Relief for the Rai's

We, The Rai family, would like to thank you for visiting this page. We are Scarlett and Ray Rai, married 16 years, and we have two bright and well rounded children in our 14 year old son and 12 year old daughter.  We extend our apologies as we had no time in which to write anything much of substance for this page before posting it, as News 13 felt strongly we should have one online in time to add a link to show during the news story about the events that unfolded in our world this Christmas day. We will come back and add more, but tonight we must try to get what sleep we can, in our hotel room, as our ordeal has been long and arduous. The short of our story, is that our family returned home in the wee morning hours of Christmas morning to find our home not just burgled, but nearly destroyed inside.  Not one inch of our home was left undisturbed, they knocked photos off the walls and some had been smashed underfoot, they even wrote a list of the bigger items they were taking, right on one of the walls in the house, and they took everything of value. We have sadly lost many immediate family members in recent years and we have placed their ashes each in the most beautiful and befitting and boxes and urns, selected to match their personalities.  The worst  part of this tragedy for us, as a family,  who has been sadly plauged with so much loss, in such a short time, was the fact that the perpetrators even stooped so low as to disinter each one of our 4 family members cremated remains from their urns. They had been in their places of honor on a built-in shelf in our livingroom, and while they did leave behind his ashes, they went on to actually STEAL the urn of our oldest boy,  who was only 14 years old when he passed away. They also took all of the valuables which were laid to rest with the rest of our family's ashes as well.  I can't put the agony of that into words. However, times are tough for us all, we know this, and having lost so many young, vibrant and beloved family members in death unexpectedly, does at the very least, redefine a "bad day" for us. Today was very bad, however, as days go, because the disrespect with which our family's remains were treated, further compounded the pain of having lost them, which is so strong this time of year, and it created a sense of shame that we could not some how save them from the invasion. The violation we feel at our family's ashes having been disturbed and robbed in their final resting places without our having been there to stop it, is something we don't quite know how to process, nor how to begin to express the pain it caused. On the bright side, we were burgled, and lost nearly every significant material possession, a huge part of our family history, but we all survived it unscathed, physically anyway, and we still have eachother, in our small remaining family cluster and we can make new memories.  We all struggle to do for our families and I think that we, like many of folks, feel that a big part of the major blessings that come from working so hard for your family's future is tied up in the hopes that you will get to see your kids enjoy the fruits of your efforts, and things like this total wipe out burglary, do steal that part of the dream away, but we don't forget that the good example of our hard work, is still set for our kids, even if every thing we worked for was essentially gone in a moment.  We know that eveyone reading this is struggling too, in one way or another, or maybe in many ways at once.  So, for that reason,  we must say that if you truly feel that you have the means to help us out in our time of need, even a little, in our recovering from this horrendous act, then please know that it would be so very much appreciated by a family who takes nothing for granted, but if you are strapped and can only share a good thought or prayer, that is emmensely appreciated as well. The Rai family is traumatized but resilient, and we are just grateful that we were not home when these monsters broke in and violated our home and our family's sense of security in the most unthinkable of ways, and so that is what we will focus on while we put our pieces back together. Thanks again for reading and be safe and well.