The Club No one Wants to Join: Eighteen Stories of Individuals Who Have Lost Their Spouse and How They Continued with Their Lives

By Wayne K. Turnbow

When you have found your companion to travel through life with, it becomes a devastating tragedy to lose that person. It affects the individual, the family, and their friends. Acquaintances struggle to know what to say, and the individual going through it wonders if there is any way to make sense about what happened and how to get on with their lives. These are the very personal stories of eighteen people who lost their spouses and had to move on. As you read it, you will see that some chose to stay single and others found another mate. The hope is that by seeing others' stories, everyone can find something in the book, either a way to talk to someone struggling or if you have lost your spouse, comfort in knowing others have found a way to move forward and still find joy in life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 12, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685269623

Book preview

Table of Contents

Title

Copyright

Introduction

Allen and Erin

Tommy and Brittany

Buddy and Sara

Jim and Angela

Dan and Doral

Elaine

Evan and Jaylene

John and Sara

Douglas and Laura

Gary and Lisa

Ray and Maria

Mary

Mike and Kim

James and Loreen

Ronnie and Jody

Mark and Robbi

Sonja

Mike and JaNae

About the Author

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The Club No one Wants to Join

Eighteen Stories of Individuals Who Have Lost Their Spouse and How They Continued with Their Lives

Wayne K. Turnbow

ISBN 978-1-68526-961-6 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-68526-962-3 (Digital)

Copyright © 2022 Wayne K. Turnbow

All rights reserved

First Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Covenant Books

11661 Hwy 707

Murrells Inlet, SC 29576

www.covenantbooks.com

Note: The names with a single person are individuals who have lost more than one spouse.

Introduction

Everyone has challenges in life. When we are looking for a way to find happiness, peace, and contentment, we look for a companion to walk the paths of life with us who is willing to share our struggles, failures, and successes.

No one gets married and plans to have their marriage end in the passing of a beloved spouse. I believe that this becomes a singular struggle that each person passing through it will handle differently.

The purpose of this book is to provide a healing outlet and resources for thought to those going through it and to provide a level of understanding to develop empathy for those who are trying to help a friend or loved one suffering from the loss of a spouse.

I have felt the need to put this book together for several years and just kept putting it off. In May of 2020, the feeling that it needed to get done just became a constant pressing issue in my mind. As I put together a list of the friends and relatives who were going through this, I was overwhelmed with a desire to try to help them heal and move forward. I know so many who have lost a spouse, and when I talk to them about how they are doing, they all seem to have a common thread with someone else I've talked with about their struggles and successes. When I share those feelings of others, the knowledge that others have the same concerns, struggles, and feelings always seem to bring a measure of peace. As I began to have people write their stories, I felt the need to step outside of my circle of influence. I knew this would add to the amount of time it would take to compile the stories, but I wanted the book to cover a wide range of beliefs, religions, and geography.

I know that religion and God play a significant role in most people's lives. I know it is impossible to not just write about the healing power God played in many of these stories, but I hoped to have the book more about the mortal side of life and the day-to-day struggles and emotions with moving on after a hard, heartbreaking loss. Not everyone is able to write their story as it becomes too difficult to relive the experience they went through.

I hope this book allows those who have lost a spouse to find comfort and possibly direction in seeing how others survived. For those reading the book that have not lost a spouse, I hope it provides you with empathy for the ones you meet in life that you can assist.

These stories are the authors' own words. Aside from a few grammatical corrections, the words and stories are their own. Some of them have asked to have their names changed.

Many of these individuals have told me that this has provided a form of release as they were able to let feelings and emotions flow through their hearts and heads into the written word. None of these individuals found it easy to do this, but most of them told me how much it comforted them to complete the task.

Allen and Erin

I met Erin in the fall of 1989 near the end of my time at BYU. We were set up on a blind date by my younger sister. We met on the floor of the Marriot Center, after an eighteen-stake fireside, and went to the German House for games and cocoa. My sister was living in the German-language house and Erin was living in the Finnish-language house. They were in the same student ward, and my sister had been really impressed by Erin. She felt like she had a revelation that Erin was the one for me.

Unfortunately, our first date didn't go well. Erin was of course very friendly, but we didn't hit it off well. I actually told my sister that I thought we had nothing in common and couldn't believe she had set us up. My sister said that unless I dated Erin again, she wouldn't introduce me to anyone else. We kept running into each other, and I realized what a great sense of humor she had. I also decided (on a whim) to refinish an old piano and Erin volunteered to help and we discovered we enjoyed working together. After several more run-ins with Erin, we went on a second date including crashing a dance at Manavu Chapel and going into the chapel area to play piano and sing. She was really talented at both. The second date went extremely well, and we fell in love.

Erin's mom passed away in July 1991, just before we got engaged. I think her passing helped me realize how strongly I felt about Erin.

We were engaged in September 1991. On the day we got engaged, I borrowed a canoe from a friend, with the idea that we would row around a little, play romantic music on my small tape recorder, read love poems, and then I would pop the question. Unfortunately, there was a lot of wind, and despite how hard we rowed, we did not move in the water. I decided we should switch positions in the canoe, and during that process, we ended up capsizing. Luckily we were close to shore, so we didn't lose anything, but the moment was gone. We went to dinner later that evening, drove up near the Y, and got engaged there.

We were married in the Manti Temple on January 2, 1992. We felt the presence of Erin's mother during the wedding. It was a wonderful but very cold day. We didn't feel the cold because of the joy of the day, but everyone else in the family was anxious to get indoors after the pictures.

One funny story—Erin forgot to bring the wedding dress to Manti. We all went down there the night before the wedding. Luckily, we discovered that it has been forgotten, so a friend was able to break into her apartment (through an unlocked window) and bring the dress.

I graduated from BYU in December 1991, and Erin graduated in April 1991. So we did not ever go through the poor-student phase as a young couple. We were married in Manti, had a reception in Salt Lake City that evening, then had an open house in Los Alamos, New Mexico (my hometown) and Yuma, Arizona (her hometown). After Yuma, we rented a small moving van (with some old furniture that her parents didn't want) and drove to San Jose, California, where I started work for Arthur Andersen, one of the big accounting firms. I feel like our honeymoon never really ended. We found a cute little studio apartment and set up our house. Erin got a job teaching math and music at a local private school.

We had five children together. Our oldest child was really a challenge to raise; he has bad ADHD with a strong rebellious streak. Also very strong opinions. It really challenged us to stay unified in how to help him and how to discipline. Our fourth child also has mild to moderate autism. We both learned a lot of patience and love for kids with special needs. Parenting is certainly a loving, heart-wrenching adventure.

We generally got along great with each other's parents. Erin's dad remarried about the same time that we got married. There were some challenges accepting his new wife.

Erin died suddenly in a car accident in July 2018. We were returning from a stake pioneer trek in Wyoming with our two youngest sons and a family friend. We had not slept very well a couple of nights before, and we were all sleepy. Erin fell asleep at the wheel. The car rolled over 1.5 times. When I opened my eyes and came to myself, I looked over and could see that she was likely dead based on the position of her body. I held her hand and spoke to her but got no response. At that moment, a strong spiritual feeling or message was communicated to me. The content of the message was that even though this would be hard, I needed to be at peace, move forward with faith, and that it was her time to go.

That message was reconfirmed in many ways after the accident. One way was that everyone else in the accident walked away and/or fully recovered very quickly. One of my sons ended up halfway out the window, and his head and arm dragged on the pavement for the last forty feet. He had a severe concussion and was airlifted to Casper, Wyoming. Luckily, one of the highway patrolmen was a church member and had consecrated oil so that we could give a blessing to my son before he flew away. He also ended up with a broken wrist. Luckily, both of those injuries healed quickly with no lasting harm.

From the moment of the accident for several months afterward, we felt like we were carried by church members and friends. Two of the couples leading the trek came up right behind us, got out, and helped calm my sons and family friend. They went with us to the emergency room. One couple took the family friend home, and the other couple drove us to Casper, Wyoming and paid for a nice hotel room. Our bishop and a counselor drove up to Casper and brought us home, and another friend paid for Nathan to fly home (since a long drive would be too taxing). There is no room to explain all the good things people did to help us. It made me realize that I can do more to help others than I have done previously.

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