While doing my morning surfing of news sites I ran across a story in today’s Cincinnati Enquirer that had me in tears.

At Death They Parted – For A Day:

The only day Joseph and Laura Presutto spent apart in their 61 years of marriage was Monday, the day between their deaths.

"They have been inseparable for that entire time," Donna Presutto said of her parents.

Laura Presutto died Sunday. Husband Joseph died Tuesday. Both were 86.

Now this is not a particularly rare occurrence as this article from MSNBC last year details:

“We see it all the time,” says Dr. Hope Wechkin, the medical director of Evergreen Hospice in Kirkland, Wash. “Often a patient will come on to [hospice] service and we find out their spouse has died six weeks earlier or so. … I think it’s about connection. For many people, their spouse represents their greatest sense of connection to this world.”

Harvard studies (as well as others) have documented this effect. My own parents died just over two years apart.

Then I read this story from today’s NY Times on how the economy is affecting families across the board. Now the Times story is covering the entire family toll, including the effects on young children but it leads me to wonder about how many love stories we will be reading about in the coming years. I hope on one side that there are millions of these love stories out there. At the same time, I pray that we don’t start seeing the flip side when people just can’t go on any longer and give up on life in this country.