The month of March brings many mixed emotions every year when it arrives. Growing up in North Dakota, I loved March: It was my birth month, the start of the NCAA Basketball Tournament, the Easter holiday weekend would arrive some years, and the piles of snow would begin to melt. I could always associate happy thoughts with March. However, when March arrived in 2011, that joy was ripped away from me. On March 13th, 2011, my first wife, Wendy, died from Stage IV Breast Cancer. I became a 37-year-old widower. 

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MY LIFE WITH WENDY

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                Wendy and I got married the same day I left for the Iraq war in 2003. We had originally set a date later than that; however, the United States Marine Corps deployment orders arrived sooner than expected. We made quick arrangements with the county clerk's office that was down the road from our apartment. After a brief ceremony and marriage certification, we drove to the airport for me to deploy to war.

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               Upon my return, we bought a house to establish our life together in northern San Diego county. Wendy became a popular special education teacher at the local middle school. Every year, she asked me to be a guest in her classroom while wearing my flight suit and bringing different equipment Marines were issued. It was her way to motivate her class to dream beyond the Special Education system. 

 

                Our shared interests took us to many different destinations. We considered Las Vegas our most-visited venue. We had many reasons to make the 5-hour drive up there: a Marine Corps Ball, a tribute party for the Casualty Evacuation Pilots, someone's birthday, or when Sting played a concert in town. One of the first things we bonded over was our respective collections of Sting and The Police CDs.

 

               Wendy's favorite color was purple. She was happy when the Marine Corps assigned me to the "Purple Foxes" squadron after flight school, and she enjoyed being a member of "the Foxy Ladies" spouse group. During my second deployment to Iraq in 2005, Wendy painted the guest bedroom periwinkle. The color choice seemed to match the décor of the room she had created. If she had more opportunity, I'd bet there would have been more purple in the house.

 

              Wendy's favorite holiday was Halloween. Every year, she wanted us to dress up and decorate the house. She probably had more decorations for Halloween than she did for Christmas. She would come up with terrific costumes from her own closet. Wendy made sure there was a different Halloween costume for school each year so she would not hear from her students that she wore that already! Children have an excellent memory for those things. She enjoyed the trick-or-treaters coming to the house and was quick to recognize everyone's costume. Wendy would hand everyone one piece of candy and one pencil; she did not like handing out something that was not useful.

 

 

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

 

                On December 4th, 2006, I received an email from Wendy: "Please call home." I was back in Iraq on my third combat tour in the country. When she answered the phone call, she told me that she had found a lump in her breast. A year before we met, Wendy had a cancerous tumor removed and had lost her mother to breast cancer in the same year. This time, she had already gone to the doctor: the diagnosis was Stage IV Breast Cancer. She was scared, and I was scared for her. Wendy did not ask me to request an early return from the deployment. Knowing how vital our casualty evacuation mission in Iraq was, she wanted me to continue to contribute to saving lives.

 

                Wendy strongly believed in defeating cancer by living healthy, exercising, and watching her diet. She did not like the idea of poisoning her body to kill off the cancer cells. If her time on earth was going to be limited, she wanted to enjoy the remaining time feeling her best. For the next three years, I was assigned to a flight school squadron where I could remain in the U.S. and train new helicopter pilots. Wendy and I took trips whenever we had time to get out of town. I even had some training trips where she could meet up with me at the destination. 

 

                In the spring of 2010, Wendy's cancer started affecting her lymphatic system. It was time to look at treatment more seriously. We flew to Houston, TX, to see an oncologist whose work Wendy was fascinated by. She had read a few of his books that gave her hope that she would not have to do chemotherapy and radiation. After a few appointments with the doctor's junior oncologists, Wendy felt disappointed in the whole system. While I returned to work, she decided to stay another week to raise her concerns with the chief oncologist. Wendy expected the doctor would keep her hopes alive with his system. Her best friend stayed with her in Houston to support her while I was back in Southern California.

 

                She got the meeting she wanted. It took place in the clinic's conference room. Wendy and her friend sat at a long table with the chief medical doctor and his staff of senior oncologists. The news was disappointing: he could not assist her the way she wanted. He and his team of oncologists suggested she commence chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

 

                Wendy came home defeated. She knew the hard times were about to begin. Returning to her local oncologist, they put together a plan to start with radiation therapy. If the radiation did not help, they would try chemotherapy next. My squadron was very accommodating by letting me take Wendy to her appointments. The treatments did not make her feel well. She could only eat simple meals, which were gentle on her stomach. We spent many of our evenings in tears. Wendy hated how the chemo made her feel. I do not know if my cheerleading had any impact on her. Or did it irritate her? 

 

                The evening after New Years Day 2011, I had to make a 911 call to get Wendy some help. Her dad was visiting us from Florida at the time. The paramedics transported Wendy to the hospital, and her dad and I were able to rejoin her in the Emergency Room. They had her on oxygen and an IV with medicine. When she stabilized, the doctors moved her to the Intensive Care Unit. Wendy's dad and I stayed with her the entire time; he slept on the portable bed, and I slept on the chair. 

 

                After five weeks of care and treatment, Wendy was strong enough to come home. We were able to make the necessary adjustments around the house to help with her new meal plans. Wendy lost her voice because of a tumor pressing against the nerves; I bought her a karaoke machine so she could talk to me without straining. Wendy still had to do radiation treatment on an outpatient basis to address new tumors that were forming near her brain. She managed to make all the appointments.

 

 

THE MONTH OF MARCH

 

              My mother had come from North Dakota to assist me with providing care for Wendy. One night, Wendy and I were getting ready to go to bed. The television in the bedroom was on ESPN playing a college basketball game. As Wendy was getting settled in bed, she pointed at the television, "I love this Seinfeld episode. This is where George does that thing." I looked back at the television, thinking she had changed the channel. No, it was still on basketball. I asked Wendy which episode was she watching. "You know, where George is trying to score on his date," she answered.  

 

                I noticed her breathing was more labored, and it wasn't from laughing. I stepped out of the bedroom with my cell phone and dialed 911. My mom came out of the guest room across the hallway. She saw what was happening and went to Wendy to comfort her. The paramedics arrived promptly. They asked Wendy several questions, and she struggled to give them a coherent answer. Giving her an oxygen mask, they set her up on a gurney to bring her down the stairs to the ambulance. 

 

                The doctors spent the next two weeks helping her. However, the cancer was getting more and more aggressive. It was so bad that it was causing fluid to form near her lungs. When the conversation turned to putting Wendy on a morphine drip, it hit me hard that the end was near. The house needed to be cleaned up and organized for the hospice equipment to be delivered. 

 

                Wendy's dad arrived again from Florida as Wendy was being brought back home for hospice care. I ensured all the guests had a room to stay in while I situated myself on the couch in the living room next to Wendy's hospital bed.

 

                The morning after her return home, I woke up to hear Wendy aggressively fighting through the morphine haze. I helped the hospice nurse get Wendy into a more comfortable position. While the nurse was cleaning Wendy up, I went upstairs to collect everyone. We gathered around Wendy as she was still fighting to hang on to her breath. We each told her that it was okay for her to go on. She should be with her mother. At 7:05 am on Sunday, March 13th, 2011, Wendy let out her last breath.

 

 

THE TEN-YEAR JOURNEY

 

                In the aftermath of Wendy's passing, I received advice from many people who thought they were helping me. Everyone had my best interests in mind, but their words were not very beneficial. Most of the advice was coming from individuals who had never experienced the loss of a spouse. I will not give examples of those "not so good" pieces of advice because I know the people who supplied them were well-intentioned. 

 

                I joined an online support group, "Widows Too Young." This group showed me the importance of differentiating between who had sound advice and who had just "opinions." As callous as this sounds, the group helped me to mentally separate the people around me into two groups: The "get-its" (GIs) and the "don't get-its" (DGIs). Understanding these groups is how you can assess the validity of the advice you are receiving. The GI group breaks further into two sub-categories: the less-than-one-year after losing a spouse and the greater-than-one-year after losing a spouse. The one-year mark is deemed significant in which the widow or widower sets a point in their life to move forward in their new world independently. 

 

                Within the support group, I met virtually with other widows and widowers in their thirties, who shared their stories and feelings—especially their concerns and fears about what happens next. There is a stigma in which young widows and widowers are susceptible to the DGIs' opinions. It seems like every person has their ideas of what a young widow or widower should be doing. However, it does not truly work how anyone planned it out. I remember feeling I could only be married once and endure the remainder of my life without a spouse because of my love for Wendy. The DGIs in my life reiterated those ideals to me.

 

                One day, I was digging around the group forums, lost in my grief with the others who were in the same position I was. A message was waiting for me in my inbox. It was from a widow in the Atlanta area who had lost her husband about the same time as Wendy's passing. The widow was a year younger than me, went to college at the university near my house, and had grown up in Southern California.

 

                I quickly replied to her message, sharing my story with her. I might have accidentally called her Alice when her name is Alise. In our message communications, we established that we had many shared interests, fears, and dreams for our futures. Being daring, we scheduled an evening to talk on the phone.  We maintained our disciplined about not stalking each other over social media or search portals. When the evening phone call finally occurred, we talked for hours. We did not hang up until she had to get ready for work. With the three-hour time difference, we managed to talk through the whole night: laughing, crying, and sharing stories close to our hearts about our lost spouses. 

 

                We spent the next few months calling each other after work. We would share events that reminded us of our late spouses, which flooded us with strong feelings. There were times one of us would share our fear of the future. 

 

                Eventually, we took the chance to meet up with each other at a neutral location. This meeting would be hard to keep from family and friends, but we knew it was vital for us to share time and determine our trust in each other. We had a spectacular weekend together. We got along well, talked all day and night, and enjoyed each other's company.

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                Fast-forward another year, and Alise and I decided to start a life together in the same location. We found ourselves a house in San Marcos, CA, where she could still work remotely for her Atlanta-based company. Later, I would propose to her, and we have been married for over six years. Alise and I have been together from beginning to present longer than we each were with our late spouses.  And now, we are also business partners, lifting others to build greater communities. 

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