Who Goes First
Me or my wife
There is a piece called Baby Affair on Facebook getting a lot of play and “shares.” It tells of the long marriage of a couple as related to the children by their father whose wife had just made her transition.
The night of the funeral, he told their children that he wanted to go to the cemetery. The children balked and he insisted so they went. Upon arrival at the cemetery, he explained how their over half-century of living together and sharing had been.
About how it was much more than the wedding ceremony, work, sex, and the many other things that are thought of when a marriage is considered.
He then closed with “…Children, that’s all gone and I’m happy tonight. Do you know why I’m happy? Because she left before me. She didn’t have to go through the agony and pain of burying me, of being left alone after my departure. I will be the one to go through that, and I thank God for that. I love her so much that I wouldn’t have liked her to suffer…”
When my wife of 42+ years Carol was in a coma in the hospital last year, I was approached by the doctors and advised of her condition and the improbability of a pain-free, decent recovery. I was also advised of the kind of lifestyle she would have IF she were ever to come out of the coma.
She would be clinically alive but probably still in a coma and on total life support, as she was at this time. She would be in a hospital bed with tubes giving her everything she needed to survive. We had talked about this before and both of us said we wanted none of that.
They were asking my “permission” to remove her from life support.
It was not easy at all but it was very simple what I should do next. I had one of our daughters in the room with me and she had heard and knew the same as I did. I simply said “God, help me,” reflected for a brief moment, and then told them to remove her from life support.
Of course, I was not happy with the circumstances, but I was at peace with my decision and have never wavered in this.
We then went into the room that Carol was in along with our children, some grandchildren, and two of Carol’s sisters. I told them of my decision and it was met with mixed reactions. Our children understood and most of the others did too.
When we married in 1980, combining two families of children at or near the teenage was not an easy task. Carol left her job to be a referee and, after supper, we would check to see that no big problems were going on.
Carol was exhausted so we then would pick up a couple of large cups of Dunkin Donut coffee to go and head to Kensington Metropark to count the deer and park at the top of a high hill and just talk.
The spot we would park gave us a view of the lights from Ann Arbor, 30 miles away. We considered it “our spot” and even bought a young tree that the park planted at our spot. The tree was only inches long at the time. We knew that this was where our ashes were to be spread because of our deep, loving history there.
The first ashes to be spread there were Sunshine’s, our first Greyhound. The tree grew tall and straight. The photo at the beginning of this story is of our spot and our tree. Carol’s ashes lie at the base of the tree with those of Sunshine while their spirits still fill us all with their love.
Children and their spouses, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren met and joined Oreo and me and we spread Carol’s ashes at the base of this beautiful tree. Oreo and I still go there to make sure all is still well.
And it always is.
I understand fully what the father in the above story, Baby Affair, was feeling when he explained why he was grateful that his wife passed first. I, too, am grateful that Carol passed before I did.
I know the pain and agony I have gone through with Carol’s passing and am grateful to God that she will not have to endure the same if the positions were reversed and I had not been there to hold her hand.
Thank you, God!
Please engage.
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More from the list: “Curated Collection V10 — ILLUMINATION”
Curated by Aiden (Illumination Gaming)