Losing a spouse is hard no matter how old you are, but it can be even more devastating when it happens before you've gotten a chance to fully make a life together.
When a young couple ties the knot, they imagine spending the rest of their lives keeping each other company.
Often, they plan on buying a home, having kids, and raising a family together.
If one person dies young, though, those plans are all disrupted. The survivor is left not only grieving the death of their spouse, but also grieving the loss of their life together.
John Polo knows all too well what it feels like to lose a young spouse.
When his fiancée, Michelle, was diagnosed with terminal cancer, they rushed to the courthouse to make their marriage official.
After she survived her first surgery, they started planning a real wedding. Unfortunately, Michelle didn't make it to the day she'd walk down the aisle in her gown.
[H/T: Love What Matters]
John's story was shared by the Facebook page Love What Matters, where it quickly went viral.
Within four days, the post had over 86,000 reactions and over 5,800 shares.
John wrote:
That’s my wife.
In her wedding dress.
A wedding dress that I never got to see her in.
We were married at the courthouse a few days before her first surgery was scheduled to take place.
We rushed there. To become man and wife.
Not knowing if she would make it out of the surgery alive.
After the cancer came back and she was terminal, we decided to plan a real wedding.
She didn't make it to that real wedding.
She died two weeks before it was scheduled to take place.
I have so many regrets.
Not getting to see her walk down the aisle is atop that list.
But, she got that dress. Her dream dress.
She loved that dress SO much.
While at hospice, she would talk to people about how great the wedding was going to be.
She wasn't coherent enough to realize that she wasn't going to make it to there.
Michelle died without me ever seeing her in that dream dress.
A week after she passed away I stumbled across this picture in her phone.
I lay motionless in bed, both happy and devastated.
Tears flowing down my cheeks as I laughed aloud at the memory of how giddy it made her.
My bride.
In her dress.
I want to live a long life.
I want to remarry and have grandkids.
I want to write and teach.
I want to spread my message to the world.
I want to tell them everything I have learned about love, loss, grief and healing.
But.
When it is my time, I am running up there.
No – I am sprinting up there!
To see her.
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