Rachelle

Andre, Although I do not generally post (I actually have only written once before to thank everyone for the help I have received just from reading all the posts), I have to stop and take time to tell you how incredible your music videos are. This last one brought me to tears immediately. What a wonderful way to celebrate a very special person and relationship. You truly were blessed. I have few photos of my husband. He loved to take pictures of architecture, gardens and cityscapes, but we did not take many photos of each other. What I do have to remember and to celebrate him are the many creations he produced over the years and added to our home, the last one being the stained glass window he designed for my bathroom. I attached a photo of it to the one email I did send the list. I also have a few recordings of his singing and playing music and some beautiful pen and ink drawings. We were both blessed to have very special loves and will miss them for the rest of our lives. Attached is the photo that my husband Ed sent to the Pancreatic cancer website where he posted an essay on his illness in the hope that he could help others. He fought the disease very bravely for a full four years. He had a really wonderful sense of humor and worked hard to try to help others get through very difficult situations. Thank you for sharing. I will never say goodbye either and I have faith that one day Ed and I will be together again.

I am writing to thank everyone for their sharing and caring. I have lurked on this site for more than a year, shared your sorrows and gotten to know many of you through your writings. Reading your posts helped me through many of the same feelings that you have shared with us all. I will carry that empty hollow feeling, in place of a very unique and special love, for the rest of my life. The tears still come at the drop of the hat, although perhaps a little less frequently now. My husband Ed suffered through more than four years with pancreatic cancer, responding well to each treatment until the cancer mutated and kept going. Finally, having no more choices, the last experimental treatment destroyed his bone marrow and he went into home hospice. This disease does have a horrible end. The second anniversary of his death passed on November 30. We were two halves of a whole. We had no children and were married 33 years and were together longer. Besides our regular jobs, we were both artists and musicians and nurtured and shared our various talents, growing and learning together. Ed was a collector of records, books, CDs, videos, antiques, tools and many other things. He was a general contractor who worked out of the house and was always making the house his work of art, until he became too ill. My house was constantly under construction. I was left with many unfinished projects and much "stuff". It may take many years for me to dig out of the debris and finish my home. Many times I would read a post and want to reply, to give moral support, or suggest ways of coping, but was afraid I would get caught up in writing and not accomplish anything here . The way I have coped is by keeping busy to exhaustion all the time. I talk to him, especially to the beautiful stained glass window he designed and had made for my bathroom - which his helper brought up the ladder to the 2nd floor and Ed installed one week to the day before he died. I have attached a photo of the window. Ed was a Christian and converted to Catholicism. I am Jewish, but having been a singer in many churches, so was comfortable in accompanying him to church. Christmas, one month after he died, I visited both churches that he had attended and got through the holiday in prayer and song. I spent the first Thanksgiving at one of his brother's homes. A Mass was said on the first anniversary of his death, and I attended. I spent Christmas at his other brother's home. It helped ease the pain a bit. For our wedding anniversary, I decided to honor his memory instead of mourning and took myself to breakfast at the special restaurant we had gone to the morning after our wedding, and almost every anniversary thereafter. I cried a bit, but was glad I went. I am fortunate in that I have a good job and savings, which has lightened one kind of burden that some of you face. Having had a near death experience in my 20's. I know that I will see my love again, when my time here is over, as you will see yours. Whatever holidays you normally celebrate during this season, and I wish you peace and love for them, try to find ways to honor your love. You will still hurt, but somehow I find it makes it easier to bear. With much love, Rachelle