Hello and welcome to this week's chat thread!

I gather Bill has no signal unless he can steal one from a neighbour so that's why I'm starting us off this week.

Not a bad start for me, with a visit to the trainer. I haven't seen him since early July and I've been making progress.

How are you doing today?

One or my good friends, a co-teacher, died in her sleep Saturday night.
The whole school is in shock. We have grandparents day today so we couldn't do anything in the morning but we are having a prayer service last hour. It's a Catholic school so we are allowed to pray, in fact we do prior to every class.

Everyone is crying including me. I can't teach ... luckily I have great students, mostly seniors so I am going to have them take over and just try to keep it together. She was 44 and they don't know what happened yet. She always struggled with her weight. We spoke on Friday after school and she told me that I was an inspiration to her because of how I lost weight and have been keeping it off. I told her that I don't think I could have done it when I had kids at home (she has two kids at home and is always busy with them). I feel sick for her kids. She is the breadwinner and the one who kept the house going. Not sure how her DH is going to handle it.

Sharon, how unbelievably sad!

What a sad reminder, Sharon, that this keeping off weight thing is indeed a serious matter. It is not just vanity or social pressure or a self-improvement project. It is about health.

I spent the weekend asking myself: "What is missing, what do you need?" and trying to identify any fleeting feelings of lightness or happiness, in the hope of pursuing them further and making them stronger.

How horribly sad, Sharon. Kind of a wake-up call for some of us.

Oh, so sad!

That is heartbreaking, Sharon.

I hope your school can be a good support for her family.

Many hugs and prayers.

Sharon, I'm so very sorry.

Sharon, that is dreadful.

Sharon, I'm so sorry. Forty-four is too young.

I would caution people about concluding that the woman died somehow from being overweight. Any number of things unrelated to weight can cause sudden death.

We don't know how she died yet -- just in her sleep is all we have heard. I don't think the weight would have been the only cause - lots of stress in teaching these days and lots of other situations that were stressful. I just mentioned the weight because she was constantly battling it - the whole 11 years I have been friends with her. Plus this is a weight forum. We talked about our struggles with it all the time and she really cheered me on and vice versa. She did lose all her extra weight two years ago but it was slowly creeping back (been there done that, many times). She hadn't gained it all back but when we spoke Friday she was very upset at how much she had gained back. I was telling her how I was using the Year Younger Next Year for Women book's message to stay mobile/healthy until the end. I told her she was a little too young for it but that it has a great message, IMHO. How ironic that seems right now.

School was very sad today but we didn't have to teach - just sort of be there for the kids. I think our school is going to have a fundraiser at the football game Friday night for the family (and probably others as well). We are planning other things as well (meals for family, etc).

Thanks for the kind words everyone.

I'm so sorry, Sharon. That is terrible.

Sharon, so sorry to hear this sad news.

Sharon-- I hope you're coping okay.

I'm not doing well with Jozi's passing. I did okay at work yesterday (more or less) but after school/evening was hard and I'm feeling very melancholy today. I woke up at 4:30 and couldn't go back to sleep and I just feel weepy.

The house is so empty (dh left for China too). Dewey is upset but he doesn't know why. He's just shaking and being very clingy. Charlotte is still meowing. I'm hoping she'll come downstairs (the cats were afraid of Jozi's size so they always stayed upstairs) once she is sure she's gone. She keeps coming to the bottom of the steps and looking around with big, unsure eyes.

Wanting to stuff my face with bad stuff but I know that won't help anything. Maybe retail therapy?? Or one bad meal??

Sending supportive thoughts, Sharon, as you work to process such awful news.