Jolt of reality

I added a gal to my friendlist on Myspace yesterday. She's a friend of a friend, graduated a year ahead of me at the same high school, and I was friends (not close) with one of her younger sisters. She accepted my request, so I did the normal browsing of her once-private page. I saw pictures of her lovely sisters, including the one I had known in school. These gals are all so smart, pretty, just overall nice people. I went to read her blog entries, and as I was reading some of the older entries I saw, "my sister is dead". I was like whoa, what? I went hunting for more information, but couldn't see more than some here and there, so I googled her sisters' name. What I found still has me in tears. Her sister, the one I knew and who was my age, had died from complications of pregnancy/delivery of her 2nd child (who also did not survive-they had induced her at 22 weeks). She had a stroke during delivery, remained in a coma until her family had to make the gut-wrenching decision to ler her body go, as her soul was already gone.

I can't pinpoint the exact reason why this is so devastating to me. There are many reasons to be affected (she was a classmate/friend, she was young, she was a mother/sister/wife/daughter)...I think the reason it really gets me is reading the words of her family left behind. Having my brother come so close to leaving me a few months ago, knowing I was just that close to writing those painful words. My heart goes out to the family. It's been a couple of years now, but I can imagine the pain is just as fresh (especially when they see her smile in her daughter). God grant them the comfort they so rightfully deserve.