A new day begins

Yesterday my brother sent out an email with a picture of him and Beth.He had been inundated with texts, phone calls, emails. It was an easy and fast way for him to let all those who were hanging on to hope to know that it was over. The email said "today at 10 AM I said goodbye to my wife." A short statement, but one packed with a lifetime of memories, and fresh, raw painful emotions. After four days of almost continuously being at her bedside, it was time for him to step away, to let her go, to pick up and go on. We stayed with him, but he insisted we all go in and say our goodbyes, and that he would be last. There would be no disconnecting of anything because she would be going up to the OR for the harvesting of her organs. We declined to come back later that evening to see her again when all the tubes would be gone, and her body would be lifeless and still. The neurologists had declared her brain dead, and that is officially legal enough for the death certificate even though her heart was still beating. She probably had left us long before, but there always has to be an offical time listed.

We left the hospital on a bright, sunny day. The world outside of the University of Pennyslvania hospital was bustling. The world was going on, even though ours had just come to a grinding halt. Last night friends and family went over to Ed and Beth's bringing food....lots of food. Sandwich trays for at least a hundred people. People want to do something, and the most obvious thing is to feed you. It's ironic how food is the center of everything. We sat around the house for hours. Friends dropped by, there was laughter, tears, and lot of memories talked about. It was joyous and painful all at the same time. The kids are devastated, and this was the hardest part watching them crying, and seeing them wondering how their world is going to be now without the woman who was the center of their lives. Oh how Beth would have never wanted this to happen to them, would have never wanted them to feel this kind of pain. She was a protective mother, and a devoted mother. She cherished her role as a mother and she loved it. She tried to protect them from hurt, and all the bad things of the world. Sadly, she is not here to protect them now, and her absence is the source of all their pain. A sad reality, but a true one.Life has dealt them a bad hand to play.

I think the funeral will be Wednesday. The weather has turned warmer here and it's sunny and beautiful today. She would have loved this type of day. I started to think about what to wear for the funeral. When you are not at the weight you want to be, I find that any social circumstance can cause a panic as to what to wear. I'm not at all panicked. I would go in my sweats. I don't care. But I know there is a protocol, so to my closet I go. Please God, let there be something black and funeral like. I don't have the energy to shop. So I find the dress, tags still on in my closet. I had bought it awhile back from a website that was offering it at a discount. A very steep discount. I think it was from Gilt. I bought it because it looked like the kind of dress everyone should have in their closet. Perfect for business, casual....even funerals. But when I bought it, it didn't fit. It should have. It was the right size. But to send it back would have cost half of what the dress cost. So I kept it.

This morning I put it on. It zipped right up. I don't love it, but it looks nice. Black, simple, but perfect for a funeral. I felt happy that it fit, and happy that I don't have to go shopping. I really don't want to go shopping right now. So unless something changes, I know what I am going to wear on Wednesday.
Even in these sad circumstances, this pleased me, because I am trying to eat the right way, and another stress is not what I need right now. I don't want to try on fifty things to see what zips, what looks okay, or what won't make me look like a stuffed sausage. I thought to myself, in good times or bad, there is always that stress. What do I wear, does it fit, do I look okay? I'm nowhere near where I want to be, but I'm closer than I was. So one less thing for me to think about right now.

So now I am putting together photos, and planning to go over later and help me brother plan to lay his wife to rest. He is cremating her as that is what she wanted. And this summer we are going to scatter her ashes on a beautiful summer evening on the beach that she so loved. This makes it so much easier than picking out a casket, and cemetary plot, and tombstone. Anything to make it easier for him is a blessing.

Again, I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your kind words of support and comfort. I would sit in that waiting room and look at  the emails on my phone and read something from one of you, and my heart just swelled with love and comfort. Those little posts kept me going because you all had no reason to care or cry along with me, but you did it out of the goodness inside of you. So many people, so much goodness coming to us. It helps.  God bless you all, and God bless Beth.