Surviving the shock of sudden loss: Mollie's Widow Journey (Part 1)

*Note: You might notice a little echo in parts of this conversation.  Podcasting isn't always perfect, and while I did my very best in post editing, some audio echos and quicks couldn't be fully fixed.  Thanks for your grace and for sticking with it. Mollie's story is truly worth hearing!

In this Part 1 conversation, Mollie shares shares the heartbreaking story of losing her first husband, Ashley, and the deep grief that followed. She reflects on their life together, the challenges they faced, and the profound impact of grief on her and their son, Colton.  This episode is powerful in her walk through the grief and the strength to keep going through her life's darkest chapter.  

Takeaways from Mollie: 

• Mollie and Ashley's love story was vibrant and full of life.
• Grief can feel overwhelming, like a bomb exploding in your life.
• It's important to allow yourself to be a mess during grief.
• Support from family and friends is crucial in times of loss.
• Wrestling with faith is a common experience in grief.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Grief and Love
03:10 The Early Days of Loss
03:43 Remembering Ashley: A Life Full of Love
07:10 The Roller Coaster of Marriage and Family Life
08:19 Facing Genetic Challenges
09:56 The Day Everything Changed
16:37 The Decision to Let Go
21:17 Telling Colton: The Worst Day
23:41 Navigating the Aftermath of Loss
31:10 The Importance of Support
36:38 Judgment and Personal Decisions
39:30 Wrestling with Faith
42:04 Whispers of Wisdom to My Past Self

Contact Mollie if her story resonated with you:
FB: Mollie Hamilton
https://www.facebook.com/share/1CF3c1cMVj/?mibextid=wwXIfr

🎧 A big shoutout to Zach King for jumping in and helpingme clean up the audio on this episode, Part 1 and Liz Davis' story. So grateful for his help behind the scenes.
Connect with Zach:  zac@warriorkingproduction.com
Co-Host of YouTube: Winter Wolf Den Podcast:  FrostCast
https://www.youtube.com/@winterwolfsden
https://www.youtube.com/@winterwolfsden/podcasts

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Molly and I go way back. We've known each other since high school, and her story is one I've held close for a long time. What she's walked through is the kind of thing you hope no one you love ever have to face. And yet somehow she carried it with the kind of grace that's honest, raw, and quietly courageous. This will be broken into two episodes. In this first part of our conversation, we talk about what it was like to lose her husband, Ashley. how it felt in those early days, how it unraveled life as she knew it, and what it looked like to keep going even when everything inside her wanted to stop. My hope is that whether you've known grief intimately or you're listening to better understand someone who has, you'll hear something here that speaks to your heart. Let's begin with Ashley. Not the loss, but the love that came first. So before we talk about what you've walked through, I want to ask... What was Ashley like? What made him him?

SPEAKER_01: 1:01

I think Ashley was really bigger than life. He was a big man physically. He had a big personality. Everyone always remembered him for his humor. He had this undercover sense about him. You would be in a conversation with him sometimes, and he would... you would say something and he would pop off and respond, but it would be very low key and it would take you a minute and then everybody would bust out laughing. He had this big humor, this big smile. And whenever I think about him, I always think about his sense of humor first. He was very funny, but he loved deeply and had a huge devotion. to his family, his mother, his father, his siblings, his child, his friends. And he was well-respected. So he was a big guy in all the ways. He just was special. And I don't think there's accurate words to really describe who he was. When I met him, it was actually, about a year before we started dating, and he loved Mustangs. We were in a Mustang car club, and I had a couple of Mustangs, and he had one, and I knew him kind of from a distance, just in passing. I didn't know a lot about him, but I knew him, and we spoke every weekend. We spoke to one another just in passing in social settings, but you know, He just loved his cars and loved softball and loved his friends and loved his family. And he was just a good, easy,

SPEAKER_00: 2:53

funny guy. Do you remember the moment you knew he was the one?

SPEAKER_01: 2:59

Yeah, I think what a lot of people don't know about Ashley and I is that I knew him from afar, you know, kind of in passing. But I had just broken up with someone when we went out on our first date. And Ashley and I only dated 30 days before we got married. We went in our first year. I mean, we got, we went on our first date in August. We got married in September and we just knew immediately that we wanted to be together. And the first year of our marriage was a whirlwind too. It was like, we got married in September. I found out I was pregnant with our first child in November. I got sick. and lost my job. And I got a job working at a CPA's office doing taxes. We started our first business and he quit his job and we opened a paint store. Automotive paint and body shop supplies. And I was pregnant and we had one friend His best friend came and worked with us. And in August, still not a year has passed, I give birth to our first child. He had a child from his previous marriage. So I had a stepdaughter and a son. And that was our first year. Yeah, the first year was completely a roller coaster. But in a good, exciting, scary, hold on for all you got kind of way. Yeah. So you all were married for how long? We were married for nine years when he died. We didn't make it to 10 years. We had that first year of life. We're running our, you know, then after that, you know, we're running our business. We're kind of establishing things. I was a step parent at the time. And I have my faults as a person. I was not a good step mom. I didn't know what it took in my late 20s to be a step parent. I barely knew how to be a parent myself. You know, like we don't know what we're doing when we have kids. We're just winging it. And I had to start winging it with a teenager, which was hard. So, you know, we were struggling at times in our marriage and juggling and balancing our, you know, our stepdaughter, his daughter, my stepdaughter. And then we found out that his sister passed away. And Ashley had a genetic disorder called Ehlers-Danlos, which is a connective tissue disease. And it's a spectrum disease. It can be hypermobility all the way up to vascular involvement, where your veins and aortas and things can tear open and you die. And it'd be very dangerous. So when his sister died, we found out that his sister had vascular involvement. She also had Ehlers-Danlos, like I said, a genetic disease. And we found out from the doctors that she had vascular involvement, that there's no way that he didn't also have the same type. So he had issues that related to his genetic disorder, but none of them had ever presented in that way. And when she passed away is when we found out that he may also have those issues. And we went straight to the cardiologist and we stayed on top of everything. And at this time, his father was running a Halloween store. I now own, you know, the franchise that operates a Halloween chain that pops up every year. And he was struggling. He had lost his daughter who helped him in the business. He was dealing with a lot and it was just overwhelming for him. And I had been helping him over the years in the business. And I stepped in a lot more when his sister passed away. And we got to the point where he said, I want you guys to take it. Ashley was having some medical issues with his vision, which was terrible. result, a result of his genetic disorder. And he was having a problem keeping his driver's license because of his vision. And so he was an outside salesman and he drove, we built our company selling automotive paint and body shop supplies into the point where we had grown as much as we were going to grow. And he was having a problem with his vision and he wasn't going to be able to drive anymore. So we sold our business. And I transitioned into the Halloween stores and then his dad decided, I don't want to do this anymore. I want you and Ashley to take this over. So Ashley and I were working together. It was the first year that we owned these Halloween stores and we had to open two locations. And so Ashley and I ran one location together and his mother and father ran the other location in town together. So that kind of gets us to this point. We struggled through the season. I kind of knew how to run things and I handled all the administrative stuff and all the accounting and stuff like that. And Ashley hadn't really worked that deep in the business like I had. So he was really learning and he was getting his feet under him. And it's a roller coaster of a season. I mean, we describe it as kind of like the circus comes down. You build a whole store, you stock it, you run it, you do all this stuff, and then you tear the whole thing down. So when November came, which is the year he passed away, November 2016, we tore down the store and packed away all of our fixtures and cleaned everything up and turned our building over. And Veterans Day weekend, we always went to the beach in Virginia Beach. Sandbridge Beach, technically, like a group of couples that always came together in November. And we would just eat and have cocktails and play board games and walk on the beach. It's cold. Nobody's there, but it's fun. Just complete disconnection. Don't do anything. Lay around all day. It's completely gluttonous. So we had gone up there and the day that it happened, we were driving home. and we packed up that morning, and I got into a terrible fight with him. I fussed him so bad because he left our pillows. He left our pillows, and we had to turn around and go back, and I fussed at him. So we drove home four hours, and as soon as we got home, we didn't even have time to We didn't have time to throw our stuff down. We literally, his brother lived in the neighborhood behind us and we went to a birthday party. When we walked in, he sat down in the kitchen and I was kind of talking to the kids. He said, I don't feel too good. And I said, what's wrong? And he said, I don't know. I don't feel good. And I said, okay. And I didn't really think anything of it. And then he came to me and he said he wanted to leave and go to get checked out. And I immediately said, OK, let's go. So I said, you know, we got in the car and as I was driving. He was just like watching this test and he said, I don't think I'm going to make it. And there was a police officer next to us and I flagged him down. And they called the ambulance and he pulled him out of the car and got him off to the hospital. It was a difficult day. And I can remember we were really, frankly, kind of jerked around at the hospital a bit. No one believed anything was wrong with them. Because when you have a heart problem, which is what he had, they're looking for enzymes in your blood work to show that your heart tissue is dying or breaking down. And his enzymes were showing normal. So they told him he had a heartburn. And I fussed and carried on with him until they put him in cardiac ICU. And even though I was telling them about this condition, he's got Ehlers-Danlos, his heart is rotated on the axis, all these things that are really important. No one was really hearing me. I felt really frustrated because I was just like, no one is listening to me. So I finally, he was on Dilaudid. which is some really heavy pain medication. And he was dead asleep in the bed and he sat straight up in the bed, clutched his chest and started screaming in pain. And I busted out of the room and I said, what do you need to do to diagnose an aortic dissection? And the guy in the ICU observation said, he would need an MRI. And I said, if you don't get him down there to get an MRI right away, I'm going to tear this hospital down. I

SPEAKER_02: 12:35

don't

SPEAKER_01: 12:36

blame you. They took him down and they did the MRI. And on the way back, they had to call the emergency, the thoracic surgeon on call in. And his chest was about halfway full of blood. His aorta was, each time he clutched his chest and screamed, the aorta was tearing just a little bit more. He had a partial dissection at that time. And when they pushed him back, The aorta ripped open before they could do the surgery all the way, full dissection. And they did the surgery anyways and tried. But when he came out and we went into the cardiac ICU and they pulled his eyes open to check for like reflex. I was in there when they did it and there was no reflex because when all the blood comes out, there's nothing there to circulate oxygen. And that was that. Yeah. But it was really hard to make that decision. I can remember when I came out of cardiac ICU because the doors keep it closed off and they only let a few people back at the time. I literally just screamed and fell to my knees and my brothers ran down the hall and scooped me up. And they were just devastated for me. And my, I mean, he wasn't gone, but he was gone, you know, but it takes time for everyone to get, I know enough about medical stuff to know that he was gone, you know, but it takes, there's a lot of people there, his parents, his daughter, you know, a lot of people have to come to that conclusion at the same time that you do. And I didn't want to take him away from them because So I made no decisions. I just waited and gave everybody the time and space to understand the same thing that I understood, which was at that moment, I understood that he wasn't coming back, but they needed to get there too. I held my stepdaughter's hand and I looked her in the face and I said, I won't make any decisions until we decide together. And only you and I will make these decisions. And I called her mother and I told her, you need to come right now. She's going to need you. She needs you. Come now. So Christy, that's her mother, came. And we're very good friends. She's a wonderful person. Never any animosity or problems with us. She came and supported her, my stepdaughter. And Ashley eventually got moved to Duke. um they sent him up there and when we got there the doctor how they called me in I never left his side I think we're maybe on day four this went on for a while and on day four the doctor said what do you want me to do he said why are you here and I said I'm here because they told me at Cape Fear Valley that he needed to be here. He said, I can't save him. And I said, I know. And I said, but he has a whole family out there and they need a doctor to say that. There were two doctors at the hospital that went back and forth. One was like, this isn't going to happen. And the other one was like, no, he can come through. And I think it was the doctor who operated on him that couldn't let it go. But when we got to Duke and they said, this isn't going to happen. He came out to the waiting room and he sat down with the family and he just said, we can't save him. And then I just looked at Amber and I said, what do you want to do? And she said, dad wouldn't want to be like this. And I said, no, he wouldn't. Ashley and I have had a lot of conversations after his sister passed away about what he wanted, what he didn't want, what life would look like. I mean, really deep, open conversations. He did not want us to struggle the way that we struggled when his sister passed away. And so he was really clear. And so... I asked the doctor, what do we have to do? And he said, we really don't have to do anything. We just have to wait. And we're going to stop giving him all this medicine. It's all the medicine that's keeping things dragging on. We're just going to stop. You know, there's no pulling the plug. We're just going to stop and he's going to drift away. So we went in and we held his hands and off he went. And it did feel like a bomb blew up my whole life. And the worst part about it for me personally was that my son was only seven and he was not at the hospital. And I made a conscientious decision to not bring him to the hospital because of all the surgery and all the things that they were doing to him. He didn't even look like himself. It was the worst possible image. I never wanted him to remember him the way that he looked in those moments. I wanted him to remember him for the big, vivacious, funny guy that he always knew. So I never took him to the hospital. And when we came home, I had to sit my son down and tell him that he would never see his dad again. And that officially is the worst day of my life.

SPEAKER_02: 18:55

Horribly.

SPEAKER_01: 18:59

I'll never forget the scream that came from that little boy. But he knew instinctively. I didn't even get to finish the sentence.

SPEAKER_02: 19:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 19:12

Before I could even get halfway through the sentence, he screamed. It was awful. And he just was broken. He really was. Because just like Ashley was attached to Amber's hip when she was a little girl. Yeah. Colton was attached to Ashley like nobody's business. I mean, I could have left the house and not come back for weeks sometimes. And I don't even know he would have noticed.

UNKNOWN: 19:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 19:39

I did all the things nobody wanted because I'm the mom, you know. Dad was the fun guy. That's usually how that works. Dad's always the fun guy.

UNKNOWN: 19:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 19:51

So it really was. I mean, I felt like in that moment, if you go back when you were a kid and you would play at the beach and a wave would come and crash over you and you just spin, spin, spin, spin, spin underneath the water, that's how it felt.

UNKNOWN: 20:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 20:10

So you don't even know how to come up for air.

SPEAKER_00: 20:12

I'm still processing everything you just said. I'm going to try to stop crying. This is a lot. This is a lot. And this is the first time I'm getting to hear everything that you had been through. What was that like for the next several weeks?

SPEAKER_01: 20:31

First couple of days, like right after that happens, you feel really almost disconnected from my body. It was very surreal and foggy, and it's busy. There's a lot of societal expectations to meet, planning funerals, and there's a lot of decisions that have to be made, and those were not decisions that I was willing to relinquish to other people. They were things that we had discussed, things that he wanted how he wanted things to kind of go and I wanted to include other people in those but I very much wanted to make sure that he was getting what he deserved you don't really have a lot of time in that at that point in time to even think about your thoughts and feelings so it's almost like you pause you're now making a lot of decisions meeting a lot of expectations Trying to tend to your child and their emotional health and physical well-being. And to this day, like kind of looking back retroactively, I think about it and I swear, this is probably an awful thing to say. But I'm telling you, funerals are not about us. They're not about the widow. It's an awful time for us. And they're not about us at all. They're about everyone else. Feeling bad. Our children and me, We didn't leave that feeling better in any way, you know? So many people came to Ashley's funeral. There were hundreds of people at Ashley's funeral. When I say he was very well respected, he knew everybody. He was very well respected. He was very connected. His parents are very connected. My parents are very connected. There were so many people at that funeral, but they were standing outside in the parking lot trying to get in. I mean, every seat was full, standing people everywhere. But I left that and I felt just exhausted, just exhausted. And you have all these people around you, right? And there were moments when I called in two cousins to come with me who I'm very close to. And we, I had to go buy, I had to go buy a suit for the funeral. So I wouldn't look terrible. And so we went off and we went shopping and we had a normal experience. Like I remember that it was normal. We laughed, we chatted, but it's an awful thing that you're having to do. But I can remember like moments of times where it was like normal and you felt good and you laughed. But then all of a sudden it's like a vacuum. Everyone sucks out of the picture and everybody disappears. And then you're alone. And you have to figure that out. And it was like, at that time when that happened, there's other stuff happening at the same time. There was a terrible hurricane in Fayetteville. And it had flooded our neighborhood. We couldn't even get to our house. And we spent the month of October, just about the whole month of October, living with my parents. We were in the heat of the Halloween season and couldn't move back, couldn't move back because of the hurricane and the flooding. Now, we didn't have any damage to our house. We were lucky, but we were kind of living at my parents' house. All of our stuff was over there. We had packed up a bunch of stuff and we had moved it over there because we knew our neighborhood flooded a lot and it was a lot of flooding. And we stayed there and then we went on this trip. And when we came back was the first time we went to our house in over a month. We literally just threw our stuff in the house and went to the birthday party. So when I left the hospital, I went back to my mother's house and I did not go back to the home that Ashley and I shared. And I stayed there for a long time at my mother's house, just trying to Get my feet underneath myself and figure out what I was going to do. And every time I walked into that house, my heart broke again. I just couldn't do it. I couldn't go back to the house. And during that time frame, I wasn't working either. The stores were closed. I had just kind of taken a break. I wasn't working every day. I had a job part-time at Colton School, but when I would go, I tried to go back to work. I really did. But the other thing that kind of happened was everybody looked at you differently. Like they just looked at you with the sadness, the sorrow. Oh my God, she's so terrible. Her life is a disaster. You know, that's how I felt. And so I felt like, Either somebody wanted me to do something for them, give them something, didn't know what to say, didn't know how to respond or walked on eggshells around me. And nobody was just normal. And I just wanted people to be normal. Right. I just want to be normal. And that was hard to do. So. I wasn't really ready to process everything that had happened. And I just really tried to be normal, even though I wasn't, I didn't necessarily feel like frozen. I just felt disoriented. Yeah. Back to kind of like that beach wave thing. Like I'm caught under the waves and just kind of tumbling. Don't know where I'm going or what I'm doing. I'm just literally in the months after that happening, I'm literally just trying to, Find a way to stand up out of that churn and just stop for a minute. And it took some time for that to happen. I never went back to the house. I never lived in the house that we lived in again. I was never able to do that. After a little while, I got an apartment. I bought all new furniture. And I moved my personal things. and stored the rest of the stuff. I didn't throw anything away. I just stored it away. And I took... Did he help you with the other stuff? His parents. Yeah, his parents helped me. My sister came and literally lived with me. We slept in the same bed together in a two-bedroom apartment. Colton had a bedroom and I had a bedroom that I shared with my sister. Yeah. And we... You know, trying to figure it out. Yeah. I mean, it was a mess. Grief is messy. It's ugly. It's not pretty. It's not fun. It's not anything you would expect. And I definitely think that one of the things that I learned along the way is that it's okay to be a mess.

SPEAKER_02: 27:48

Yeah. You are allowed.

SPEAKER_01: 27:51

That's right.

SPEAKER_00: 27:53

Yeah. So people were treating you differently. Yeah. You just needed to go day by day. How was Colton and Ashley's daughter? How were they taking all of this while you were trying to just make it day to day?

SPEAKER_01: 28:07

So I will speak for Amber. Amber at that time, she was, she was older. She had graduated from college. She was living her life. She wasn't like a child or at home at that point in time. Colton, on the other hand, Colton and I went straight to therapy just as quick as you could run the therapy. We ran there. Yeah. You know, his therapist always said that he was really emotionally mature for his age. He struggled. And the biggest problem I had with him was he didn't act out or anything like that. We had a lot of conversations and I was really in survival mode. I was a mess, right? And I wasn't a good mom at that time at all, not even remotely close because I was just a disaster. And I tried, but I just, I needed help. And I had a lot of support around me. I had my parents, I had his parents, I had my sister, my I had the people who have worked with me for years and years now. I even had them around. I had this group of people around me who were helping me the best that I could. I had my dad and stuff like that. And I got him back to school and I got him into therapy and I knew he was struggling. And so we stayed there with my parents for a while so that he would have A really strong set of people around him and Ashley's parents were really involved. I knew I was smart enough to know that I wasn't capable in the moment. Everything that needed to be done. So I leaned on the people around me and was vulnerable enough to ask for help. I need you. I need some help. And that was hard to do because as a parent, we don't ever want to admit that. that we're failing and not doing a good job. But the fact of the matter is that in a time like that, it's okay. I can't do this. I'm a mess. I'm trying. I mean, I would get up every morning and I would pack his lunch and I'd get him off to school. But there were things that I wasn't very good at and they were helping along the way. The good thing was, is that Colton and I spent a lot of time talking. And because of the shared experience that we had, Like we're closer because of our struggles. The bad thing about it was, is that I made mistakes in that Colton almost became more of a confidant at times. And I started to see him, even at a young age, feel like he had to take care of me or look after me. once I recognized what was happening and, you know, obviously I'm going to therapy, I'm talking to my therapist about it and stuff like that. I think being vulnerable and being honest is a good thing, but he couldn't feel responsible for fixing me or taking care of me. Right. Like I had to let him know I'm okay. I'm okay. And we went through some stuff together that took us some time to kind of recenter and get things back. Right. But we did. And I think that whole experience was, we are closer together than a lot of moms and sons. Yeah. We just talk about things that most boys wouldn't talk with their moms about. Right. You know, I mean, he'll tell me anything. Right. Sometimes I'm like, please don't tell me that. That's

SPEAKER_00: 31:56

funny. Well, at least that, you know, that relationship wasn't severed. At least that relationship brought you two closer because then you could grieve together instead of grieving separately.

SPEAKER_01: 32:07

Yeah. And I think that being able to show him and tell him things that I was really thinking and feeling gave him the opportunity to also feel comfortable enough to say, yeah, I feel, I feel this too. And his therapist described it as when children lose a parent like that, like they only have so much emotional maturity, no matter how old continue to breathe. Right. Until they reach full emotional maturity, they can't actually finish grieving.

UNKNOWN: 32:36

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 32:36

And you have to give them that time and space. So it's like he's constantly kind of replaying and going through this over and over and over again, which is why we talk about Ashley a lot. We talk about what happened. We talk about why some of the things that happened, the decisions that got made, why we made those decisions. And as he ages, I can see him becoming more mature and understanding.

SPEAKER_00: 33:00

I think especially because we have kids the same age, they need that extra bit to process at each level. And I think that's really great that the two of you were able to do that together because there's a lot of things that even now he's still processing and there's still things that he's going through that it's going to carry into his life and how he chooses to live his life.

SPEAKER_01: 33:23

Well, and I think that kind of transitions us over into at times I felt a lot of judgment. From people looking at some of my decisions and giving me a hard time about what I was choosing to do. One example of that is a decision that I made in relation to what we're talking about. Ashley was cremated. That was what he wanted. And I have held on to his ashes. There are some people who have given me a really hard time about the fact that I haven't spread Ashley's ashes and done what he wanted me to do with them yet. Even to this day, I

SPEAKER_00: 34:00

still have Ashley. So Ashley wanted you to spread them? He did want me to spread them. And

SPEAKER_01: 34:06

I swear I will do it. But I haven't yet. And the reason why I've chosen not to do it, and I do believe he would agree and understand, is that our son needs the time and space to understand everything. And when I spread his ashes, I want him to be able to say goodbye.

SPEAKER_02: 34:30

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 34:30

To have the closure that he needs. And that means that I'm going to hold them until he can participate and fully call for him and understand. And hopefully we'll be that point in time where we can all have more healing and more closure, but all together. I didn't think that it would be fair for me to get that and Amber to get that without Colton having that opportunity. And at eight years old, he wasn't going to get that. So I'm waiting. And a lot of people got a lot to say about that sometimes, but I don't care. I had to make decisions along the way to ultimately cultivate my new existence.

SPEAKER_02: 35:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 35:22

And, Part of that meant that choices that I made, sometimes they weren't for the best. Sometimes it was just about surviving emotionally, physically, whatever. And I was just doing the best I could at certain times. And then other times I was, I transitioned into kind of fake it until you make it. And then ultimately my circle, one of the things I noticed, one of the biggest changes after is that my circle changed a lot. Some of, some of the people I lost because I decided that they weren't the best people for me in those moments. And that's okay. People come and people go and that's all right. That doesn't make them bad people. It doesn't make me bad people. It just means our time together is over. And some people I lost and I regret, you know, and I miss those people and I wish some things hadn't have happened, but I have to be okay with that because ultimately I lost them because of the decisions that I made. But those decisions led me down the path and put me where I was supposed to be. Right. And I'm comfortable with that. I might be sad about the loss of those people, but I'm comfortable with it. Right.

SPEAKER_00: 36:42

And I know we talked a little bit about your faith in this. So I'm just curious, as you were trying to survive, Where did God meet you in your grief or did you wrestle with him a little?

SPEAKER_01: 36:54

Oh man, I wrestled bad. I was angry. I don't just mean a little bit angry. I mean, I was really angry. I would say that my thing kind of cracked and then built back so slowly over time. It took me, it took perspective and time and distance for me to be able to see his work. And I feel like my faith is stronger now, but looking back, I definitely fought and wrestled trying to understand how this could be my path. Why is this my path? Why is this on me? But I know now that he only gives us what we can handle. He places us where we're supposed to be when we're supposed to be there. And that faith is just that we can't, we can't see it. We can't touch it. But you have to believe that he leads us where we belong and that all of these things that we endure or encounter or overcome give us tools that we take with us into life and that it's going to help us grow so that when we encounter this next phase of his plan, we're going to have everything we need to be successful. And that growth doesn't always feel good, look good, or any of that. Right? It's very painful. It can be very painful. I think attitude and just being able to have faith that there's a path for you that makes sense is important. But in the beginning, it was awful. I mean, it was messy and disastrous. Like I went to church and sat down at our church and I didn't even, I couldn't even make it to the service. I just cried and left. I couldn't even go back to our church. Yeah. It was painful. It was hard.

SPEAKER_00: 38:51

I imagine it was. I don't think anybody listening to all that you've been through would say that that's not something that they wouldn't do the same. If you could go back to that version of yourself, because you did have a shift, what would you whisper to her?

SPEAKER_01: 39:08

Okay, so I would probably say I would tell myself, you won't feel like this forever, right?

UNKNOWN: 39:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 39:16

That it's okay to be messy. I really didn't want to look messy on the outside because I felt a lot of judgment, a lot of things. But it's OK. It was OK to be messy. And I would have told myself it's OK to be a mess, to be a disaster. But this is my life and I don't have to please everyone else around me. It's OK to make decisions for me and my son. Yeah. And I would have told me to give myself a little more grace. Judgment didn't just come from other people. And we do this all the time in our life. We judge ourselves. We are so hard on ourselves and the world is ugly enough. We don't need any more bad judgment. Absolutely. Plenty of that is coming from outside. We need to give ourselves grace. And I would have told myself that. I also would say that I wasn't doing Ashley any disservice by trying to find and create and cultivate a new life for myself judgment from outside judgment from myself at times I felt like I wasn't allowed to move on but the fact of the matter is I am allowed to move on I am allowed to Move forward. And I felt a lot of guilt associated with moving on, moving forward. I did it anyways. The dialogue was very, you know, was negative for me, myself, not externally. I didn't put that off on my kids or anything, but just internally, the way I spoke to myself wasn't very nice because I felt a lot of guilt. And I didn't need to feel guilty. Life moves on and I don't have to stand still. No. I think those are all things that I would have told myself at the moment. Yeah. Letting go of what our dreams were, what our life was, what our plan was, was the hardest.

SPEAKER_02: 41:21

Right.

SPEAKER_01: 41:22

And we had a life that we planned together. Like we knew where we were going and it was hard to let go of that. So there was a part of me that wanted to stand still and, And live in the past. And there was a part of me that wanted to move on because it was the right thing to do for me, for my son, and even for Ashley.

SPEAKER_00: 41:45

Yeah, because you can't stay there. No. Life keeps going. Yes. You can't just stay there. You just end up wallowing in something that not even God wants for you.

SPEAKER_01: 41:55

Yes. And I think Ashley... Ashley watched his parents. I'm not saying they waller in their grief. But one of the reasons why Ashley chose to be cremated was not only did Ashley's sister pass away, but her three children passed away from a genetic disorder. All three before the age of five. So Ashley's parents have experienced an extreme amount of loss. They've lost two of their children. and three of their grandchildren. So there's a lot of loss there. And Ashley didn't want his parents and his children to have to go back to the cemetery and put flowers. There's a lot of obligation that comes with that. And he didn't want us to remember. Some of the conversations we had is, I don't want my kids to remember the worst day of our lives. In that way, he wants us to carry him on in a positive way and talk about his funny stories and his humor and all this great stuff about him. And that doesn't have to be done at a cemetery, which is why I chose to be cremated.

SPEAKER_00: 43:11

I didn't know that his parents had lost the three grandkids. So that's the weight. I really want to thank you for this, Molly. I know taking us through this has been heavy and I know that I feel the weight of it and I know the listeners and those will be hearing your story will as well, but we'll just take a quick breath for a moment because we know that life has to shift and move forward, right? That's right. We'll pause the conversation here, but Molly's story doesn't end with loss. In part two, we talk about what it means to rebuild, to love again, and to live fully even after deep grief. So leave your thoughts, take a deep breath, and get ready for the next episode. If this episode moved you, please share it with someone who might need it and if you haven't already, follow the show so that part two shows up right in your feed. While you're waiting, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review. It really helps others discover hidden chapters and hear stories that matter.