The Words - An Autobiography

The Greatest Loss

In the morning, I knew my wife wasn't just feeling under the weather, like the awful, achy case of the flu that I felt I was suffering. Something was terribly, catastrophically wrong. Somehow, she'd made a mistake. A terrible, terrible mistake, and there was nothing anyone could do. There were no do-overs. There was no way to take it back. There was no way to undo the procedure.

Several horrific days later, I lost her. Does that statement seem too abrupt and stark? For me, the experience was every bit that abrupt and stark, as it is for anyone who loses the person most dear to them without any forewarning, especially when we expected that we were beginning our journey of forever together. At least, I expected that we were.

Does Hell Exist? That is a question you've often asked. And based on my experience, Yes, I believe it does.

The period following my wife's death was one of loss and intense pain, physical and of every other sort known to man, fogged thoughts and vaguely remembered events. Days that I remember about as clearly as those absences of my early childhood. I vaguely recall one of our doctors explaining what had gone wrong or trying his best because he wasn't entirely sure himself, nor did anyone else appear to be. Yes, in general terms, we all knew, but the why...?

I remember holding my wife's hand after we'd determined there was no longer any hope, and I'd had to make the most horrendously impossible decision I'd ever faced. Keeping her on life support would only extend her suffering, her body's self-destruction to its inevitable conclusion. Her final words were her request for me to let her go and live forever.

Fulfilling the first part of her request felt like ripping my own heart from my chest, then listening hopelessly as the beeps from the monitors slowed. Her breaths grew farther apart, irregular, stopping a moment before she gasped another, each torturously seeming to be the last, until I sat in stunned numbness, waiting for another breath that would never come. I watched a flat line on the monitor and listened to the shrill scream that filled her room until someone had the kindness to turn it off.

I don't remember how long I sat in silence before my numbness gave way to grief so profound I didn't believe I could survive. I sobbed uncontrollably, holding my dead wife's body, with tears and snot pouring from my eyes and nose, soaking her hospital gown. When I was told it was time for them to take her from me, I held her hand and didn't want to let her go. It was another loss I wasn't ready to endure.

She'd said other things to me as she drifted in and out before losing consciousness forever. She said she loved me. She'd told me she was sorry. She was happy I would have forever. She wished she could share it with me. Then she'd mumbled other things that made no sense at the time, that it wouldn't have been long anyway and that I would never have done it otherwise.

I don't recall telling the people at the hospital what arrangements I wanted because I was unprepared to think of such things. My administrative team came to my aid, responding to my telepathic scream of inconsolable grief, which must have echoed throughout the entirety of Virtuality. Bob and my brother were there as well. I don't remember any conversations I might have had with them or anyone else.

I know there were visitation hours at a funeral home, where I stood for blank periods staring down at my wife's lifeless body in disbelief and despair. I must have spoken to people, shaken their hands, and accepted their hugs and condolences. I know I walked about, stared at the flowers and the cards, and recognized who had sent some of them at some deep distance.

I would assume that following the funeral, notes of appreciation were sent out. But, if they were, I had no involvement, at least none that I can remember, and I can't imagine how I'd have been able in the state I was in. Some combination of my administrative team, Bob, and my brother must have also taken care of this. I know I spoke at my wife's funeral and heard people express how beautiful and heartfelt my words were, but I don't recall a single one. But I have vague memories, flickering fragments of the procession to a cemetery that followed and her casket placed in the wall of a mausoleum - one more loss of her for me. And then I was alone. More alone than I'd ever thought possible.