To my lifelong bestie...a true "gold friendship"

(Jim, Sarah, Rachel, Isabelle, and Mady White - May 2008)

There are days I forget. I will hear a song and reach for my phone to text or call. I will see her picture and feel like she is still present in our lives. But, inevitably, I will reach for the phone or pull up her email address and the memory that she is gone will hit. Usually it is a hard and shocking hit. Much like the one I felt when she was diagnosed with Stage 3 pancreatic cancer while appearing 100% healthy.

(Sarah and I - 1975?)

Sarah and I were born in 1974 6 weeks apart. Our dads had known each other in high school, our parents double-dated and then stood up for each other in their weddings. So when they became pregnant at the same time it was only natural that Sarah and I would be connected. Our moms would rub their bellies together and sometimes I convince myself that we began to communicate even while in- utero. I entered the world, two weeks late to my mother’s dismay and misery, on August 27, 1974 and Sarah came after me on October 10, 1974. I have this set of pictures of the two of us as newborns and the scene is this: in both pictures our moms are holding us but in picture number one we are content. Picture number 2, taken seconds later, we are both screaming our heads off! Yep, that pretty much sums us up; we were joined at the hip and the heart from October 10, 1974 on.

I remember when we were about 5 or 6 and playing at her house one day. We walked by the bathroom and my brother had left the door open while doing his business. We were FASCINATED! Standing up?!? Well that would be so much easier we reasoned. So we waited until he finished and then we went in together, closed the door, and at the same time straddled the toilet (oh my goodness don’t you just get a picture of this in your mind!?) and tried to go the way we had seen my brother do it. Well. Needless to say, it didn’t go so well, as you can imagine!


When I was 7 my dad got a job in Colorado. It was painful for our families. We were all being distanced from our “bestest” friends. But when you are connected at the heart distance doesn’t matter much. In fact, it can serve to provide determination to keep the connection strong.

Every summer and some holidays we would travel back to Michigan and it was like we had never been separated. When we were in middle school Sarah would spend the night with me at my grandparents’ house and so would one of our cousins, Andre. He was a bit younger than us but had developed a crush on her! One night we could hear him singing the song “Sara” by Starship (Jefferson Starship to those of you who know them as such). We cracked up! From that moment on every time we heard that song we would just giggle. About two weeks ago I was grocery shopping and “Sara” started playing over the loudspeakers. I cracked up and whipped out my phone to call her, but then the hit came. And in a nano second I went from laughter to tears. She’s gone.

(Sarah and Mady - Summer 2008)

When we were seniors in High School I went to visit her and my grandparents. Because of that visit every time I pull out and use my vacuum I think of her. That visit I found out how completely obsessed she had become with vacuuming. She vacuumed all of the time! It calmed her down; I think it might have been a form of therapy for her! Vacuuming made her really happy. Shortly after her death her youngest daughter was playing dress up and pulled out her own toy vacuum and was happily vacuuming away. Sarah’s “mini-me” is apparently going to carry on the habit!

(Isabelle vacuuming - January/February 2009)

Sarah was the maid of honor at my wedding. A couple of years later I was a bridesmaid in hers, 6 weeks after giving birth to my first child. But I wasn’t missing that wedding for nothing! Distance had not, could not break our bond. Oh we had other best friends, other people who knew us better, who we spoke with daily but there was always a bond that we shared that could not be broken. When Sarah, after a couple years of struggle, got pregnant with twins I flew out for the baby shower. It was a milestone moment that I didn’t want to miss and now, on this side of it, I am glad I did not miss. I think my regret would be deep if I hadn’t made it for certain moments of her life.


One of the twins, Rachel, started having inexplicable seizures when she was about two. The seizures delayed her development. After years of testing and experiments there is still no answer as to why the seizures started, why they continue, and why Rachel. The unanswered why’s wreaked havoc with Sarah’s heart and with her sanity. For years she fought with the anger that there were no answers to her questions, with anger that Rachel wasn’t developing like other kids her age and therefore treated differently, with the anger at herself for getting frustrated with Rachel when she didn’t know any better. And then about a year and a half ago Sarah was released from the anger. She finally got to the place where she accepted the situation, accepted Rachel for who she was, accepted that some people would treat her daughter different or stay away from her out of ignorance. See, God knew what we did not. Sarah’s time was near and she needed to be released from that before he could take her home. There was a huge shift in her whole demeanor once she allowed the questions, frustrations and anger to go. About a month or so before Sarah was diagnosed Rachel had a severe seizure. She had never had one like it before and never since. It was so severe that Sarah had to use a med on her that was a “just in case” med. She was shook up. It scared her so badly that her email had fear weaved into it, unusual for Sarah to convey. Sarah loved Rachel so much and while her special needs were hard to deal with she didn’t want to lose her daughter.


(Sarah and Rachel - Summer 2008)

It had been six years since we had seen each other. I had never met the twins or Isabelle, their third child. “On a whim” my dad flew me to Michigan in October 2008 as I was on my way to NYC. It would be a short trip, he said, but at least I would get to see Sarah and finally meet the girls. “On a whim” turned out to be the last time I would ever see Sarah this side of heaven again. None of us knew how close her time was, especially her. I remember the morning I left her feeling like we had just gotten back in our groove and I had to go. There’s no room for regrets, what if’s, or wishes. God’s grace is that “on a whim” I got to see my lifelong bestie one last time before her Creator called her home.

On November 12, 2008 Sarah was diagnosed with Stage 3 pancreatic cancer after she woke up one morning and basically couldn’t get out of bed and had to be taken to the ER. Her symptoms? None that indicated stage 3 cancer. We were all in shock. Stage 3 with no prior symptoms? The moment her diagnosis was given she declined so rapidly that there was no time to prepare.


I knew Sarah loved me but to my recollection she had never actually said the words. That wasn’t really her style. I was okay with it because I knew; I didn’t need her to say it. About two and half weeks before she passed away I was able to speak with her on the phone. She was weak and was nearing the end of her voice but we talked and her humor was intact. I was scared. I was feeling so far away, so disconnected, so useless. I told her I was coming back in January to help out for a week or so. She laughed and said okay. Sarah never needed help; she was always the one helping. Her “love language” was acts of service. At the end of our conversation I said I loved her and then I heard her say, “I love you too” and I cried. When she said that I knew that she knew that we wouldn’t be seeing each other in January because she wasn’t going to make it that long. Sarah was doing what I believe most people do when they know their time is close, she was making sure she expressed herself to the people in her life that she loved. Two days later Sarah fell silent and didn’t speak again.

Sarah passed away at home with her family in the early morning hours of December 23, 2008. She went quietly and without the immediate knowledge of her husband, Jim, and her mom, Cindy, who were in the room with her. She had wanted to go when the little girls weren’t aware and when there wasn’t all this activity around her, God honored her request. It was a quiet and somber Christmas. Here in Colorado we gathered as a family and prayed for and remembered our “family” in Michigan who were now looking at life without their daughter, sister, wife, and mother. The rest of us were looking at life without our friend.


The day after Christmas my parents and I flew out in the wee dark hours of the morning to attend the wake and memorial service. I didn’t know how I was going to say goodbye to this woman who had been in my life just as long as my parents and grandparents. She had been in my life longer than my brothers! She wasn’t my friend; she was my sister – a part of me. So a dear friend drove up from her home in Ohio and came to stand by my side and by my parents’ side as well. We sat at Sarah’s wake with her family and friends all day. Available to them and available to each other. Jim chose an open casket. He reasoned that her sickness and death had come up so quickly that hardly anyone had the chance to see her and say goodbye and he wanted people to have the opportunity to do that. I walked up to Sarah, laying there looking alive just asleep and I thought I saw her breathe. I had to restrain myself from grabbing her hands, from reaching out and touching her. Walking away was a hard moment.

The next day Sarah was laid to rest. It was the most surreal moment I have had in my life to date. This wasn’t supposed to be happening. She was young, she had three little girls to take care of, and she had a husband she was still living life with. She was needed and wanted. Why her? Didn’t God know Rachel, her special little girl, needed her? Sarah was Rachel’s world. What would they all do without her? She was the bedrock of her whole family. And she was gone. Lying in a casket departed from us and present with the Lord. But it wasn’t supposed to be that way. Now I have questions that I must struggle through, most likely for the rest of my life. One may mistakenly think I am mad at God because I have these questions, but I am not. I know God is sovereign and sees the whole picture. And I also know that he is okay with my questions and he will meet me at that place of wondering and he will give me peace in the lack of an answer here on earth. And when I finally see Sarah again my questions won’t matter any longer.


My friendship with Sarah has taught me about the value of relationship. Her death has reminded me to keep investing in the relationships I have in my life. Life should not be so busy that I don’t have time to invest in the people that matter. Saying “I love you” is always appropriate! When I come to the end of my life the only thing that will matter in those moments, as it did for Sarah, is the relationships I have invested in. We forget that our days are numbered and we don’t know that number, only God does. When Jesus walked this earth he spent the majority of his time investing in people and relationships because that is how God, in part, reveals his character and nature. Our busy activities won’t matter and won’t count for much at the end of our lives. But our relationships will. I’m reminded by the passing of Sarah to make the most of every relationship in my life that I have been gifted with and to not take even one day for granted. Like I said, there is neither room for nor value in regret but in moving forward and taking the lessons I have learned and applying them to my life.

The day after Sarah’s memorial service I went out with two other childhood friends, we had all grown up together. I have memories of these two precious friends as well. They were Sarah’s best friends. Like I said, we had other people who knew us better, who we considered to be our best friends but nobody could break the bond we had from being born “together” and continuing to share the milestone moments of life together despite the distance. We went to Sarah’s favorite restaurant and ordered her favorite drink, an Arnold Palmer, and shed a few tears and a few laughs. And while distance also separates us, we now make more of an effort to keep in touch.


Saturday, October 10, 2009 would have been Sarah’s 35th birthday. Her husband bought a cake and celebrated her life with her girls and her parents. Her sister declared it national “call your sister and tell her you love her” day and I made it a point to smile throughout the day each time I thought of her. There’s a lot of “firsts” to get through this year but we’ll get through them. God is good to provide the grace each of us needs to get through the harder moments.


To Sarah Lynn House White…thank you for your love and friendship, thank you for the years of memories and milestone moments shared, thank you for 3 beautiful girls that will carry on your memory, thank you for the laughter. We shared life together; I miss you deeply but I would miss you more if I had never had the chance to know you.