Inseperable Love: Wife Dies Of Heart Attack 10 Minutes After Her Husband Of 45 Years Dies (PICTURED)

A South Florida couple who spent all of their time together exploring and fighting to preserve the Everglades died just 10 minutes apart this weekend, bringing a sweet end to their 45-year love affair. 

Tom Shirley, 83, was hospitalized Saturday night at Cleveland Clinic in Weston, after complaining of heart trouble.

His 75-year-old wife Naomi spent the night at home but was called into the hospital on Sunday when doctors said her husband was close to death. 
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Couldn’t live apart: Naomi and Tom Shirley died within 10 minutes of each other this past Sunday. The two had been married for nearly 45 years.

Minutes apart: Tom Shirley was hospitalized for heart trouble Saturday night and his wife was called in the next day when he was near death. She died of a heart attack on her way to see him, just 10 minutes after he passed away.

Tom passed before Naomi could arrive, but Naomi never made it to the hospital anyway. She died en route from a heart attack herself, just 10 minutes after her husband’s passing.

‘My father passed away not knowing that mother was on her way to see him and she passed away within 10 minutes… so neither one knew the other one had passed,’ son Tom Shirley Jr told NBC6 South Florida. ‘They’re together now, looking over everybody.’

Tom met Naomi more than four decades ago when she was working at a drug store. 

Soul mates: The couple met more than four decades ago when Naomi was working at a drug store. The two married in 1969 and raised their combined four children together .

The two married in 1969 and they raised their four combined children together.  

Daughter Melanie Davis looks fondly back at cross-country road trips and eating powdered doughnuts, chocolate milk and bananas while camping in the Everglades – adventures organized by the outgoing couple. 
Naomi worked as a nurse when the kids were still in the house while her husband served for 30 years as a lieutenant in the Florida Game Commission. 

Nature buffs: Both shared a love of the Florida Everglades. Above, Tom Shirley drives an air boat.

After retiring in 1985, Tom Shirley wrote a book about his time patrolling the Everglades for dangerous alligators, poachers and moonshiners. 

The Glades were where the couple like to spend their free time too, and Tom Shirley even designed an air boat of his own to ride on the marsh.

‘My mother loved fishing and the outdoors life and he was a game warden and that’s what attracted them to each other. They both liked the same things,’ son Tom Shirley told CBS Miami.

While daughter Melanie Davis says it’s been hard to process the death of both parents at the same time, she’s grateful neither had to live without the other. 

‘I have to be thankful because she’s not sitting somewhere sobbing and all upset dad’s not here because they were each other’s whole life,’ Davis said. 

Together forever: Their children say it’s hard to process the loss of both parents, but they are glad they didn’t have to spend life apart.