Article from Indian Country Today
By Gale Courey Toensing
A citizen of the Onondaga Nation, whose Snipe Clan name was Gowanahs, Tonya Gonnella Frichner left peacefully during the first hour of February 14, 2015 surrounded by family members and friends in her New Jersey home after a valiant decade-long battle with cancer. She was 67.
Being with Gonnella Frichner at the end of her life was a beautiful experience, Betty Lyons, Gonnella Frichner’s niece, told ICTMN. “I was laying next to her and holding her hand and it helped me to help her—and that’s how she was. She always made you feel good. Even in her death there was that generosity. She passed peacefully. Her husband was the most wonderful husband—he’s like a father to me. He made sure that she had exactly what she wanted right to the end—that she got home and had the peace of being surrounded with family. It was like a gift she gave to us to be with her when she passed. It’s not about what you do in this world, it’s about who you really are.”
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