It is with great sadness — yet in the hope that her tragic end might save another — that I report the cause of my beloved Allie’s death. She may have taken too much over-the-counter cold medication (generic Nyquil) that night before she got ready for bed. The cough suppressant dextramethorphan interacted with prescription pain medication that she took for endometriosis and, as the pathologist at the Davidson County Medical Examiner’s Office told me, it shut down the mechanism in her brain that controls the “will to breathe.”

So she essentially just drifted off to sleep, then coma, then death. She felt no pain.

I say she “may have taken too much,” because Dr. Adele Lewis, the pathologist, told me that 10-20% of people are what’s called “slow metabolizers” of dextramethorphan, and that could account for the extremely high level of the drug that they found in her blood. In other words, a pretty fair chunk of society doesn’t process the drug like it’s supposed to be processed, so multiple doses even as directed can accumulate and stay active in the body. I want to point out that this is a very common over-the-counter medication for cough suppression, and it’s been around for 50 years. There are documented cases of accidental overdose death with this drug, so it’s not something to play around with, especially when mixed with prescription medication.

Some idiotic people actually abuse the drug, but that certainly wasn’t my Allie. She just didn’t feel good, so she took something she had taken many times before. We’ll just never know for certain how much she took or when.

As I researched the possible causes of the sudden death of a young, healthy woman, something like this was high on the list. It is profoundly sad, because her death was an accident, and accidents — at least one like this — can be prevented. I don’t dwell on that, however, because it will keep me forever bound to the past, and the best way I can honor her and her life is to live on and be well.

It took a long time for the Medical Examiner to piece this all together, and I am extremely grateful for their assistance. It has been agonizing for me and Alicia’s entire family, but now we know. And this will help us with our grieving. There aren’t words in any language to adequately express the loss of someone like her, so I won’t try.

I’m moving to Dallas next week to begin another chapter in my life, one that she had a major role in developing (and is likely orchestrating from the world beyond). I need this move, this change, this turning-of-the-page. The headstone on her grave will be up soon, and it contains the last words I ever said to her: “He gives to His beloved, sleep.”

She is gone, but her memory will always be with me.

It’s been awhile since I got personal. A lot of people have been asking me how I’m doing, so I thought this might be a good time to tell you. I’m doing well and getting stronger with every week that goes by. I still don’t know her cause of death, and that hangs there like Damocles’ Sword. I won’t know ’till the end of the month.

This past weekend, our friend Holly and I filled a 20-foot dumpster with junk from the garage and house. My Allie was a packrat, and she’d dragged her “stuff” all over the place during her life. It wasn’t much, but it was hers, if you know what I mean. What it was, was boxes of papers and, well, stuff, most of which I was able to toss into the dumpster. I had to go through everything, because hidden in these boxes were little gems about her and her past that I have since woven into a memory book.

Here’s a bit of advice based upon my experience: If you have things you’d rather your loved ones not find, throw them away. This includes photos and letters involving old boyfriends and girlfriends, especially those that, well, you’d likely not display on the dining room table.

I bought a cedar chest and have stored the most precious items there. Her childhood treasure in the form of a tin of marbles. All of her writings. Her harmonica and the silly flute that drove me crazy. Her jewelry boxes and the small box of arrowheads that she collected over the years (she was part Cherokee). Articles of clothing that are special to me. Her television news awards. Her UT coffee cup. And much, much more.

This is a part of the process of letting her go, and the more I do these things, the farther away she seems. And while I would give anything for just five minutes with her, this seems right, because the pain is evolving into the memories that I choose to keep alive, and there’s nothing painful there.

So I’m doing better and I’ll be okay. Thanks for asking. It means more than you can imagine.

It’s Memorial Day, and my neighborhood is basically empty. Everybody’s out doing something with family, and I think that’s great. People will take a lot of pictures this weekend, because that’s what we do. We try to capture the moment for all time by taking pictures of it.

This is on my mind, because I’ve spent the weekend working on Allie’s memory book. You know what I value most about the pictures I have? It’s not the photos of special occasions when everybody gets together, and it’s not the formal, posed pictures taken by a pro. It’s not the family gatherings or the shots of her on-the-job in the TV News business.

What brings my heart the most joy are simple, candid pictures of every day life. You know the kind: no make-up, no special “good” clothes, nothing artificial — just life in its natural form. These are the pictures that mean most to me right now, because I don’t want to remember her just for the holidays or the special events. I want to remember the rawness that was myAllie.

And so my message to you this holiday weekend is that you take all the pictures you want today, but don’t forget to take a few tomorrow and the next day, too. For one day, you might find yourself in my position and discover that the moments most worth capturing happen every second of every ordinary day.

It was one month ago today that I awoke at 3:30am to find my precious Allie dead on the bathroom floor. The last month has been the most painful of my life, but I’m doing better — thanks in no small measure to you and the hundreds of emails I’ve received from friends, former co-workers, family, and people I don’t even really know.

One friend called to say that he was so inspired by things I wrote about the importance of every moment that he swallowed hurt pride and reconnected with his daughter. She had apparently been quite rebellious, and he was pissed. They weren’t talking to each other, but now they are.

I’ve been drawn closer to my own children through this.

I’ve made new friends and discovered tribe members I likely wouldn’t have met otherwise.

These are silver linings in the dark cloud of her passing. I’m sure there are many others.

I miss my sweetie, but the agony has faded, and I’m busy preparing to move forward. I still have bad days, but the important thing is I’m letting myself have them. I won’t pretend to be strong. That’s just so much bullshit in the wake of such a loss.

I’m creating a memory book, having a dumpster delivered next weekend, giving notice to move August 1st (don’t know where just yet — likely just a smaller place here), planning a garage sale, and keeping busy with writing and clients.

Turning the page on this is what I must do, and I know that’s what she would want me to do. I have so many sweet memories, and she will always occupy a special place in my heart.

Thank you for being you and for asking how I’m doing.

Airports are places where I can get lost in a crowd. Such self-imposed isolation produces an introspective mind, and so I write. Yes, this will be about Allie and my grieving.

I share this not because I have some maudlin need to vomit my emotions all over you, but because I believe life and death are shared experiences. If the wisdom of the crowd means anything, it’s our ability to learn from each other, rather than entirely through history, tradition and what the elites tell us to learn. This is basic postmodernism, and the PoMo’s mantra — I experience, therefore I understand — includes the experiences of those close to us, be they our friends, family or tribe.

And so I share, in the fervent hope that somebody, somewhere needs to know what I know, and that this knowledge will become a part of the web’s long tail, to be shared by others across the landscape of time.

Let me begin this journey with an axiom I have come to believe: Love is a one-way street, flowing from the source of life itself through us to others. God is love and God is life, so love and life are the same. The heart may beat, but what provides the juice? That is life. That is love. That is God.

Nothing about love’s real deal is self-directed, although we certainly gain much. I liken this to a garden hose. We are the hose, the spigot is the source of life/love, and the nozzle is our method of spreading this to others. When all are functioning, all is well. We know contentment and serenity, not because we “seek and find” it, but because we’re giving it away to others and receiving a fresh load from the source of everything.

If we close the nozzle, that which is in us stagnates. We may run to the spigot all we wish in search of a fresh flow, but it can give us nothing until we give away that which we have. All of nature works this way. Only humankind has the authority to close the nozzle.

My love for my precious Allie is well documented here. I gave everything I had to us and our relationship, as did she, but the source of our contentment and the quality of our connection came not from what we received from each other but what we received from the source of all. That is the secret to happiness, not the extent to which we can manage our surroundings (and the people around us).

When she died, I was devastated. My whole world was yanked from underneath me, and I could find no peace. This is the way of grieving, as documented so well by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in the last century. Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and ultimately Acceptance. How could you be gone? Why did you leave me? If I could only die too. Darkness and loneliness. These are the very real feelings that accompany a sadness so profound that words can’t do it justice.

All of these are self-centered efforts to protect that which is inside us, closing the nozzle, if you will. We circle the wagons, because we can’t stand the pain. We’re also terribly afraid and vulnerable at such times, and self-preservation takes center stage.

Allie’s sudden passing devastated her whole family in Lawrenceburg and many former co-workers, and I spent time hugging and holding them as well as receiving hugs and kindness. That’s the way we do things as a culture. We assemble together, because we find healing together.

But eventually comes the night, the empty bed, and the lonesome valley that we must walk by ourselves. This is where the real agony exists. No one to kiss me goodnight. That special warmth replaced by cold sheets. And then there are the thoughts and the whys and how comes, wild horses running through my mind that demand to be ridden, examined and experienced. I pray for morning, and sleep eventually comes.

A few days ago, I heard a song by Big Blue Hearts called “Lovin You.” The chorus spoke to my heart, “Lovin you is the right thing to do.” There it was! My answer.

One of the things that happened to me in the grieving process is that, in trying to protect myself from pain, I cut off all the joy that came with the outbound flow of love towards my Allie. After all, she was gone. How could I continue to love her? And isn’t shutting the door on that what it means by acceptance?

No. No. A thousand times no.

I love Alicia Faith, and I always will, and the extent to which I can acknowledge that and let it happen determines the quality and depth of my peace and serenity, because that’s the natural way of things. She may be gone — and I may be mad at her for going — but only I can block the love I have in my heart for her. Moreover, from a very real and practical perspective, loving myself is a big part of that. She helped teach me to love myself, and that, too, is a part of my healing.

And permitting myself to love Allie even though she’s gone is the secret to my wellness at this time. I also think it’s the key to my future — and especially any future relationships I might develop. Just because she’s gone doesn’t mean I have to “be” any different than I was when she was here. Discontent is directly proportional to the degree to which I fight the need to love her.

One older friend of mine who’d lost his wife of 55 years two years ago told me that I’m in store for many lonely months, but that eventually the pain will fade. This, I assume, is conventional thinking, and I certainly understand what he’s trying to tell me. But the truth is that nobody knows the pain I feel, nor could they possibly understand the joy I feel in my love for my Allie.

I’m neither naive nor a fool, and I know there are still rough days, weeks and months ahead. But I also know where to turn when I’m feeling down. I know that shutting out the pain also means shutting out the joy, and Allie wouldn’t want me to do that. She was my breath, and she remains the essence of all that’s worthwhile in me. Memories may fade with time, but I will always love her.

As I told people at the funeral, when the final sun sets and they write the book of love, Jesus will be chapter one. But chapter two won’t be Romeo and Juliet, Sleepless in Seattle or Doctor Zhivago. It’ll be Allie and Terry, two lost and tormented souls who found each other late in life and never took a moment of their short time together for granted. She believed in me, and that gives my life purpose and reason to go on. I believed in her, too, and she knew that.

Here’s something very private that she wrote to me on January 2, 2005. This was my Allie:

Thank you Lord for your Terry, then and now, my husband, a beautiful wedding ceremony, he let me be princess for weekend and now a lifetime ahead. We get one day at a time and I’ve never been happier or more surprised and real curious about having a partner who’s not about to get out and shoot a standup. His Carmex kisses, Bible reading, coffee making, spooning me, feeding me, loving me back. It’s a first love, thank you God, the wait was worth it and now I’m going to make every hour of every precious day count and lay down at night with a heart of happiness, not what or who will I report in the morrow…

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