monday). This fund will go to charities close to Mark’s heart.

Services to be held at First Christian Church in Santa Maria, Tuesday December 2, 2008 at 1:00 PM, graveside service and reception to follow.

As I was working on sending out this e-mail, Mark did finish his journey into heaven! His passing was very quiet, very comfortable. Kevin was sitting with him reading scripture, and I was also in the bedroom. At this time we are tentatively setting services up for Mon or Tues, we won’t know until tomorrow. Keep your eye on the website. Thank you again for your love and support! Sue

We hope you all have a great Thanksgiving.

Their Christmas card recently stated, “Mark says that even though his body is looking weak if you could evaluate the health and well-being of his soul, he would look wonderfully healthy.” Through God’s grace, Mark continues to live joyfully and be an encouragement to all around him.

Well, the end of last year brought some good things and hard things for Sara. She found out that her device was malfunctioning, and had to have a surgery in October to have it replaced. Thankfully, the company took full financial responsibility for the device and all related hospital and doctor costs. That was quite a blessing, but she still had to go through the inconvenience of another surgery and a small setback with the device. Since October, by my observation, she is doing very well. The progress seems painfully slow at times, but if you step back and consider how she was feeling/how many seizures she was having from now to last May, the change is dramatic and quite impressive. For example, she went through our cousin’s wedding last Saturday without any seizures, and none the next day either! Normally busy days like that bring about a couple bad days of seizures. She is still having seizures, but definitely not as many as she did!

She is still having the device turned up gradually, and has quite a way to go to reach the maximum potential of the device (good news, really, as that keeps us hopeful for more improvement). She still is on a lot of medications, and it seems that the doctors are waiting for her to stabilize prior to bringing her down from them.

So in all, things are going well, and we continue to thank God for His gracious care of my sister! Please keep praying that they will be able to bring the seizures under control and that she would be able to start coming off the medications. Thank you!

I just wanted to update you on how Sara’s been. (By the way, yesterday - July 22nd - was her birthday… Happy Birthday Sara!) Sara returned to the doctor to have her device turned up again on July 12. They now have it set on .75 millivolts every 3 minutes. Sadly, she did have a grand mal seizure on July 14, BUT it had been 2 whole months since her previous one!!! Going from several a week to one in 2 months is an amazing, miraculous improvement which we are extremely grateful to God for!!! She does feel better day-to-day, and has been able to do more. She is even allowed to stay home alone sometimes, which she was looking forward to (of course she loves all the time she gets to spend with people, but I think she enjoys being able to do her laundry and dishes as well!).

The magnet is helpful as well. Even Seth and little Hana have learned to use the magnet on her with good success. This is a blessing, as it pulls her out of a seizure when she’s already started one. The doctor says that only 20% of patients respond to it at all, so it’s wonderful that it helps her!

Thank you for all of your continued prayers and help!!! Sara, and our whole family, appreciate it so much!!! God has been very good to us!!!

p.s. Sara is attempting to put together a thank-you card list. While we think that it is pretty extensive, we wouldn’t want to leave anyone off. Please let us know if you don’t get a card in the next month or so.

Mark’s son Luke got married to Christina Martin on June 9. It was a beautiful wedding, held at the Riddering’s home. Sue worked hard to see that thousands of beautiful wildflowers bloomed just in time, and the rest of the back yard looked spectacular as well. They were married by our pastor and Christina’s brother, Josh Martin. Luke swept Christina up for the recessional to “Eye of the Tiger” (Rocky theme song). Check out a few pictures in our photos section! We were helped all along the way by amazing family and friends… without whom it would have been impossible. Once again, we felt incredibly blessed to have the aid of so many wonderful people! Thank you to all of you who helped–you made it a perfect day! Check out the Photos section to see more pictures!

In other news, Sara visited the doctor again (on June 12). She got the frequency of her device turned up this time. So, now she receives 0.5 millivolts every 5 minutes (it was every 15 minutes before). She also got the go-ahead to start reducing one of the bad meds. It will be an adjustment as I hear it can be hard to come off of them. But, she seems to be adjusting well so far, with just normal tiredness. We keep praying that God will sustain her and are sooo happy about the dramatic improvement!!! She still has not had a grand mal seizure since the device was turned on–amazing! Praise and thanks to God for using this device.

Sara is very happy and looks forward to her next adjustment, after which the doctor said she will be able to start decreasing her medications!!! This will be an exciting step. I (Sami) got to see her using her magnet last weekend and was impressed with how quickly it pulled her out of an absence seizure. Within seconds she was continuing the same conversation, with little affect from the seizure.

Thank you for all your love, prayers and constant support!

PS. Happy Memorial Day!!!!!

They started today by turning the device on and setting it with a low voltage (0.25 millivolts). They will continue to raise the voltage over the next year or so, up to a maximum of 3.0 millivolts.

We are grateful that Sara is not feeling some of the more painful and annoying side effects! It sounds like there is only a small tightening in her throat. This is good, as that means the doctors will be able to turn it up faster.

We are thankful that Sara seems to be adjusting well. We continue to pray that God would use this new therapy to heal Sara, and we ask that he would grant us patience as this will be a long process.

Thank you for your prayers!!!

Oh yeah… make sure you check out Mark’s new story: Batter Up!