I thought honoring my husband’s final wishes would be the most difficult thing I would ever have to do.
I was wrong.
The hardest part came afterward, when people began questioning whether those wishes had truly been his.
My husband, Mark, had been seriously ill for months. At the time, I was six months pregnant with our first child, a little girl we had already decided to name Cecelia.
We had dreamed about becoming parents for years.
Then everything changed.
One evening, while we sat together on our porch, Mark placed his hand gently on my pregnant stomach.
“If I’m able to help someone after I’m gone,” he said quietly, “I want to be an organ donor.”
I immediately shook my head.
“Please don’t talk about that.”
“I need to talk about it.”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
He looked at me with a sadness I had never seen before.
“I know. But if I can’t be here to watch our daughter grow up, maybe something good can still come from what happens to me.”
I didn’t want to think about losing him.
I wanted to think about baby names, nursery decorations, and the day he would finally hold our daughter.
Instead, we were discussing what would happen after his death.
Mark eventually became too sick to continue living normally.
