Claudia Del Carmen Sanchez De Mejia

Dinora Del Carmen Sanchez De Mejia, also known simply as Dinora Mejia, 60, of Woodbridge, Virginia passed away in the afternoon of Sunday January 10^th, 2021 at Sentara Northern Virginia Medical Center in Woodbridge, Virginia. She died due to complications caused by COVID-19. She became infected with the coronavirus sometime in the week of December 10^th, 2020 and had a confirmed positive test that same week. On December 16^th, 2020, she had to go to the hospital. Although the hospital was not allowing any visitors, they did allow her to have her cell phone. Therefore, family and friends called her, texted her, and did video calls with her as much as she could tolerate. The coronavirus made her extremely weak and out of breath therefore she could only have brief conversations. In those brief exchanges she did on her phone, family and friends expressed how much they cared for her, how much they loved her, how much they were praying for her, and how much they wanted her to come back home. The hospital also allowed for drinks to be brought to her and so her family would deliver her the juices and smoothies that she asked for. She was able to talk with family and friends and drink the juices and smoothies family and friends delivered for her until she became too weak to talk and too weak to eat and drink. Although family and friends could not be by her side, she left this world knowing without any doubt how much she was loved and how much she was going to be missed.

Dinora was born Friday April 15^th, 1960 in Canton Nueva Concepcion in the town of Chirilagua of San Miguel department in the country of El Salvador. She was born to Natividad Sanchez, her mother, and Santos Lara, her father. She grew up in the town of Zapatagua which was a rural town near Chirilagua. Dinora would live most of her childhood in Zapatagua before she was sent to the United States, still in her teens.

Before Dinora was sent to the United States, she met a boy named Andres who would later become the love of her life. She met him at a school party she was at with her sisters. Andres approached her pretending to look depressed and saying he was supposed to be on another date and that the other girl was a no show. The story goes that she laughed off this kind of advance but hung out with Andres anyway. Soon the party was over, so she went home for the day. However, days later they would meet up. Eventually they would see each other more frequently and soon they were meeting at a particular spot under a now famous tree (famous in the family that is). Dinora’s father was not particularly fond of this situation and so eventually her father arranged for her to leave El Salvador to head to the United States to live with her older sister.

The older sister that Dinora went to go live with was named Fredisvinda. Fredisvinda was much older than Dinora, at least 10 years older. Yet they were the closest among all the siblings of Dinora. Fredisvinda had moved to California and was building a life and family of her own there. A little time would pass before Andres came to the United States in pursuit of Dinora and they would reunite.

Dinora and Andres dated for some time. After some time, they received the blessing of Dinora’s sister Fredisvinda and got married. Dinora and Andres later moved to Washington DC in pursuit of better opportunities. It was in Washington DC where they would give birth to their first child and daughter Claudia.

After some time, they had another child, their first son who they decided to also name Andres. At this point with the family now bigger they decided it was time for a bigger home. They sought and eventually settled for a single-family home in Woodbridge Virginia. It is this home where Dinora would spend the rest of her life.

Dinora and Andres would have two more children. Another son who they named Guillermo, and another daughter who they named Naomi.

Throughout Dinora’s life, there were arts that she sought to excel at and that was the culinary arts. There were many dishes that she loved to make. Some of these dishes were Salvadoran dishes that are better known in their Salvadoran names. These dishes included pupusas, tamales, panes rellenos con pollo, sopa de res, carne asada, sopa de modongo, huevos con chorizo, plátanos fritos, yuca y chicharrón, pastelitos de carne, pescado rellenos, arroz con leche, atol de elote, quesadilla, horchata, and fresco de tamarindo. Dinora loved to cook and this was a love she held on to until her last days.

Dinora was a devout Christian, Catholic to be exact. She would always leave the Bible open at Psalm 91, a song about God’s protection. She gathered and displayed around her house many ornaments of angels and of crosses. She also kept various portraits of Jesus that would be hung on the walls of the house or set on the furniture. When she was not busy cooking or doing other chores, her pastime was to go on YouTube and listen to many sermons given by priests. She also liked to watch or rather listen to videos of priests that would simply read verses of the Bible word for word. When there was time to go on short outings, she would take trips to the National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes which was in Maryland.

Dinora was a loving wife. She loved her husband Andres immensely. She would encourage her husband in his work and did what she could to support him. She was supportive of her husband’s idea to build a retirement home in their native country of El Salvador, which her husband succeeded in. Dinora is predeceased by her husband who died of cancer less than two years before Dinora’s passing. In the final days of her husband’s life, Dinora did all that she could do to save his life, and then when it was determined that her husband’s cancer was terminal, she did all she could do to make him as comfortable as possible.

Dinora was a loving mother. She would always say “I love you four equally”, speaking of her four children when a question of which of her children she loved more would come up. She strived to provide for all her children as best she could. Food, clothing, a home, comfort when her children were sick as well as when they were well, and of course motherly love.

Dinora was a loving daughter. After she left El Salvador, she kept in touch with her parents as best she could. When Dinora’s mother became very old and deaf, she offered her mother assistance by taking her to doctors to see what can be done about her loss of hearing and also to offer her a better quality of life. It pained her immensely when her mother died several years ago. Dinora’s relationship with her father was a tough relationship. Her father was a prideful man with a mind towards loving his sons more than his daughters. Still Dinora loved her father. Her father became so old and frail that he could no longer get out of his bed. In the days that Dinora would go see him in his death bed in El Salvador, she got his father cleaned, shaved, given a fresh haircut, changed into fresh cloths, and fed with his favorite foods, the foods that were still possible for him to eat. She felt great sorrow when her father passed away, which happened to be during the pandemic though her father simply died of old age and not because of COVID. Dinora was unable to go to her father’s funeral due to the pandemic, so instead she took the comfort that her daughters offered who knew full well what it was like for a daughter to lose a father.

Dinora was a loving sister. She strived to be a good sister to her fellow siblings. As mentioned earlier, there was one sister who she was particularly close to. That was her sister Fredisvinda. She loved her sister Fredisvinda. They had an age gap of 10 years, Dinora being the younger sister, yet they treated each other like the best of friends. It meant so much for Dinora to receive the blessing of her sister Fredisvinda to marry her husband Andres and depart to Washington DC. The years would go by and they would keep in touch frequently. They would even visit each other from time to time, Dinora taking trips to California and Fredisvinda taking trips to Virginia. Dinora is predeceased by Fredisvinda by several years, Fredisvinda having passed away due to cancer. The death of her sister due to cancer caused her great pain but ultimately gave her the strength and fortitude she had when she comforted her husband with his struggles with cancer.

Dinora was a loving friend. She made many friends throughout her life, at church, at her workplace, and on her travels. There were friends she would go to the beach with, some she would travel with to El Salvador, and even some she simply went to the store with.

Dinora is missed immensely by her family and friends. Though she is no longer with us in body, the memory of her remains strong in the minds and hearts of loved ones. May she rest in peace.

Dinora is survived by her children Andres, Guillermo, and Naomi. Dinora’s first child and daughter Claudia also survived Dinora but sadly Claudia only survived Dinora for two days before she too fell victim to COVID-19. Dinora is predeceased by her husband Andres who died on Saturday April 6^th, 2019 due to cancer.

It was Dinora’s wish to be together with her husband Andres upon her death and it was both Dinora’s and her husband’s wish to be interned in El Salvador. Her husband was cremated therefore Dinora was also cremated and placed in a single urn of two compartments, one with her ashes and one with the ashes of her husband. A service and life celebration will be held at a later date.

The internment of Dinora’s and her husband’s ashes is planned to be done in El Salvador. The exact time and place will be determined at a later date.