Paige Doreen Asten, 82

Paige Doreen Asten (Florence Doreen Stahl), born December 1, 1942, to Blanche Marie (Brant) and Wayne Seral Stahl in Somerset, Pennsylvania; died April 14, 2025, at Mustang Creek Estates of Sachse, Texas. Paige lived close to her sons and grandchildren for the last year of her life.

To tell you of her life would be worthy of an epic novel that she loved reading. A mystery novel with a heroine who forged her path, realized her dreams, and helped others along the way. Her car broke down in Texas, and she didn't mean to stay. In 1969, she married Kenneth Townsend, and they raised four children. In 1986, she married the love of her life, Hervey Perez. With his help, she opened the Asten Center of Natural Therapeutics. In 1973, her daughter Diana was hurt in a car accident. That event shaped her life into helping not only her daughter recover and thrive, but to share that knowledge with others.

Paige began her massage career in the backroom of a spa, giving "not those types of massages." By 1977, she was an American Massage & Therapy Association member. Over the years, she held many board positions on the state level, both in the Texas and Montana Chapters, and at the national level within this organization. She was a Texas Massage Therapy Association member, an Ordained Reverend of the Bridge of Light. She has held numerous certificates in sports massage therapy, reflexology, hydrotherapy, cranial therapy, Swedish massage, etc. She helped to shape the laws regulating massage therapy schools and massage therapists in Texas. After moving to Montana in 1989, she spent many years traveling the state working with massage therapists and legislators to write a law ensuring that massage practitioners were educated and licensed.

In 1983, Paige officially opened "The Asten Center" to train massage therapists. Hervey was one of her first students. Over the years, he encouraged her to take risks, think of their profession on a national level, never settle, dream big, and achieve the impossible. Which together they did. Over the years, they taught thousands of students their profession through their school and seminars, both in Texas (South) and Montana (North).

Paige was active in their chosen community of Whitehall. She helped line the streets with Christmas wreaths and banners. The Asten Center was often the sight of packing eggs for the annual Easter Egg Hunt. Paige made sure Hervey was suited up to play Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. The Ambulance crew always enjoyed her baking skills. She continued her love of providing education by sitting on the board of P.U.L.S.E.

Her legacy is one that makes her children and grandchildren proud: that one is not too young to learn, that you can change other people's lives through touch, that if you see a problem, you can fix it by being involved, and that everyone deserves to be treated with respect and dignity. Paige is preceded in death by her husband, Hervey Perez, and daughter, Diana Renee Townsend.

She is survived in Texas by sons Paul (Dao) Townsend, Steven (Rita) Townsend, and daughter-in-law Jill Larsen; grandchildren Katie (Daniel) Sample, Andrew, Donavon, Seth, Kattie, and Amy Townsend, and Emma and Elena Contreras. In Montana, she leaves behind daughter Elizabeth (Tim) Howser and grandchildren Thomas Townsend, Tristin, and Thaddeaus Howser.

Her children ask that you share a story about Paige and Hervey. What crazy thing do you remember about Hervey? What pearl of wisdom did Paige share? Also, remember them in your hearts because you were in theirs.

A Moment in Time by Paige Asten

Originally published in "Expressions," a supplement to the Richland College paper on December 3, 1984.

The very pregnant woman stands in a dimly lit hallway of the county hospital. She is staring at the double doors at the other end of "that" hallway. Bright lights stream through the glass upper portion of those doors, and she sees white clad figures moving hurriedly back and forth behind them. She looks down at the floor, 30 steps, and she can be at the doors, 60 squares of scarred tiles. She can tell you which ones are cracked, which ones have rust marks on them, and which ones need to be replaced.

Only five minutes inside the room is she allowed. Five minutes to be with her only daughter who lay so still and silent in that room hooked up to all those blinking, buzzing machines. They call them "life support systems." To her, they appear strange and menacing, as if any one of them will have the power to announce a horrible sentence.

The woman looks at her watch. It's time. She can go in now. She hurries down the hall, eyes on the doors, not noticing the other people in the hall also hurrying towards those doors, not seeing the tiles at her feet.

The doors open, someone beckons her inside, Hurry, please. She has difficulty getting her swollen body between the machines and the bed. She carefully avoids bumping any of the machines or pulling any cords as she maneuvers into position. She looks down at the white, lovely face that just weeks ago was so excited about the opening of school and her upcoming seventh birthday. Look quick, eyes flutter, they open. The little girl looks around, her eyes are wide and staring, she shudders, and her eyelids close again. The nurse watching quickly puts some white fluid into a syringe and injects it into the intravenous drip attached to her little girl's arm.

The nurse looks at the woman and, to answer her unspoken question, says it is to calm the stomach so that too much acid will not be produced. This is the first response the little girl has shown since being brought here. The woman clutches the rails on the side of the bed weakly, a bit faint. The baby inside her, so quiet these last few weeks, squirms and kicks a little.

Time is up; the woman must leave now. She again counts the tile squares as she slowly walks to the waiting room where she will sit reading, sewing and praying for the next two hours.

Two hours pass, and again the hurried walk down the hall, through those doors for another precious five minutes of time. How long has she marked her days in two-hour intervals? Weeks now, but it seems longer. The doctors say, "No hope, no hope." Her heart says, "Hope, hope." Her mind worries, she quiets her mind, and listens to her heart. Another trip down the hall, this time she senses something different. She holds her daughter's cold little hand and brushes back a wisp of stray hair. She picks up the small jewelry box with the twirling ballerina inside, winds it up, and opens the top so music will play. The nurses say they do this often, too.

Bless them for being so caring, surely she can still hear? The woman leans over the rail and kisses the little girl on the forehead. "Please, please, stay with us, we love you so much." Eyelids flutter open; this time, the eyes focus on the woman, a slight smile, and the little girl mouths the words, "I love you, Mommie," before her eyelids close again.

This time something is different, a peace, a knowing, a sharp cramp, a welcome cramp.

A new life to share. Tomorrow, the woman will have some special news for the little girl lying so still in the big hospital bed.

Tomorrow...