The End ........ Adam's doctors want to sit down with us to discuss his condition. The nurse escorts us into a room with a table and several chairs. The nurse leaves and in just a few minutes he walks back in and places a pitcher of water and a box of tissues in the middle of the table. He leaves again. I can't breathe. I know what's coming. It feels like an eternity before the door opens again. There is a parade of doctors that come into the room. It's the entire trauma team who has been on Adam's case since he arrived in the emergency room. There's nothing more they can do. Adam's kidneys are no longer functioning. His lungs are not carrying oxygen to the brain. The brain has been oxygen deprived for so long the brain damage is extensive and irreversible. His chances of survival are nearly zero. She recommends we remove him from life support. I just scream no - he's only 21 and he's too young to die. I will take care of him but he can't die. Jim takes my hand. He tells me Adam has already died. We just need to let his body go. Phone calls were made. I don't know who made them. But family and friends were called. Adam would die today. The visiting room started to fill up. But we never left Adam's room. There were no set visiting hours for us anymore. The nurse closed his curtain and allowed us to stay with him. My sister who lives in Louisville wanted to come say goodbye before he died. We told the nurse to wait until all the family had arrived. I wish she had lived in Anchorage. I just held him. I cried. I talked to him. I said a million I Love Yous. I remember looking up and seeing Becky walk into the room. I saw nothing but pain and sorrow in her face. Oh how she loved Adam. She burst into tears at the sight of him. With her arrival, I knew the end was near. Everyone was around his bed. He was surrounded by everyone who loved him most in this world. We all had our hands on him. I was singing him his lullaby. Jim was on the other side of the bed holding his hand. He was assuring Adam that he would take care of everything. Adam would no longer have any worries; how proud he was of him. Jim was so broken. He was about to lose his first born son. The nurse slipped in and didn't say a word. From the corner of my eye I saw him walk to the ventilator, but I couldn't watch. I just concentrated on Adam's face. His breathing became slower as the nurse turned down the ventilator. Then someone said "he's gone". His heart monitor had flat lined. It's hard to describe what happened next. But there was a physical pain in my heart as our souls separated. It felt as though he was ripped from me. He was gone from me forever. We stayed with Adam for as long as we could. I just remember crying. My knees buckled from underneath me. Kari seemed to melt to the floor. Someone held her. Michael just laid his head on Adam and sobbed. And Jim, who is the strongest man I have ever known, was broken. Our son was gone. I don't know how long we stayed with him. Much like the surgery, it could have been minutes ... could have been hours. Time had no value to me. I distinctly remember walking down the hallway headed back to the waiting room. The other families that we came to know in the waiting room lined both sides of the hallway as we passed through. Most were crying for us. Some reached out and touched my arm or hugged me. In the waiting room was all our friends and family. There was so much love there. I could feel the strength in their arms as they held me. I didn't have the strength to hug back. I was spent. I was numb. I was overcome. It was over. My son was gone. My life was forever changed.