One of the most difficult aspects of this has been imagining you dying alone in the water thousands of miles away from me and those you loved. Alone.
And while I prefer to think you just lost consciousness and there was no struggle- I made the mistake last night of asking a Dr. friend what would've happened if you had hypothermia. I had to cut him off because it was too much to bear.
Today I talked about this with my counselor and how I could not really move on from feeling so, so sorry for you that you had to go through that- and she told me that after their daughter passed at 18 in a car accident, her husband had a dream in which Jesus Himself was carrying her away gently from the wreckage. It brought them great comfort. "We don't know," she told me, "what happened then...we weren't there...but if God is love, then He woudn't have forsaken or left Dan alone because He loves him- he may have just enveloped him in the most loving, beautiful way."
I liked the thought and sat with tears in my eyes- but then couldn't help sarcastically replying, "so he lovingly comforted him while watching him drown...great."
But this is comforting. Because according to the Christian faith there is only one person who has to die completely alone- without any help or comfort from God- and that was Christ- Eli Eli Lema Sabachthani- something like that- "My God, my God- why have you forsaken me" he cried out.
I remember in the early days, I was sitting on the bed crying to a friend about how I just couldn't even begin to imagine what Dan went through- and she looked at me with very strong eyes, a clear voice, and slow- pronounced words and said- "Dan was not alone...he was not alone."