In Honour of My Late Husband Jeff on His 50th Birthday

This month was supposed to be my husband Jeff’s 50th birthday. It is also around the time that would mark 5 years since his cancer treatment for stage 3 esophageal cancer wrapped up. For anyone who knows about cancer, you know that five years without cancer rearing its ugly head again after treatment is a major milestone. It means you are officially in remission and cancer-free. So this month was going to be something really big to celebrate at our house!

But the cancer came back and on August 7, 2019, Jeff died in my arms, taking his final breaths while I told him how much I loved him and that it was okay for him to rest now. That was the saddest day of my life. And, it tore me apart to see our young girls grieve their Dad, too.

We are not having any big celebrations this month at our house, but the girls and I are doing something special together to celebrate him in a more quiet way…just the three of us.

For those still getting to know me, I want you to know that so much of who I am today is because of Jeff Oestreicher. He was the nicest, sweetest, and most thoughtful person I have ever met. He was also my best friend, co-parent, and true love. There was so much more to Jeff and our love story than cancer, pain, and goodbyes.

Jeff was born on March 17, 1973, in Peterborough. In true St.Patrick’s Day fashion, this little guy emerged into the world with beautiful red hair. He was the son of a United Church minister and a school teacher as well as the younger brother by two years to Jonathan.

Jeff definitely took the path of the “good boy” and was largely shaped by his family. Jeff took a shine to hockey at a young age and it would be one of his passions until his last breath. Jeff was also involved with baseball and soccer. As a kid growing up, he spent a lot of time with his family. They had a cottage on Golden Lake near Killaloe, Ontario (home of the first Beaver Tails pastry chain).

Jeff was highly intelligent, but he also worked very hard at school. He was at the top of his class from a very young age. He was valedictorian both at elementary and high school. He was also very athletic, often getting MVP awards. But because he was so nice, we also have a massive box of Most SportsMan Like Player trophies for every MVP one in there.

Jeff was always very healthy throughout his life. He never missed a single day of school from kindergarten throughout university or work EVER due to sickness. No joke. Until the cancer came.

He did not smoke, ever do drugs or drink alcohol. He was largely vegetarian and didn’t allow himself to indulge in many desserts (despite his sweet tooth) the last 10 years of his life because he was trying to “be healthy.” Jeff didn’t fit the profile in so many ways for this cancer.

Jeff got a scholarship to attend the University of Waterloo’s math program. After a short while there, he realized he wanted to shift to accounting as his major. He graduated with a Master of Accounting degree and completed his CA designation. But around the time of his graduation, Jeff’s thoughts were not with school.

His mother, Marilyn (ironically my Mom’s name, too), was dying of breast cancer. She had fought it a few years earlier, but it had returned and Jeff’s Mom never got to see him graduate from university.

She also never got to see him have a girlfriend. Jeff was largely focused on school and sports, and he was shy. I am sure girls along the way had crushes on him. He was a cute guy, but he never had time or energy to put into relationships until later on. Jeff told me once that his Mom really wanted to make sure he got a good partner someday and that did occupy her mind knowing that she wasn’t around to see that happen. I feel she led Jeff and me together even if she wasn’t here on Earth to do it.

Jeff started his career working at the accounting firm BDO. He made many good friends there that lasted for the rest of his life. But after a while in that industry, he felt like this world wasn’t for him. He had been so inspired by the work that his Mom had done to help others as a teacher. He wanted to follow in her footsteps so decided to leave the organization he was working for (in Jeff-fashion he gave one year’s notice to his employer to help the office through a busy period) to start teacher’s college at Western University. He was always thinking about what was best for other people.

Jeff loved teaching and he thrived in the classroom. He worked at a high school in Elmvale and he also really enjoyed the coaching aspect of the school’s sports teams.

But, it was time for a move again. Jeff’s Dad’s health was starting to fail quickly with Parkinson’s Disease. So Jeff got a teaching job at the local high school where we grew up to be close to his Dad. And the big perk of that was he got to live close to his brother, sister-in-law, and three young nieces that he adored!

Jeff and my paths had been running parallel for so many years - we went to the same high school, church, and university, and we knew a lot of the same people. But it wasn’t until a fateful weekend in July 2006 at a Homecoming festival in our hometown that our paths seemed destined to collide.

Jeff was easy to talk to and so supportive. We were also aligned in many key areas. But we influenced each other, too. When we began dating, Jeff came to cheer me on as I was competing a triathlon. Next time around, Jeff had entered the race, too. I will never forget seeing him passing other guys riding road bikes with his mountain bike. Jeff’s legs had the strength of a gladiator’s.

For someone who may have seemed reserved at first glance, Jeff liked to have fun. And I was good for him in this area. I challenged him to do things like sneak into a golf course at night to play a round or find our way onto the pool deck at a 5-star resort in Hawaii and creatively try to get towels and hang out for the day (and not get kicked out) without wristbands.

I was always making Jeff laugh and he was always teaching me to be a better person. I was type A and a big-time Driver personality. Jeff was more ‘go with the flow’ and really grounded me. He was steeped in common sense. And he made me feel like everything was always alright.

Jeff was the best Dad. Our daughters lit up his world. Being a Dad wasn’t always an easy job for him. After I suffered a brain injury in 2012, Jeff became our one and three-year-old daughters’ primary caregivers. He was also my caregiver.

For 5 years, I was in outpatient rehabilitation. Jeff was our knight in shining armor. He worked full-time (although had the summers off. At this point in time he was an Accounting Professor at Humber College. He loved this job and often said if we won the lottery he wouldn’t change anything in his life). He made all the meals, did all the cleaning, and all of the childcare, and took the girls to their dance classes, soccer, hockey, and birthday parties. He volunteered at the school once a week as a pizza helper and he was also a Sunday school teacher for our girls at church.

Jeff coached our daughters in every sport they played. All while bringing meals to me three times a day to eat in the darkened bedroom as prescribed by my rehabilitation team as I needed to rest my brain. And he never complained once. I felt so frustrated with myself and the slow speed of my healing, but Jeff never got frustrated with me. He was so in love with me and just wanted to help.

We were that couple that walked hand and hand down the street. We talked about our feelings and our thoughts. We considered each other in all of our planning and communicated often. We built in time for regular date nights because it gave us a break from the busyness of parenting but also because we loved being together.

Jeff would pretty much do anything I wanted to do. And even though he rarely spent money on himself, if I wanted to go away on a trip together for an exuberant amount of money, Jeff was in. And when I had wanted to quit my job as an executive in the corporate world not knowing how our family would maintain even our home, Jeff said go for it. He always had my back. And he adored me. I was his person. When he looked at me, I could feel how much he loved me. I was the greatest thing ever to him.

It absolutely broke my heart when one day after he had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, he sat me down and said, “You have my blessing to marry someone else if I die.” The look of pain in his eyes as he said this was unbearable. His words were true selflessness. He wanted me to be happy in whatever form that took if something should happen to him even though the thought of another man loving me when he couldn’t was gut-wrenching to him.

But, that was Jeff. So selfless.

When Jeff and I were told the cancer had returned in the late summer of 2018, we were devastated. Shortly after, we went to Disney World so the girls could get to experience this trip with their Mom and Dad. This trip ignited in Jeff a desire to keep going. He wanted to fight this cancer against the odds. So I began to research and connect with doctors from all around the world. Some things started to open up for him in terms of trials that might be impactful. We knew there was no guarantee. As a mother of our children, I had to play the short and long game at the same time. I was prompting him to write cards for the girls for a bunch of future occasions if he didn’t make it. We did the trips. We said all the words that needed to be said. But, I never once took my eyes off the prize of keeping him alive.

We were set to go to a clinical trial in California in June 2019. But one week before that on our big girl’s 10th birthday, Jeff had a paralyzing stroke while driving the girls home from breakfast out. This changed everything. Jeff had to stop doing palliative chemo and there was no way he was flying to California in that state nor would he be accepted into the trial while paralyzed.

Before the cancer, Jeff struggled at times with growing older and not being able to do things as he had before. He felt a bit more winded on the ice when he played hockey compared to the younger guys. It was challenging for Jeff to not be really good at things, because normally he always was. So the irony of this for him…going from a guy who tried out for Red Bull crashed ice skating competitions and with his team, won the North American Pond Hockey Championships (even with terminal cancer) too many times to count, to someone who was in a quadriplegic wheelchair that he could only take being in for 30 minutes a day due to the pressure on his lower back was a prison sentence for him.

Yet, he still wanted to stay. He was holding on for the girls and me. Right to the very end, he was pushing himself to stay alive. We wanted every day together we could get.

We were so in love and we were so scared. He desperately didn’t want to leave us.

It felt impossible to believe with my heart that Jeff could die even though cognitively I was very aware that he was a very sick man. I let his body do what it needed to. If he didn’t want to eat, I didn’t force him. Even if it was days without food at the end. His doctor told me this was part of the dying process.

I focused all of my energy on being with him. Loving him. And making him as comfortable as possible. Even though, my heart was breaking the entire time. But, I had to let him go because as long as I kept fighting, I knew he would too. It was time to put down the boxing gloves and just be with each other and really soak in every moment we had left.

After Jeff died, it left a massive hole in my life and in our daughters’ lives. People say that death gets easier with time. Maybe that is so. I haven’t gotten there yet and not sure if I ever will. Jeff dying at this stage in his life, in our girls’ lives, and in my life, still feels tragic to me. We were all so blessed. And I do believe we have a love that lives on forever. But, it still hurts.

As I look at our girls, sometimes I can’t help but smile when I see our eldest have a grin on her face that looks just like her Dad. Or when our little one scores a goal or makes a great save as a goalie in sports. He is still all around us.

I know I wouldn’t have been the person I am today without knowing and loving Jeff Oestreicher. He made me more grounded, empathic, kind, and he loved me completely and unconditionally - the kind of love I had thought before was only possible between a parent and a child. And because I was loved that deeply, I now love even deeper. I share this love with our daughters, our family, our friends, and myself.

I wish Jeff could be here today on his birthday. Oh, the things we would do! But I am thankful every day to have been loved by this amazing man and for the gift of our daughters that he is so very much a part of.

Happy birthday, honey. I love you. I love you. I love you.