Hello, I love you all, even across all the time and space. My heart hurts. Especially for M - this is how I lost my mom. JZ, your words mean everything. I keep thinking, I'm lucky just to have known you. I'm at a loss, except for love, love love.

You're both amazing people & how sad & how wonderful that you can be there for & with JZ, David. A friend who was a volunteer hospice worker said, Who is to say that death is not the greatest joy? (If there's an afterlife, which, probably not but if so, I hope Ed & Ginger & ita & Connie Neill are there to greet her. Jacqueline could tell them how very very much they are missed and how sad it was to not get to say goodbye to them, or to see them get to do things they'd wished for, like Connie & travel.) Please tell Jacqueline I said goodbye & I'll always remember how amazing she has always been, a jaunty red hat & lipstick enlivening the boring Berkeley Rep usher dress code, the wonderful camaraderie of the Ren Fair people partying in West Marin, and always her kindness, but tartness & correctiveness to trolls or (xkcd) "people on the Internet who are wrong," (Ginger could write a ripping good paragraph about commas), and Jacqueline's brilliant pen. JZ is amazing to read, in any venue or forum, brilliantly expressive of her unique take & keenly intelligent point of view. She's always been one of my favorite writers (her & Rebecca Solnit) & I will miss that voice so very much, even from afar. (& Thanks for the referral to the law firm in Portland, everyone's happy with them.) Godspeed. I consider myself lucky to have known you even a little bit, JZ, thanks to this board.

OMG David! Did nurse Renee help her status?

JZ you are forever in my heart

Gud, dude! congratulations

what Java Cat said in Spades!

Definitely wish we'd spent more time together. Sometimes, searching for other things, I find e-mail where she encouraged me to apply to/ submit stuff, and mostly? I didn't do it all that often. She saw something more than I(and definitely more than editors do) though I have tried harder than ever this year. (In a movie, of course, the combination of Facing My Fears and Friends Facing Tragedy would mean i'm killing it, but not really)

I don't know what to say, other than all my love to JZ, and David, and Matilda, and Emmett.

I love how she always fights for what she thinks is right, but also her intense joy in life. I remember when she had been to a show or a parade or something, and then afterwards stopped and had wine and madeleines for dinner. Not that she ate like that often, but the sheer joy she took in doing such a little thing is still typical of her today. It still seems so essentially JZ, even in these circumstances.

::curls up quietly in the corner, just to be around her people::

Feeling the same way, Smonster.

Yesterday was taxing. Physically, emotionally and intellectually.

I had long conversations with Drs. Tambe, Stewart, Moreno-John, Patel, Tay and Van Loon, as well as Case Coordinator Rohan, and Nurses Renee, Roan and Alex. And a dietician and an X-Ray tech.

And it was all about understanding the implications of every choice related to Jacqueline's care as we tried to transition to hospice. I had to absorb a lot of highly technical information about TPN (Total parenteral nutrition) lines and why doctors don't like to use, them and the NG (Nasogastric) Tube down Jacqueline's nose which I promised her we would remove at night so she could sleep and what a G-Tube (Gastrostomy) procedure involved, and whether Jacqueline could be fed through it. All from different doctors and nurses who had slightly different takes and agendas and also manners of presentation.

At the end of it I understood everything I needed to know to make a decision with Jacqueline, but I had a brief thought that my entire process that day would have been impossible for somebody on the spectrum. Because all of the doctors are being circumspect, and don't want to push you in one direction or another, but they have more information/experience/knowledge than you.

So I had to read each doctor very carefully, to ascertain why they had a particular qualm or hesitation, or why I was framing a question incorrectly etc.

There's some combination of letting the patient and family decide, with a little dusting of liability, and also a desire to be gentle with how they unfold the bad news to you.

Then I would check in with my nurses to get their perspective and experience, and then go over it with Jacqueline but she's really exhausted and has a tube down her nose and throat so hard for her to process all the details. But I know what she wants, and I'm advocating for her with the doctors to get to agreement on the plan.