A facebook friend posted this morning that over the weekend, her friend's husband died suddenly of a heart attack. He was young and they had a two-year-old daughter.  The wife just graduated from BYU Idaho with a teaching degree and was excited to finally be a stay at home mom.  She said she was glad she stuck with it and got her degree.  What a blessing that she is now qualified in that way to support her daughter financially.  She was so excited to go on a 6 day vacation with her husband.  I am not sure if they had taken the trip already or not.  On her blog she wrote that she thought a lot about when to have a second child.  His last facebook post was a video of his little girl and he wrote how much he loves his wife and his daughter.  He talked about he was the luckiest guy to have them in their lives.  And then within two weeks he had died.

It's so sad.  Things can be so heartbreaking sometimes.  I know that Heavenly Father has a plan for each of us and we don't really know what that plan is.  We may think we know, or we may have a good idea of what it is, but the details of it, we ultimately don't know.  We know what our rewards can be if we are faithful, and sometimes that might be what keeps someone going.  We know that this family will be together forever and they are sealed as a family.  This knowledge is crucial.  It's just the living without that person that is the struggle.  This young mom had hopes and dreams and plans with her husband.  They are different now.  She wanted and thought her earthly future would include them being together.  I'm sure she'll get remarried and have more kids, although surely that is the LAST thing on her mind right now.  It's hard in the present to see the long term blessings that Heavenly Father has in store for us.  But he sees us, knows us, guides us, and comforts us. You never know the course your life will take.  The challenge is what you do with the changes.

Someone posted this quote on the wife's fb page.  I find it comforting:

"In like manner our father and mother, brothers, sisters and friends who have passed away from this earth, having been faithful, and worthy to enjoy these rights and privileges, may have a mission given to them to visit their relatives and friends upon the earth again, bringing from the divined Presence messages of love, of warning, or reproof and instruction to those whom they had learned to love in the flesh." -Pres. Joseph F. Smith