Post Tragedy Honeymoon

Hello, my name is Christopher Graves and my wife Karen and I have the privaledge of knowing an amazing couple named Jennipher and Brian Lorber and this go-fund-me post is for them. We've been close friends with Jen and Brian for roughly 7 years and were very sad to see them leave San Diego to move to Montana in 2012. Jen's amazing Mom Deb, a real estate agent in Helena, couldn't have been more excited to have her daughter and son-in-law move up to her town and she immediately assisted them in finding a forever home even being featured in an episode of "House Hunters," (http://helenair.com/news/local/house-hunters-to-feature-couple-s-search-for-home-in/article_3473689e-5cb5-11e3-9adf-0019bb2963f4.html)
Fortunately my wife and I were still able to maintain our friendship even over the large distance. Finally in 2013 Brian proposed to Jen after years of saving and delays and their wedding was on June 2nd, 2014. After their wedding they had planned on taking a dream honeymoon to Thailand that same year but were sadly beset by personal disasters that drained their savings starting with a major surgery for their dog that same year and then in 2015 being forced to replace a roof on their home. Finally last summer, they made firm plans for their dream honeymoon and booked it for late February, 2016. They decided to invite friends to come with them and my wife Karen and I were one of the lucky friends to be close enough to earn an invite. In total they planned to meet up and celebrate with two different couples and one single friend while in Thailand. Jen and Brian have two weiner dogs named Guiness and Lady and Jen's mom volunteered to watch her "granddogs"  while they embarked on their honeymoon and drove them several hours away to the airport to send them off.
     Jen and Brian arrived in Phuket, Thailand a day earlier than we did. As soon as we reached baggage claim in Phuket my wife used the free wifi in the airport to reach out to Jen and Brian and tell them that we had landed and would be seeing them within the hour. It is then that Jen texted Karen that her mom Deb had fallen down the stairs in her own home's basement and was in critical condition and on life support with her husband Harry at her side. Just like that their honeymoon was over and Jennipher's life would never be the same. Jen and Brian were rushing to the airport to immediately fly home to be with her mom since obviously family is always more important than friendship and vacations. After nearly 30 hours of traveling exactly one day after they landed in Thailand they arrived back in Great Falls, Montana where her mom was on life support. It turned out she had suffered major head trauma from falling down the stairs and was brain dead. On February 27th, 2016 at the young age of 64, Debra Smith was taken off of life support with her family and friends at her side and she passed away shortly after.  She was kind, inspirationally passionate for life, beautiful, happy, bubbly, caring, selfless and overall an incredible human being and mother to Jen.  I debated putting Jen's own facebook post here from the day Deb passed away being that it is clearly so personal but I think it's too powerful to ignore and more than I could ever say; 


Jennipher Lorber feeling heartbroken.
February 28 at 10:05pm · Great Falls, MT · 
Today my grief is more than one soul should ever endure. I lost my motherDebra Smith. My best friend. My everything. I am broken. I am lost. I am beyond console. I can't even breath.
Why did this happen to someone so young and so full of life?
How will I never hug her or laugh with her again? How do I go on? Will I ever laugh again?
I have small comfort in knowing how truly blessed I was to be born to her.
How incredibly fortunate we were to have the loving bond that we had.
No one had a mom like mine and I count my blessings every single day.
Thank you Mom for your wisdom and guidance and love and friendship.
My world is forever better because you were my mother. Thank you!
I love you as big as the world is round!!!

Life can be unfair and cruel. Deb didn't deserve this, she had decades of life to live. She was more than just a mother to Jen, she was her best friend. Nothing will ever change what happened but our goal here is to find a way to bring a sliver of happiness to a tradegy too terrible to comprehend. Instead of buying flowers or sending a card with our condolences, we want to do this. We want to prove to Jen that there is still happiness in her future and there are good people everywhere that care for her. My hope here is to put enough money together for her and Brian to take that honeymoon that was tragically cut short. I plan on keeping this a semi secret from them for now being that the funeral isn't even until March 12th but after two or three weeks I will bring them in on this post and any donations will go straight to them.They received virtually no refunds on prepaid excursions, hotels or end of trip flights and incurred a huge bill for their emergency international flight. This after 2 years of penny pinching and saving for their honeymoon.
     A vacation will never heal that hole that Jen has in her soul or bring her mom back but just maybe a honeymoon funded from love from friends, family and complete strangers will start to heal her heart. Perhaps in a sad way this could be perceived as a last gift from her Mom. Thank you for taking the time to read my (Jen and Brian's) story and I hope this will make a difference for two incredible and deserving people. For those who donate, I can only say thank you for being an amazing, kind person and that you've made a difference. Thank you.