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Grief, Loss, and FAMILY.


David Sevey

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Hello All, 

Grief is not a pleasant topic for anyone, for those of us that have lost a loved one my condolences.  In my personal opinion grief never truly goes away you just learn how to deal with it and hopefully move on with our lives. 

As a person who is dealing with his own mortality here is an idea for those of you that will eventually pass due to this horrible disease.  I have a 12-year-old son and a 17-year-old daughter and of course my lovely wife.   Our families and loved ones are on this journey with us and I wanted to come up with a way to be there after I had passed.  So I have made 3 large envelopes one for each of them. I put on the front  "open only when I am gone" inside I am not done but am diligently writing the letters for each of them, there are several letters in each and I tried to think of things like "when you have your first kiss", "when you have the worst fight possible with your mom", "If you get married", "If you don't get married", "When your time comes".  Hopefully, you get the gist of the idea.  It has been one of the most emotional things I have ever done. I hope that it will help ease my passing and give them smiles throughout the years.

Luckily my wife and kids are also very technically savvy and have an online presence.  I have found several services and have set it up for a short while on their birthdays, holidays, and special occasions they will get an email from me and on a few of them a short video message.  

Hopefully, some of you can use these ideas to bring some joy to your families and loved ones.  Also, they are not my ideas they are a mix of several I came across on my Internet travels.

David Sevey

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I think the letters are a lovely idea, as are the messages for the future.  I do think maybe I'd ask how they would feel about getting emails apparently coming from you.  I could imagine that being scary or upsetting if they didn't know you had set it up.  Maybe you could discuss it with your wife, and let her talk to the kids after you're gone to see how they'd feel about it.  You could give her hard copies of the messages to give to them if the email from beyond would freak them out, as well as instructions about how to turn off the messages if the hard copies are preferred.  And you could save the videos to disk, too, just as a backup, if they choose not to get the emails.  And maybe they will absolutely love getting the emails--I think I'd rather get the messages in another way, but that's me, and everyone is different.  

I don't mean to discourage you--as I said, I think it's lovely that they will know how much you wanted to be there, how much you loved them and were thinking about their futures.  You sound like a great husband and dad.  And what you are teaching your kids now is something they will have with them forever.

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  • 7 months later...

Hi David,

I think it's very kind that you're leaving behind letters that will be so much comfort to your wife and children. I'm in my third year of widowhood and enjoy reading the notes that my husband had written for me while he was alive. I'm also sorry that you and so many others are enduring such a painful disease. 

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