They depended on their parents for everything. Then the virus took both.

[Zorro]

Now the Ismael children — 13, 18 and 20 — are struggling to cope with grief, but also with how to keep a car running, pay bills, be a family

She was tired of wearing black, but the teenager knew she had to, at least for one more day. So after Nadeen Ismael swept the floors and arranged the couch pillows just the way her parents liked them, she returned to their bedroom. Behind the door, Nadeen, 18, reached up for her mother’s favorite sweater, still hanging next to the leather jacket and Levi’s jeans her father left there after his last day at work three months earlier.

Across the hall, her sister, Nanssy, 13, put on the black shirt adorned with a sequined gold star that their mom, Nada Naisan, had been given as a teenager in Iraq. In another bedroom, the girls’ brother, Nash, 20, pulled on black socks, pants, shoes and a button-down, all gifts from his mother, who did so much of his shopping that he wasn’t sure what sizes he wore.

Their house was quiet that morning in mid-June, as it seemed to be almost all the time now. Nada wasn’t frying omelets in the kitchen next to the “BLESS OUR HOME” sign, insisting that her two oldest children sit and eat and talk with her. Their dad, Nameer Ayram, wasn’t crooning the made-up song in Chaldean about Nanssy that always made her laugh. “Bobbit baba,” he most liked to call her — “Daddy’s girl.”

All dressed, Nash walked to the small bedroom his sisters shared.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

“Ready,” Nadeen responded.

“Let’s go,” said her brother, who hoped that this day would mark the end of the hardest time in their lives and not the start of something harder.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/local/coronavirus-orphans-kids-lose-parents/

[Botany]

1. I will never complain about anything again

heartbreaking

[calimary]

2. It catches you in the throat, doesn't it.

[SergeStorms]

3. Could you...

briefly describe the rest of the story for those who run up against a pay wall at the WaPo? Thanks.

[KS Toronado]

4. One way to get around some pay walls

Is to clear out your browsing history/cookies. When the pay wall comes back, clear them out again.
Works for me on a lot of sites.

[33taw]

9. You can also switch browsers.

[LisaL]

13. The family with 3 kids immigrated from Iraq into US.

Parents really babied their children. Both parents died from covid, so children are having a hard time, they are missing their parents and trying to figure out how to take care of thing such as bills and so on.

[SergeStorms]

20. Thank you.

Thanks, LisaL.

[kimbutgar]

5. I got so sad reading this

These were good people who loved their children.

I want to send them some money now.

[LisaL]

14. There is a link to their go fund me in the article.

[masmdu]

18. Link to GoFundMe for the kids

https://www.gofundme.com/f/nash-and-his-sisters-home-while-parents-in-icu

[irisblue]

6. 😢😢😢 I grieve for them

[pandr32]

7. Sad reality for far too many

[Sherman A1]

8. Sad

[iluvtennis]

10. My heart breaks for these kids.

[Purvis Lodge]

11. Lurker who never posts, but OMG...

I am just so sad for them. I just fucking wept.

[bronxiteforever]

12. Kick and recommend for visibility. Must read.

[Initech]

15. This virus is the absolute worst.

[LisaL]

16. It's a really weird virus. Some people have barely any symptoms, and some have severe symptoms

including death.
Sounds like this particular family was especially susceptible for whatever reason (genetics?) Both parents died, two older children were sick from the virus (and my guess is that probably all three children were infected, with younger one remaining asymptomatic).

[JI7]

17. Such a sad story but we need to hear about them. There will have to be support

groups in the future for those who lost loved ones and survived this themselves.

[Midnight Writer]

19. Don't fret, children. President Trump is working on a payroll tax cut to help out.