Carpentersville’s Postler loved people, God

The later years of Pat Postler’s life are a story of love and faith.

Postler, who spent many years fueling a drug addiction with money from prostitution and cycling through abusive relationships, met a man who brought her back from the edge and found a God who gave her the strength to stay there.

Postler died at 57 on May 26 from a long illness related to diabetes. Her husband and those who knew her will remember a determined woman whose love of God shone through her life as she helped people as much as she could.

That help often came in encouraging others to make the same life changes she made and the strength to know it is possible.

Postler’s transformation came at the urging of her husband, David Postler.

The couple met when Postler was still caught up in her addiction but David told her she needed to get clean or they couldn’t be together. The fear of losing him pushed her.

“With God’s help is what did most of it, but when He made her, He gave her a determination far beyond what most people had,” David Postler said. “She was easily the most determined person I knew.”

The program she found to help her with her addiction was Reformer’s Unanimous in Rockford, and the church she found was Greater Grace Church of Chicago, in South Elgin.

Harry Weiskopf, the pastor at Greater Grace, met Postler 10 years ago and calls her transformation a miracle. He cited her love for her husband and desire to marry him as a key factor in her resolve.

The Postlers married in 2002 and continued as regular members of Greater Grace Church. They also branched out to Carpentersville’s Bible Baptist Church where Robert Jacoby was the pastor.

“She was just a blessing to so many people,” said Diane Jacoby, Robert’s wife and a good friend of Postler’s. “If she couldn’t help them, she’d find somebody to help them.”

Postler volunteered at PADS, Wayside Cross Ministries and made nursing home visits with her husband. Postler also sold Avon Products for a number of years, though that became hard because of her medical problems.

David Postler became his wife’s caregiver for her final years and, though it was extremely demanding, said he wouldn’t have had it any other way. He drove her to church, helped her keep her business and sat with her in her many hospital stays during the last year of her life.

Postler said he never imagined he and his wife would be 90-year-olds together because she was already off work on disability when they met, but he said they did their best to enjoy the time they had.

“We could argue and fight and everything else, but in the end we loved each other deeply,” Postler said.

Greater Grace Church ordered “WWPD?” wristbands that will be available for those who want to live keeping in mind, “What Would Pat Do?”

If anyone in the community was touched by the way Postler lived her life and would like a wristband, call Weiskopf at (847) 707-5844.