Courtesy of Juan Cruz Jr.
I met my first wife when she was 19 and I was 23. Three years later, our only daughter, Destiny, was born. For the next three years, we lived a relatively quiet, uneventful life, just enjoying friends, family, and life in general.
This normal existence continued until a cold day in February 2000, when my wife went out for a run. She had to cut that run short because she had a shooting pain in the hip of her right leg. She didn’t think much of it; she thought she had just pulled a muscle during her run.
The next day, she woke up with a swollen leg. She hesitated to go to the hospital and decided to give it one more day to see if the swelling would go down on its own. When it was still swollen the next day, we went to see a doctor. They performed a CT scan.
We received the results and the worst news of our lives a day or two later. The swelling of her leg was caused by osteosarcoma. It’s a cancer of the bone, typically found in adolescent children.
Our world came crashing down around us when we heard the word cancer. It was terrifying for both of us. At the time of the diagnosis, our daughter was just 2 years old.
My wife started cancer treatment
Her cancer treatment started shortly after the diagnosis. She began getting radiation and chemotherapy at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, NY.
From February to September 2000, she received radiation and chemotherapy. In September, another image scan was done. To our devastation, the cancer had spread to her lungs, and the doctors told us that she had less than a year to live.
In November of 2000, my wife entered hospice and was there until January 2001.
I was with her when she died
The day she passed, I was with her at the hospice. I was sleeping in a chair next to her. I still remember what I was wearing that day: black jeans and an orange sweater.
It was around 5 a.m., and I heard her breathing heavily. As I looked at her face, her eyes were closed. It had been a while since she had fully opened her eyes.
I called the nurse through the call system, and they came into the room immediately.
The nurse asked me how long my wife had been breathing hard, and then the nurse proceeded to listen to my wife’s heart with the stethoscope.
The nurse then looked at me and said, “It’s almost time.” There was no ambiguity in her words, and they needed no interpretation.
At this point, I was kneeling next to my wife’s bed. I grabbed her hand and started talking to her. I told her it was OK to let go and that our daughter, Destiny, and I would be OK.
She took her last breath at 5:25 a.m. on January 14, 2001.
As I continued to hold her hand, I buried my head in the bed and began to cry.
It was the greatest gift I could ever have had
Being there when my wife died was a gift. I was there for her last moments, and she wasn’t alone. Just like I was there in the labor and delivery room when our daughter was born, I was able to be there when she passed.
It was a great sense of privilege that I was able to share those last moments with her in that hospice room.
I believe that it helped with my grieving. Had I not been there, I probably would have had many regrets, and mourning her death would have taken much longer than it did.
Resilience helped me navigate life after loss
Little did I know that the strength I gained from witnessing her passing would be the foundation I would need to navigate life’s challenges. This became the strength that I would need to navigate my divorce from my second wife in 2021, my dad’s passing in 2022, and being laid off in 2024.
Witnessing and being part of my wife’s passing was a profound experience that helped me put things into perspective, a perspective that has guided my decisions and actions since.
It was a transformative experience that not only reshaped my priorities but also instilled in me a determination to focus on what truly matters in life.
No matter what life throws my way, I’m much better prepared to face it with courage and a perspective of what matters.
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