Obituary of Jane Clayton Indruk
It is with profound sadness that we announce the death of Jane Clayton Indruk.
Jane in her 75 years brought incredible kindness, understanding, determination, thoughtfulness, energy, enthusiasm and joy to the many roles she played as daughter, sister, wife, mother, grandmother, nurse and friend.
Jane was born on February 20, 1951 to “Big Jack” and Carroll Clayton in Washington, DC and later lived in Bayonne, NJ, Carmel, IN and Lake Shawnee, NJ before moving to Glen Ridge, where she attended high school and as the oldest of seven shared a household bursting with both chaos and love. She graduated from the Mountainside Hospital School of Nursing in 1972 and held several positions at Mountainside before earning her Advanced Practice degree from Columbia. She lived in Montclair, with Mountainside as her second home, and she received the Schumann Award for nursing excellence, rode the Mobile Intensive Care Unit as its first nurse, joined the nursing school faculty as an academic and clinical instructor, was instrumental in establishing its emergency medicine rotation and served as both clinical nurse and nurse educator in the ED for years.
Being an exceptional nurse was a big part—but only a part—of the incredibly rich life she led.
Jane leaves wonderful memories in the lives of the family for whom she has been the never-ending source of encouragement, advice, guidance, happiness and most of all love.
And she was the light of the life of Bill, her husband of 40 years, with whom she raised their children in Montclair and worked for decades in the Emergency Department at Mountainside, went on annual medical missions to Honduras with the Henry B. King Medical Brigade and innumerable memorable trips to celebrate birthdays, holidays or life itself.
Jane leaves behind an amazing family, with daughters Elizabeth (Joseph) Ferraiolo, Lauren (Ian) Moreno, and step-son Gregory Indruk and his partner Christina. Her seven grandchildren—Liz’s Thomas(17) and Grace(13), Lauren’s Savannah(9), William(6), Christopher(4), and Caroline(2), and Greg’s Wesley(4)—were the source of unending pride and delight as she watched each of them emerge to become the remarkable people who filled her days with such happiness. There was nothing Jane loved more than watching Thomas pitch at his baseball games or watching Gracie sing her heart out on stage—including at Disneyworld. She could always be found at Savannah’s school performances or field hockey games, and she sat bundled in blankets on the sidelines of William’s 8 AM soccer games. Jane worked diligently with Christopher’s letters to prepare him for kindergarten, and she loved building legos with him and Wesley. Helping a third generation learn to ski was for Jane the fulfillment of a long-standing goal, and reading to a delighted Caroline on her lap was for her pure joy.
She never tired of hearing (and when necessary guiding) the life adventures of her siblings—Elizabeth (Bill) Buchanan, John (Debbie), Roger (Laurie), Bill (Jeannie), Thomas (Joan), and Robert (Eleanor)—and the nieces and nephews (and great nieces and nephews) they brought into her life.
Countless others meant the world to Jane: the staff at Mountainside, the nursing students she taught and mentored, the thousands and thousands of patients she cared for, and her many friends in Montclair and then those in Indian Lake who made living in Denville for the past 13 years a very, very special part of her life. Jane loved the literally hundreds of Wednesday dinners, birthday celebrations and clubhouse events she shared with her wonderful friends here, and they provided love, support and then, at the direst of times, food for her family. She cherished it all.
She never tired of telling them all how lucky she was to have them in her world. They all knew that they were in fact the lucky ones.
Jane was a planner. She had the vision and the imagination and the energy to decorate houses (including a surprise ski house for the kids) , plan weddings (for her birth daughters and surrogate daughter Allison), family vacations (to Europe, Mexico, Hawaii, Canada, Disneyworld, the Grand Canyon, Yosemite and, yes, Philadelphia), skiing lessons, Easter egg hunts, the Fourth of July, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and most importantly Christmas celebrations complete with Advent calendar gifts for each and every grandchild and annual trips to Macy’s Santaland and Rockefeller Center. And she never let her illness slow her down.
Jane was more grateful than she could ever express to Dr. Wang, Katy and Jen at Memorial Sloan Kettering in Montvale and to Dr. Stubblefield and Marissa at The Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation in West Orange for providing limitless assistance and hope in bringing her on her incredible journey from cancer-ridden paralysis to being the loving grandmother who fulfilled the dream of walking miles through London and Paris with her adoring granddaughter Gracie.
Jane is also grateful to the numerous friends who have sent her heartfelt messages of gratitude for the tremendous role she played in their lives—professional and otherwise—providing encouragement, expertise and unending kindness and generosity.
And most importantly, Jane’s wonderful magnanimity is manifest in the devotion of her daughters, Liz and Lauren, whose indefatigable efforts in the nearly four years since Jane’s diagnosis had her admitted to the best possible facilities, saw her through protracted difficult hospitalizations, oversaw the renovations that allowed her to come home despite profound disability and provided Jane with constant care in her final days so she could, as she wished, spend them at home. Their actions represent the true selfless love that their mother demonstrated throughout her life in all the many roles she played so beautifully.
If you wish to honor Jane in a way most meaningful to her, the family would appreciate a memorial donation to The Henry B. King Medical Bridgade (https://henrybkingmedicalbrigade.com/), Memorial Sloan Kettering (giving.mskcc.org), or Kessler (Kesslerfoundation.org) in recognition of the enormous roles they played in her remarkable saga of science, courage and determination.
We ask that everyone who was ever fortunate enough to know Jane keep her memory alive by bringing selfless kindness into the world.
A celebration of Jane’s wonderful life will be planned in the future.
