When I Die, Please Don’t Let My Kids Go In My Closet

Sitting at the bar of our local swing club the other night, my best friend and I made a toast.

“To another crazy night that we can never talk about with anyone else.”

Then we laughed, licked the salt off our hands, and threw back the shots. As we turned our shot glasses upside down on the bar, we watched a girl on the stripper pole hoist herself up one arm at a time, like this was something she did every day.

Almost at the same moment, she lost her grip and slid down the pole in a way that made everyone flinch.

My friend leaned over and said, “I hope she’s not dead.”

We waited a beat. The girl stood up, flipped her hair, and climbed right back on the pole.

“That’s good,” my friend said.

I don’t know if it was the tequila or the girl who just looked dead on the dance floor, but I turned to her and said,

“Speaking of death…”

“When I die, you’ll have to go through my stuff before my kids do.”

She didn’t hesitate.

“Obviously,” she said. “And I would be honored to give a eulogy about how we spent our weekend nights.”

She also made it clear she was still handling the closet.

Once you say something like that out loud, there’s really no pretending it was just a joke.

The conversation immediately turned practical.

“Your husband will call me,” she said, “and I will come over and sort through all of your toys and lingerie to see which can stay.

And honestly, I’m going to have to rent a U-Haul just for your shoe and boot collection, so we should plan for extra time.”

I cut in immediately.

“NONE of my toys or lingerie need to be seen by the kids. Take it all. Don’t sort. Don’t evaluate. Just dump it all.”

She nodded. “Agreed. This is not a judgment situation. This is a removal situation.”

Then she added, “And your phone.”

I groaned.

She shook her head and said, “Nothing good can come from your kids scrolling through your phone, reading your texts and seeing G-d knows what kind of pictures. Nothing. There is no version of that where anyone feels better afterward.”

Then she remembered the computer.

“Any files marked ‘Private,’ ‘Personal,’ ‘Do Not Open,’ or anything you named optimistically,” she said. “Those first.”

I laughed and said, “Those could be anything.”

“Yes,” she said. “Exactly.”

“And,” she continued, pointing at me, “you will do the same for me.”

We laugh and think this is funny, but quite honestly, when my former husband died and the kids grabbed his phone and computer, explaining things was definitely not funny.

A lot of that time is still foggy. He had temporarily moved out and was living in a high-rise about ten minutes away. The police told me I could go there and collect his things, and for reasons that made sense to me at the time and absolutely do not now, I brought my two girls with me. I think one of them had to drive his car home.

It was not a good plan.

The moment we walked into the condo, they scattered. No pause. No hesitation. They went through that place like bees on honey, opening drawers, closets, cabinets, moving so fast I didn’t even have a chance to look first.

I was still standing there trying to get my bearings when I heard one of them yell, very loudly, from down the hall,

“OMG. WHAT. THE. F***.”

I knew exactly where that sound was coming from.

I ran toward the bedroom and followed the noise straight into the closet.

Inside was a large suitcase filled with sex toys. Not hidden. Not tucked away. A full suitcase. Like he had packed for a trip.

My daughter was standing there staring at it, frozen, and the cops suddenly found the hallway extremely interesting.

Now, I have no doubt that cops have seen their share of weird and crazy things, but there is zero percent chance they have not told that story at least a hundred times. Somewhere out there, I am the wife in a “you will not believe what we walked into” story, because it was very clear I was the wife… and also very clear there was a girlfriend.

And I thought that was the end of it.

It was not.

After I came out of the closet, still trying to regain some control over the situation, one of the cops very casually suggested that I might want to check the bathroom drawer.

I opened it.

It was filled with condoms. Completely full.

To this day, I have absolutely no idea what the hell my husband was up to.

And judging by the looks on my kids’ faces, neither do they… but they’ve definitely formed some theories.

Theories they don’t want to discuss and absolutely do not want excuses or explanations for.

So yes, when my friend and I joke about being each other’s “person to call,” this isn’t dark humor or exaggeration. It’s experience. It’s knowing exactly how fast kids go for phones, computers, drawers, and closets when something happens, and how permanent those discoveries are once they’re made.

This isn’t about shame. It’s about adults having parts of their lives that were never meant to be discovered by their children, even after death.

So my friend will get the call first. She will handle the closet, the phone, the computer, the bathroom drawer, and anything else that might require explanations no one needs in the middle of grief. And I will do the same for her.

I’ve also made it very clear that under no circumstances am I to be viewed in my casket wearing anything sheer.

I only wear that in the club because it’s dark.