Grief: How do I take my own advice?

I write about it, I talk about it … now I have to weigh the value of my own words.

I lost one of my best friends Saturday. I was not prepared for Molly to … die. I was prepared to help her when she would get home from the hospital. She had scribbled a grocery list, and I promised to do the shopping when she was released, when she got the OK to go home where her frisky and loving dog awaited her return.

I wasn't prepared for her to leave me after the countless hours we had spent together in the last three years … all the phone calls and emails that we had shared. All the laughter and tears we had exchanged and absorbed. All the conversations we had had about the REAL challenges of Alzheimer's and life itself.

Molly was a retired kindergarten teacher and an expert on Alzheimer's … a caregiver for her husband Joe, a devoted wife, mother and grandmother. She didn't need a variety of credentials to earn the expert title. She opened her heart and home when I was working on my book about Alzheimer's. She bared her soul when the pain of caregiving was real and let me know if I really "got it" or if I was full of crap when I put it all down on paper.

I got personally involved because I couldn't help falling in love with Molly and Joe and their kids and grandkids. They weren't one of those statistics. They were a real family with real challenges, and Molly gave so much of her time and energy to helping and motivating and inspiring and consoling other families. That literally took guts and passion, and rarely will you find someone with all that and a smile when you really needed it.

As my husband Roger and I embraced and sobbed upon the news of her passing, he whispered that she was the "Unsinkable Molly …" Yes, she was unsinkable, unstoppable and a whole Thesaurus of those "un" words. However, it was unthinkable and unimaginable that her tired body would be unable to continue the journey.

She told me of life's challenges along the way and how she would resolve them: "Just something Molly needs to walk herself through, with the help of God and friends!"

I console myself with my own advice to continue celebrating her life while giving myself permission to grieve, to allow the tears to flow and not apologize when I have a "Molly moment."

Yes, life would be much easier, or let's say, less complicated if we didn't allow ourselves to bond with others. It's safe not to get involved or not to care too deeply. It's hell to lose someone you love, but I wouldn't give away this pain for anything if it meant I couldn't have had Molly in my life.

The joys and the wisdom she gave me and the world will far outlast the tears and the emotional and physical pain of loss that will consume me now and in the immediate future as I, like Molly had, walk myself through, with the help of God and friends.

She once wrote me after one of my blog entries: "I hope this is read by a lot of people as a story like this can educate many. What an educator you are and to think I know you!"

No, Molly, what an educator YOU were and to think I knew YOU!