Cindy and Merle

Merle and Cindy, a married couple, share their different backgrounds and interests. They have been married for over 40 years and have volunteered in various community organizations throughout their lives. They discuss how sudden or unexpected death, specifically Cindy's late husband Dan, impacted their relationship. Cindy describes the night Dan didn't come home from work and how she discovered he had been killed in a hit-and-run accident. She shares her initial grief and restlessness. All right. Hi, Merle and Cindy. Thank you so much for joining us today. So why don't you start off and just share a little bit about yourself. Cindy, why don't you go first? Okay. Well, we've been married for a long time. We have two adult children, 11 grandchildren. We come from very different backgrounds. I was raised in a family with three sisters, no brothers, and two parents. My mom was a stay-at-home mom that had some emotional challenges, and my dad was an engineer at Boeing. So pretty traditional, you know, like middle-of-the-road sort of thing. What are some things that you like to do? Just tell us a little bit about yourself personally. I was in the hiking club in school. I did a lot, a lot of music. My mom had been a music major, and I followed my parents to the University of Washington, primarily because neither of my sisters went there, so I was not going to be characterized as somebody else like I had in high school. That was a little rough. And so lots of music, lots of sports, lots of community involvement, a lot of volunteering, and I worked as an accountant for many, many years. Did taxes and stuff. It wasn't the numbers. It was easy for me to do the numbers, but it was the people. I really enjoyed meeting the clients and solving the problems. You're a people person. I am, and I also like an answer to my questions, so I thrived on things like math where there was an answer rather than theoretical things where, you know, art was not my thing. But I appreciate great art. I've just been that good at creating it. So, yeah, a real community kind of person. Okay. And Merle, what about you? I came from quite a different background from Cindy. I was an only child raised by a single mom, and there was a lot of moving around growing up, and the economy is pretty tough in the 60s and 70s, so we did kind of move around and follow the work, that kind of thing. So, yeah, it was just completely different. And when I met Cindy, polar opposites. Solid family and, you know, very, very well grounded in each other. And, you know, I like to meet people where they're at, and so it was a great experience getting to know them and their life. So, yeah. What are some of the things that you like to do these days? So, I have retired from Boeing after 31 years. I was quality manager for 15 years, and Cindy and I traditionally volunteer. We've been married 41 years and changed now, but we volunteered even when we had little kids in the house. Our big one at first was a special offender center in Monroe. So, we... At the prison. At the prison, we dealt with special offenders like homicide, boy, pedophiles. They were all there. And we were building bridges with these folks, and we really enjoyed building those relationships, but then the prison system, in order to make money, they would move the prisoners. Oh, I'm going to Walla Walla next week. And I think that's how they made a lot of their money. So, we would start these relationships, and then all of a sudden they'd be gone. And we decided, hey, we don't want to do letter campaigns and keep starting over. And then I took a transfer from Boeing to Texas. We were there for four years, and then we did community outreach there. Went to England for three years on assignment, and then we came back. We were sitting in church. Where are we going to volunteer? Hospice sent out an email blast. We need volunteers. So, we looked at each other. Let's give this a whirl. And we went through the training, fantastic training, and we started on the end-of-life side. And then I went into Camp Aaron. It was a big buddy grief camp for kiddos. And then it was the bereavement side that sucked me in like a tractor beam. Then Providence, as a volunteer, had me facilitating groups, supporting with one-on-ones. I was doing, I think, three groups a month. After work, I'd go to Providence and lead a group. And by this time, he'd lost his mom, his dad, and his step-dad figure. Never married his mom, but three significant parents in a short space of time. You are both community people, volunteers. I can just tell you're very big people. People, people. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, today, we are actually going to talk about how sudden or unexpected death impacts new relationships and marriage. And, Ro, you just said that the two of you have been married for over 40 years and changed, to use your expression. And I know that shortly before you got married, Cindy, your husband, Dan, died unexpectedly. And I really want to thank you both for agreeing today to take a trip down a painful memory lane and share with us your early experiences in your relationship and how Dan's presence and the grief has remained part of your marriage throughout the years. I work with a lot of clients who, after, you know, some of their healing, start to get into a new relationship who, you know, after a spouse or a partner has died. And so I think they're going to find this really interesting today to hear your perspective of what it was like for you to start dating Cindy and Merle, what it was like for you to kind of have Dan's presence in that relationship. So, I look forward to our discussion. Thank you. Cindy, describe for us what happened when Dan did die. What was it, about 42 years ago now? Forty-three, yeah. Forty-three, yeah. He didn't come home from work and he was on the swing shift, so he got off at 1130, should have been home by 1150 or so, didn't show up. And I had heard sirens and stuff, but didn't really think anything about that. But then when he didn't show up, I thought, oh, he had been trained as a mechanic and he was very good. And I thought, oh, he's helping somebody at the Boeing parking lot or something. And then I thought, about ten minutes later, he would have called me, even though we didn't have cell phones at that time. He would have found a way to call me and let me know what happened, and he hadn't called. So then I started getting concerned, and I had my hand on the door to leave, and I just didn't leave. I thought, oh, if I go and he comes back, then I'm going to miss him and he won't know where I am. So I thought, I better write a note, you know, and then I better check with 911. Well, I called 911, and they were amazing. And they kept me on the phone, not the first time, but they said they'd call me back. And then I called them like ten minutes later and said, I haven't heard back. And they kept me on the phone and passed me around to a couple of people saying, oh, we're going to check this. Oh, you know what, there's another listing. We're going to check that and see. Nope, we don't have any accidents. And they kept me on there until the coroner could finish his investigation on the site and then come back to my place. So he had gone in the neighbor's driveway, and I saw the coroner's van coming. And I thought, oh, gosh, you know, Dan hurt somebody, and he's being questioned and whatever. So I didn't ever think that it was him. But when the coroner came in, asked if I had somebody else to call. So he called my sister and her husband to have them coming over. And then he takes out Dan's driver's license from his pocket. And then I figured out, uh-oh, you know, I know what this is. And I immediately had this reaction, that is not yours. Why do you have that? But I didn't say that, but that's how I felt. And I remember that really powerful, like, give me that. It is not yours. So he told me what had happened and told me that they had kept me at home because they didn't want me to come upon the accident. He had been hit on the Mucklefield Speedway head-on by a truck, and it was a hit-and-run. So the bumper of the truck was left at the scene of the accident. But he had been in the ditch, and they just did not want me coming on that scene. So I asked if I had any questions. And I just got up and started folding laundry. And I said, I'm sorry, I can't sit still. He goes, that's fine, whatever. So he waited until my sister got there. And then I went and stayed at my parents' house, but they were out of town. So we called Chelan, where my parents were vacationing, and told the police what their car looked like. And they found my parents and had my parents come back. And that's what the first 12 or so hours was like. Wow. What do you remember? Well, first of all, thank you for sharing that. I'm sure even though 43 years later, that's not got to be an easy story. No, it makes me a little restless to tell it, but I'm fine. Thank you for sharing that. What do you remember about your grief early on? Oh, nothing had a place. I didn't handle it well. I was very restless, didn't sleep much. I had just that day seen Dan, and we were on opposite schedules kind of because we were both working and both going to school. But I had had a number 10 out of 10 counseling session for depression, which they determined was just a learned behavior from my mom's mental illness. And they had kind of released me, you know, and Dan had gone to that appointment to find out what the ongoing instructions would be and so forth. So I'd seen him that afternoon, and then we had talked about Mount St. Helens because that was the day that the volcano became active. So we were on the phone several times. It wasn't the day that it exploded, but it was the day that the volcano was active. So we had talked, you know, several times. And then just to have all of that expectation just gone, like I suddenly have no future. I suddenly have no place to live because I didn't want to live at our house without him. I didn't have – I had my job, but obviously I didn't go into that right away. They did give me a little bit of sleeping pills, which I used for like two or three days. I had a couple of very vivid dreams, one of which I couldn't say if it was really him communicating with me or not. I have doubts about that. But the other one I know is just my fabrication of my brain. It was a little bit different in that it was all stuff I would say and not really stuff he would have said. So I could tell that my brain was just kind of processing things. The family was very supportive, but I was just restless and didn't belong anywhere. Wow. You said you didn't handle it well. What does that mean? I went with people everywhere they wanted to go or whatever they wanted to do. I was in close contact with his family because they pretty much had adopted me. I mean, when I first met his parents, they said, call us mom and dad. And we were just dating, but they knew that we would probably get married at that point already. But I went places with friends. I moved in with different friends. I just went, yeah, I didn't want to be alone, so I moved in with a friend. And then I find out that she had a boyfriend sleeping overnight. And I'm going like, that's not what I'm up for. I don't need this relationship stuff going on. And then I moved in with a brother and sister who were also other students at my school. I did go back to school to finish my AA degree. And then the sister has a boyfriend that moved in. I'm like, I just got away from that. And it was winter, and they didn't want to heat the place. And then I found that people had been in my room, and then I decided I'm going to move somewhere else. So I moved in with someone else. I don't even remember the whole chain. And I would go places, go out at night. I never was the type to go out partying or dancing. So I thought, oh, it doesn't matter anymore. I'll go out partying and dancing. And I'd go out. Someone would ask me to dance. I'd say, no, thanks. And I'd go around and go back home, you know, just like, oh, that wasn't helpful either. So I didn't have any activities that I was interested in. I didn't really care that much about school. I still don't even remember what the campus looked like hardly at all. I was just in a fog. So I didn't – I was not gracious. I did not go to church. I did not, you know, do all of the things that would have been good for me at the time. When did Merle come into the picture? I met Merle through other people at Boeing. So I had gone places with people that knew Dan from Boeing. Merle had worked there and knew Dan before, but then had not been working there for a while or got moved to another area or something. And then he came back and he goes, where's Dan? And they go like, oh, didn't you hear, you know? So Merle was going scuba diving with another one of the guys or two guys from Boeing, and they invited me to go along. And I met him on that scuba diving trip. I was not diving, but I was just on the boat and part of the crew, part of the gang. So we were all kind of together at that point in time. Yeah. Merle, when did you and Cindy start dating? I recall it's about six months. It was official then. But, yeah, we were just kind of hanging in with the same crowd. And, you know, crowd members would – people would come into the crowd, others would step away and not be in the crowd for a while. So it was that kind of a fluid society almost. And it was great. And then we – I finally did ask her out. Of course, out of courtesy, I waited until it was finals week for her. It was horrible. Yeah. No, I can't go because I have to pass this test. Yeah, just for a little while. So, you know, we'd go out and have a beer and pizza. Which I don't drink beer, but I went because I was struggling with my studying. Yeah. Yeah, and then I took her to a Rush concert that week. And, yeah, it was just a lot of fun drives where we would put on Bible instructional cassettes. I don't think they were 8-tracks. I think they were cassettes by that time. And, you know, there would be a lot of questions and answers. And then I'd pretend I knew what I was talking about and I could, you know, wax eloquently with these theological answers and everything. I think I was probably right most of the time. But it was a great interaction back and forth. She – I'm a first-generation Christian. I kind of started bringing myself to church growing up. And she – I think Cindy was dropped off at church. But there was never really the big spiritual component in our families. So it kind of got the click for both of us. Yeah. And I, meanwhile, was accepting dates from invitations from people at school and another friend and stuff like that. So I was really running myself ragged going to school and going to every social event that I got invited to. So he was inviting me out, but it wasn't an exclusive relationship or anything for another number of months. So when it did become exclusive, what was it like for you, Cindy, to be in a serious relationship again after Dan's death? Well, I was seriously not going to be in one, thank you. I just said, I will go places with you, but I've already had the best that I can have. And there isn't any better. I'm not looking for a relationship. He goes, okay, we'll just be friends. And about a week later, he kissed me. And I'm going like, well, that felt pretty good. So then he said, I would like to go out with you and have you not going out with all those other people. And I go, huh. And so we talked about it a little bit. And I don't know, I guess I said, yeah, we can give that a try, but I'm not looking for a permanent relationship. So I just really was clear that this was not going to go somewhere. How was the grief for you during all of this? Did you feel Dan's presence? What feelings were going on for you? Well, this was a little bit of a challenge not to really talk about Dan once we decided to date, because before then I felt perfectly comfortable saying, you know, this is who I am, this is where I'm at. But then I thought it was unfair to Merle for me to bring it up. So I thought of Dan every day and actually have for all but a handful of days in these last 40 years. I just think of him because so much of who I am today, you know, that was a very impressionable time in my life in my 20s, my early 20s. And he taught me so many things about living on my own and taking care of myself. So a lot of who I am is out of that relationship. But I tried to not be bringing up anything about Dan unless I kind of got permission from him. So every – Permission from Merle? Yeah, every couple of weeks or so I'd say, could I talk to you about something I've been thinking about? He'd go, yeah, sure. But I tried really hard not to make it, you know, the middle of our relationship once we were actually dating. Because, you know, but it still was a part of my life, of course. Well, we tried to really make it a part of our relationship, too, because he was a good man, a good young man. They were both kids at the time, but he was a good guy. And we automatically kind of made it a big tent by including his parents and his siblings. The siblings I got along with didn't agree with him at all spiritually. And with one of them I agreed with kind of politically, but we still got along. And, you know, they got cheated by losing a sibling and a son. And to this day our kids would, you know, call him aunt, uncle, grandma is still with us. So they were part of our family. So it wasn't a thing where it should be taboo, because that was a very integral part of her life. It was very short and ended way too soon. But then we didn't want to have Dan be a part of our relationship, especially once we talked about getting married. Yeah, I was never compared to Dan by her. And that's really what made it so easy, I think, for me. Yeah, so I did a little bit of journaling. I did a little bit of reaching out to other people that I felt like I could talk to more openly. And then if it was really something on my mind, I'd tell Merle I'd like to talk to him about something or get his feedback on something. But I tried not to have him feel like he was being compared to a ghost who was being idealized, which I did sometimes. I'd say, oh, you know, Dan would have done this or this. And he goes, no, he wouldn't, you know, because he knew him. So he could say, you're idealizing. And I'd say, okay, I am. You know, he could totally call me on it. That was a big word for me at the time. So there was a little bit of negotiation, but he was willing to feedback on that. And I was careful to ask. And I don't think I ever shouted out to him about anything. I wish you were like Dan or something. You know, I felt it sometimes. Like I wish you were the kind of person that I'm already, you know, familiar with. I wish I didn't have to break into this new relationship. I already did that. And that was easier for her. Well, it was easier for me, harder for her, because, you know, young marrieds, they argue about the dumbest stuff. Well, she kind of went through that. And so I got the more mature model. She did have to kind of start over a bit with me. I got the immature model. Yeah. I had to teach him, you know, grown-up people don't do that. That was a junior high behavior. Stop that. Yeah. You know, so he was pretty accepting, you know, once in a while walked away. And I'd say, walking away is a childish behavior. Don't do that. You stay here and you talk it out. Say more about the word negotiating, where you had to do a little bit of negotiating. I told him what I thought, and he would get mad and walk away and then come back and say, I thought about what you said, and this part of it makes sense. That part of it doesn't have to do with me. That's another world. That's not my world. Yeah, a lot of skills I actually started to learn through the relationship because it was a very different dynamic in my house with people coming and going in the house and a lot of lack of communication or silence, eye rolls, that kind of thing. As he grew up. As I grew up, yeah. So, yeah, this was all kind of new territory. So we, well, Merle's not really a vocal processor, and I am. We accepted coaching from people we trusted, and we especially had a couple that were friends, and she was a lot like Merle, and he was a lot like me. Like, if that husband and if I were going to be late, we would call the other person. If she was going to be late or Merle was going to be late, they were late, you know, like they didn't call ahead. So I could often call this one friend and say, this is what's happening, explain it to me, and she would be able to explain, you know, that's not a big deal, and this is how it is, and blah, blah, blah, and they had known him since high school. So it was very helpful to find another couple with a different dynamic that could articulate some of the stuff that we couldn't explain. So that was the negotiation. It involved finding our resources and getting someone who could, you know, clarify things for us. So the early part of our relationship, maybe the first year or two, was, oh, maybe 10. One, two, or 10. One, two, or 10. And as we started to have the kids and stuff like that, these guys already had kids. So they were able to say, yeah, we don't agree on everything, but here's what we do. We expose the kids to everything except, you know, some of the stuff that you can't forget. And so they helped us arrive at a cohesive way of parenting by being able to throw these things in there. Having friends with kids a little bit older than yours and who have been married a little bit longer than you, I can't express how valuable that was. Yeah, absolutely. So, Merle, I have an interesting question for you. Did you ever find yourself feeling like envious, not envious, but like jealous or insecure of Dan? Insecure of yourself or jealous at all? No, because he was raised in a different family environment. I mean, he had a father around. And they did family things like Boy Scouts. And I think Grandpa Don was a scout leader, too. So those are things that they had put in place and they thrived with. And, you know, I really felt glad that they had achieved what they had as a family. And they were total innocents with the accident and the loss. Why should they have to pay more? So it was a thing to kind of celebrate. Yeah. And, again, he was never thrown in my face. So, yeah. But the way we handle things is way different because of our different family backgrounds. So my family background was so much like Dan's. He was kid number two out of four. And I was kid number three out of four. And we both had parents who worked at Boeing. And, you know, we just already knew, you know, a lot like brother and sister how everything was going to go. We both had big families. Merle walked into a big family. He was an only child. And I had two big families before him. So I think that was hard because he'd just get peopled out, I guess I would say. Well, there was times where, yeah, you know, dinner or lunch would go on and on. And, you know, just kind of sitting around. You get bored in the environment. But not bored with the people. So it was good being part of two large families. Yeah. Two families. What was that like for your family, Merle? Because all of a sudden they kind of overnight inherited two other families. How did that go? Not well. There was an opportunity to inherit two other families. But being an only child with no father around, things were fine until we determined to get married. And then we were met with antagonism, especially Cindy. And then I was kind of in the role of protector. And then when our kids showed up, there was a lot of vindictiveness. And there was some mental illness growing up. And that tended to manifest itself. So it was having to be on guard, you know, going over to my family's house for Christmas or Thanksgiving and then having to leave to go to the next, you know, other two families, her and Dan's. That got very, very hard and very tense some years. I hated the whole idea of the holidays coming up because it was going to be an instant replay. But Merle had also been his mom's protector. So we had a few discussions about, you know, the complexity of stuff. You know, don't mention Dan or his family. Don't do any of this. It just makes it harder for my mom. So, you know, he was kind of protecting his mom, too, because he'd grown up as her man of the house. So he was protecting me, like, right at the moment, mostly by insulating what was going on. But he was protecting her at the same time from all the things that he knew were upsetting to her. And it was a no-win because no matter who I married, that person would be the enemy. So there was going to be lashing out sooner or later. About every get-together, there was some form of that. And she saw me as Dan's widow. So, like, if he died, he's done. Forget about him. Forget about his family. And his mom was really struggling with me having any loyalties to that extended family, which Merle and I had to work it out between us. Once we agreed, then whatever everybody else thought didn't matter and we were just polite. Like, okay, we just say okay, you know, and deal with the frustration. But there were some shouting matches of how I was handling everything so poorly. I had to think through, you know, was I or wasn't I and who's going to be my resource. You know, you tend to go to a resource that will tell you what you want to hear. But in that case, I wanted the truth. So I had to figure out who's going to feed back to me what's really going on here and how I should handle this. And Merle was pretty good about it, but he was also too close. Yeah, there was times I would just pull my family from there for three to six months, six months when it got really bad, but usually three months. And then, you know, there was this kind of enemies at war under a truce, you know, niceties. And then it would just get progressively worse. But she had a terminal lung cancer diagnosis. It did come together at the end where she actually let Cindy come in to her room to help with caregiving. So that was kind of a, I wouldn't say uneasy reconciliation. It could have been much better, but it could have ended much worse. And I think the helpful part for us was making a decision together. How are we going to handle this? What are you going to do? Here's our code words, right? We have escape code words. Like when she started landing on our daughter, for crying out loud, that was 10 years old. And she should be serving her brother or whatever. It was just part of the behavior thing. And she was trying to kind of drive a wedge between some different family members, and that was completely unfamiliar to me. But when Merle and I could talk about it, Merle decided his loyalty was going to be to me, but he wasn't going to give up on his loyalty to his mom. So once he could say that, then we established what the baseline was going to be, and we could work from there. Yeah. So I had to have an underlying philosophy, a code with this whole thing. And this would be a question I would ask young husbands that are going through the same thing with their families. Are you going to be married to your mother? Are you going to be married to your wife? It's your choice. I mean, you can't go back and forth. And for me, are you going to be married to Dan or are you going to be married to Merle? Yeah. So there were a couple of decision points for me. Yeah. My journey as an in-law in these two families was great. Hers was different. Hers was a rather rocky road oftentimes. Yeah, and when her boyfriend died, when she died, and after we were caregiving with both of them. His mom's boyfriend. Yeah, and he was always in and out. And he had his own things. You know, it was like I didn't even care. I was just so glad they were both out of pain because they both had painful cancer. That was the relief. But other than that, I didn't care. I felt bad about that too. And then I didn't understand that until I got into hospice volunteering and then met with folks like you and whatnot. You know, it just kind of started gleaning. Yeah. And likewise, we're still learning from you, you know, what some of these emotions mean that we go through that are connected to our past. Yeah, but the complexity here, I mean, you start off with grieving Dan's death. And then you're figuring out how to develop a new marriage and incorporate Dan's memory. And then you've got the complexity of families and in-laws and allegiances to parents. I mean, so much stuff, which is why I was so glad you agreed to talk with us today. So you can just, I mean, of course, everyone's story is so different. But you're just introducing all of the different things. One other thing, you know, Cindy, you and Dan, you know, were just launching your lives. And so you must have had so much of Dan's and your life that you had to sort through. What did you do with your house that you didn't live with, the belongings? How did you deal with all of the reminders of your previous lives? It's here. And we love it, yeah. We did, Merle and I, early in our relationship, before we had kids, I think, traveled to Hawaii. And we got a teak chest there that's now at the foot of our bed. And that's where our memory stuff goes. So I have, like, Dan's Boy Scout badges. We didn't ever have children. Dan and I didn't. So there's nobody to pass his stuff along to. And his siblings got the things that they wanted to get. But some of his commemoration stuff and honor cords from high school graduation, his diploma, all that stuff is in that teak chest. So once every half dozen years, I open it up and just kind of thumb through that stuff. And that's been a very nice memory that way. But, again, as soon as we decided on something, that was when the peace would settle the dust from wherever we were struggling. So it was whenever something was undecided that we were both kind of thinking different ways about, then that was harder. That's what we would have to kind of agree on. And we even found that in our relationship, because we are so different in our backgrounds, but we like to ‑‑ we land at the same spot, we like the same stuff, then about every five or six weeks, we need to just break away, kind of reset, go over stuff, especially now that we're both still volunteering in the community. So we figured out that. We also figured out I have Dan's birthday, death date, and our anniversary dates, where I do whatever I want those days. If I have to work, I work. But afterwards, then I go do something that I just feel like doing at the time that I think that Dan would do for me or with me. And the first decade or so, I didn't invite Merle. But after that, I started telling him what I planned and if he wanted to go or not. So it usually involved the mountains or the beach or the ‑‑ I don't know, his dinner out or something like that. And then also ‑‑ go ahead. Oh, that's just wonderful to hear. Back before we had met, I think probably before you guys got married, I bought 40 acres and I was single, wanted to be a mountain man, and in north central Washington, beautiful country, and no, you were married, and then her and her husband bought 10 acres in Oroville, so not too far, just across the valley from where I was at. And about six years ago, we said, hey, let's sell these properties. My 40 acres sold, and then her 10 acres, hers and Dan's 10 acres sold. And she said, you know what, I want the proceeds from that to go to Dan's parents, his mother now, and the siblings and the nieces and nephews. So she divided all that in honor of Dan and gave it to all these cousins that really didn't hear enough about Dan because they weren't born. And so they got to hear about him and what he was about, and they got to get some money from something that was Dan's, their people, you know, and sibling. So I thought that was wonderful. It was a great connection to our nieces and nephews there. Yeah. Well, that's great. To go back to the siblings and have a meeting with each one, and Merle came with me to all of those. Yeah. That's really great. I do want to ask you a question about coping mechanisms real quick. When things got really tough for you, what, Cindy, what did you do? And Merle, please feel free to chime in as well. What helped you cope, you know, early in your marriage and I'm sure throughout your marriage? Yeah, we mentioned having friends that were a little more experienced at life and relationships than we were. We also volunteered, so we had a lot of connections in the community of various sorts, you know, and might be needing help with a project or a thing or selling something like the cars and so forth that we had. But my faith system, you know, as we had gone and driven and done these Bible study kind of things, I never read the Bible because I was Christian, but it was a history book and I was good at all the other stuff, but not history. So I just didn't read that big, fat old thing that had a lot of history in it. And then Merle started to bring to reality that these principles that help you with living and having Christ in our relationship, to me, was one of the significant things that we are so different that that sealed a whole lot of the differences and helped us to communicate. We had a foundation for communication. But I think that regardless of our particular faith or my particular faith, for people of any faith or no faith, for them to decide what are they going to do with all those comments from all the people that say that they have spiritual advice or your faith will help you or all these kind of nebulous comments that are unuseful. Once you decide what you're going to do with that, then there's a lot of orderliness and peace that comes with that. Am I going to be closer to God? Am I going to be further away? And I went through a four-month thing about a year and a half after Dan died. Am I either going to be mad at God for the rest of my life or trust him that he knows what he's doing? And I was pretty sure I was just going to stay mad because I was pretty mad because I figured God knew what was going to happen. He didn't stop it, and that's on him, so I'm done with him. But then I come back to, you know, I really did believe there was a God. So at about four months, I thought, all right, I'm going to trust him. He knows what he's doing. And actually, I met Merle that next week. Oh, wow. You know, that was, I guess, about a year after Dan died. So deciding what your attitude is going to be, not necessarily deciding all the stuff you believe, but deciding which path you're going to go down brings a lot of peace and orderliness to the decision-making process. And from there, you have something to relate to. Oh, good. That's what I felt like was significant. With me, it was a different story because I had some anger issues, so I would just get pissed off. And I thought that it was progress when I wouldn't hold a grudge or stay angry for a week because that was the culture that I was brought up in. So, you know, getting angry and then getting over it was good. But then, and this took many, many years, understanding that somebody can bring something up and I'm not being attacked. Oh, that was huge. Just starting to learn that. And, you know, you still have to, I'm still having to undo that, unlearn that. Right. You know, growing up, anybody, even in my adulthood that was older than me that would get in my grill and scream, I would, that would, what we call a trigger. I mean, I would just, so, yeah, and it's learning to get through those things that, yeah, you're not being attacked. And I wouldn't even scream. I would ask a question like, why did you do that? That didn't make any sense to me at all. Yeah. And I'm trying to make sense out of it and I'm just being forward about it. And he's going like, quit attacking me. And, you know, so for him, he decided his viewpoint was going to be not to jump to being attacked. And the decision of how he was going to approach it was even more significant than what he did. Okay. So I'd like to ask you two more questions. So you both mentioned that you're involved in helping out with and providing bereavement support. And so I wanted to ask, have your own grief experiences influenced the work you do right now? Yeah, the fact that Dan was hit and it was a hit and run, I knew the guy actually in high school. And he lived not too far from there. And he was drinking heavily in high school, so I know he was likely drinking that night. But they didn't catch him until the next morning, so they couldn't prove it. But I know that he was making just bad decisions, you know, the whole time. And I know Dan was laying in a ditch. I know, you know, this whole thing was really sudden. All of that just makes it possible somehow now to be able to hear other people's story. And I guess I get that. It's not like any other story and yet it's a real story, you know. I mean, it's just so unbelievable. And you can't process what each step of all of that was and how much I just wanted to be with him wherever he was, alive or dead, whatever. And, of course, the coroners wouldn't let me do that. So to not have access, to not be able to change it, you know, all of those things, it really makes me feel like I can hear their story. And I can say that I know I don't have the same story, but I do get that it was super hard. So to just be able to let people talk and then to be able to share resources that I've learned about since, which many weren't around at the time. Yeah. But resources about understanding, you know, this all makes sense. This is how your body is going to react. You know, please do tell your doctor that you've experienced a significant loss recently if you're going to get some treatment for something because it could be related. And here's other people that I know that have gone through what you've gone through. And here's a group that you can participate in that will help you sort things out. So being able to share all of that is just so meaningful and seeing people's lights come on that there's actually hope. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I remember a lot about you. Yeah. Grief and loss. Wow. It never really hit me until our kids, rather closely together, moved out. We raised them to where they would, if they wanted to move when they were 18, they could. Well, they up and did. I mean, they got their nerve. And her daughter was like 17. She started college early. And it wasn't long after that. I couldn't get out of bed and I was really depressed. And we didn't know what was going on. I don't think we had that lesson at hospice yet about that kind of loss. She wanted to have me on suicide watch. And it was really that bad. I wasn't suicidal, but it was unbelievable. I didn't want him to be alone for extended periods of time. Yeah, my joints ached and all the classic symptoms. So that was a huge learning curve there. And, you know, we've got two kids and we've got 11 grandkids. And we're not Mormon or Catholic. I know what your audience is thinking right now. But we've got a lot of grandkids. But, you know, they understand these values, too, of bereavement and whatnot. We've all learned from each other, too. Yeah. Well, we had such a great conversation. And we didn't get a lot of time to talk about everything that you do as community chaplains. But we will post your website and all of your programs in our Facebook group. So we'll put a link and everything that you do do so that our listeners can go to your website and see all of the things and the resources that you have. Yeah, that's a collection of our favorite things from a lot of places. And some people have even written poetry and stories and sent them to us. So we'll make sure that that's available and we write about that. And we all feel from each other, don't we? Yeah. Unfortunately, there's enough pain to go around. And so we want to make sure that we can help as many people as possible. So my final question for both of you is, what advice would you give to a new couple where one person in the relationship has experienced an unexpected death of a previous partner before they've gotten together, and now, too, they are living with grief in their new relationship? So, Merle, let's start with you. I would say honor that wilderness journey. You know, don't let your grief, don't let your pain go to waste. Just do what you can to embrace it and learn from it. And, you know, let the people go that aren't going to be there to help, that you thought would be there. Not because they're bad people, but put them at a distance, because there's going to be others that are going to want to share and going to want to just bring the curiosity. So be prepared for those people to show up. And that will put your life in a new trajectory. Yeah, and I like what Merle says there about approaching things with curiosity, approaching people, sharing the stories, reaching out. We have a responsibility to be there for one another, and we have a responsibility to reach out to care for ourselves. So there's groups, there's people, there's therapists like yourself. There are resources, and we really collectively as a group want people's lives to function and function well. So if you're not feeling that hope, then search it out. We're glad to help you with that. And with our website, people can reach us anytime. And I'm sure they can write to you and get a time in your busy schedule that they might be able to get some really significant help, because you are so wonderful at doing so. Thank you very much. Well, thank you. This was such a wonderful discussion today. And you just really helped illuminate, shed light on such the complexity that happens. But you also showed, number one, that it is so possible. I've had the pleasure of knowing you both now for almost 18 months, going on years. Yeah, it's been great. And I've worked with you on another project. But that you have this amazing marriage that works. Dan's presence I'm hearing is, I'm going to say the word, alive and well in your marriage, even though he's unfortunately no longer physically present on this earth. But you've done a lot of hard work to get through Cindy individually, you know, the fact that he's no longer living. But to really negotiate, and I loved how you used that word, you know, how difficult it was to figure out how to work through things in your marriage and with family relations. And it shows. And I just think that's such a great role model that you are going to be to other people. And I've got clients who are struggling with this issue right now. Would you accept hugs? Yeah. You would accept hugs. Okay. Well, tell people that. They're open for hugs, virtual hugs. So thank you for sharing your story with us today. Thank you, Jennifer. Thank you both, Tamaril and Cindy.