Obituary of Salwa Elias Parhad

Salwa Elias (Madalo) Parhad, 82, passed away peacefully at home on March 11, 2025 after a long illness.  Salwa was born in Alqosh, a small and beautiful Chaldean village in northern Iraq, on September 25, 1942 to Elias and Wareena (Audo) Madalo, the fourth of nine children.

The family was well known in Alqosh, as her father was the much beloved and highly regarded school principal in the village.  As a young teen, Salwa embarked on her first adventure, moving to Baghdad with her younger brother Sami, living with their uncle’s family so that they could attend high school in the capital.

Salwa was a hard worker and an excellent student, and decided to pursue medicine – a bit of a departure in her family of teachers and engineers.  At University of Baghdad Medical College, Salwa met Harvey Parhad, the only son of an Assyrian-German family, and shyly and patiently waited for him to work up the nerve to talk to her.  They married in Baghdad in 1968.  Three years later, with their two-year old son Raymond in tow and their daughter Rita on the way, they embarked on the next adventure, leaving Baghdad for London, landing in a place so different from everything Salwa had known.  Despite the culture shock and missing her family desperately, Salwa adored London, and was delighted to host visits from her parents and many of her siblings during the five happy years she and Harvey lived there.  After the birth of their last child Edward, they made their way to the US, first to Newtown, CT and eventually settling in Vernon Hills, IL, where they lived for forty years. 

Together with Harvey, Salwa worked as a psychiatrist at the VA Medical Center in North Chicago (now the Captain James A. Lovell Federal Health Care Center), specializing in geriatric psychiatry and dedicating over thirty years of her life to treating veterans in her adopted homeland. 

After retiring from the VA, Salwa and Harvey made their final move to a condo in Chicago, leaving a home they loved to be closer to their children.  After a lifetime of big moves and adapting to new places, this final and shortest move was perhaps the most difficult – especially after the loss of her beloved Harvey in 2022, after 53 years of marriage and true partnership.

Salwa is survived by her three children Raymond, Rita (Steve DeAtley), and Edward Parhad, and three grandchildren, Olivia and Evan Parhad and Sophia Parhad DeAtley; her four sisters Sultana (Hermiz) Hanna, Samira Qillo, Sahera (Noail) Jabrail, and Souad (Hani) Sulaiman, and her three brothers Sami (Ingrid) Madalo, Salim (Najlah) Madalo, and Saeed Madalo, and many loving nieces and nephews.  She is preceded in death by her husband Harvey, both her parents, her elder brother Samir Madalo, her brother-in-law Rahim Qillo, and her sister-in-law Faeza Madalo.

The Parhad family is grateful for the excellent care Salwa received from her team of loving caregivers and from Unity Hospice Chicago.

Services will be held on Saturday, March 22, 2025 at St Joseph Catholic Church, 121 E. Maple Ave, Libertyville, IL.  Visitation begins at 9:15am and funeral mass begins at 10am, followed by interment at Ascension Catholic Cemetery.

In lieu of flowers, please consider making a donation to Catholic Relief Services or Médecins Sans Frontières.