"The nightmare is over"

When I sat with my wife in 2006 and watched her take her last breath, it was a huge sense of relief. I spoke to her when I knew she was gone, "It's over _____, the nightmare is over". Her years of pain and grief were finally at an end.

Early in 2009, I received the final email from my best friend in Florida, USA. We'd become so very close over the years on the net with daily contact. Her life had turned into hell after her husband died, and she killed herself. Her last words in that most personal of emails were "The nightmare is over".

Today the last bit of my own train wreck came to an end. I've been emotional and crying for a couple of hours now. Sitting on the side of the bed I have sobbed and sobbed, such has been the intensity of emotions. 

And at the end, when calm started falling, I realised "The nightmare is over". The train wreck is finished.

And then I realised; I'm the only one out of the three of us to survive the nightmare.