In the Midst of Life

Dorothy’s own words as I wrote them down:
    ‘Hehad prostate cancer twelve years ago, but recovered, and was active till nearly the end … but in July I could see that he was going down in health … he had no pain … it was a big effort for him to do anything … no pain … just weariness … he didn’t realise at the time that he was dying … the pain only started on Sunday … perhaps the cancer had come back … I don’t know … the Macmillan nurses came and he had morphine patches… slow release, you know … very good, very effective … on Thursday he was worse, and he said “I think I am dying” … I said, “Don’t worry, I am with you and will stay with you” … but on Friday he was bright and breezy … until the last day he went to the lavatory by himself, with a Zimmer frame, you know … and he shaved himself… his hand was steady … the weather was beautiful, really beautiful… he went to the window and looked at the sun on the garden and said, “The world has never seemed more beautiful … I want to take a photograph, and you can remember our last days” … I fetched his camera, and he took five pictures… I have them here … they are beautiful … then he went back to bed … he never got up again … he knew he was dying … he had said many times, “If I have to go into hospital I will find a way of killing myself” … I had already promised him that he would not, because I would look after him … the doctor came that day and said he would probably live another two or three weeks but I said no, he is dying … I can see it in his eyes … Friday night he wanted no supper, and he wouldn’t drink, either … it was a terrible struggle to get him to take even a few sips of water … I could see by his eyes he was going, and I called the children … I have a son, three daughters and six grandchildren … One of them said she would stay with him during the night, whilst I got some sleep … at three o’clock she woke me up and said, “He is dying, you are right, his breathing is very slow, he is going” … I held him, saying over and over again, “Go in peace, don’t worry, you are safe, go in peace” … I kept saying these things all the time … he heard me and understood … he knew he was dying … his breathing was getting slower … slowly, slowly, he went away … After that I didn’t leave him … he was not conscious, but I kept saying, “Go in peace, mylove, don’t worry, everything is all right, go in peace” … and slowly, slowly, he went away … and his breathing stopped at eleven thirty in the morning … it was a beautiful day, the sun was streaming through the window … it was a beautiful death, too … we laid him out… a day or two later I found a note in the drawer of the cupboard beside his bed … it read, “I hope the love I have for you will linger on and support you through the last years which I had so longed to share with you …” (She showed me the note, written in spindly, shaking handwriting.) … he must have written that for me a few days before he died … so you see, he knew he was dying … we were married fifty-two years … it was a perfect ending … I am not sad … lonely, yes, but not sad.’
    Then Dorothy told me that one of her daughters arrived with her son, a boy of thirteen, after the death had occurred. The boy said, ‘I want to go into the bedroom to be with Grandfather for a while. Don’t come in, any of you. I just want to be by myself, alone with him.’ He shut the door, and ten minutes later, quietly and solemnly, came out. But he never said a word about his thoughts and feelings.
    That boy showed a maturity and wisdom beyond his years. He faced up to death in the only way that is meaningful – by being close to it. It was an act of love, but also an act of sound common sense, which some instinct told him was necessary. He voluntarily drew close to death, and was not afraid, an experience that will stay with him as he grows and matures.
    The last words of the last monastic office of the day are, ‘Lord, grant us a quiet night and a perfect end.’ It is something that we can all pray for, but it is something that we can in no way command, because, at the end we are entirely dependent on the love and goodness of others.
    The turning point in many lives is bereavement. Many have channelled their grief into activities for public benefit, and this has helped them transform bad into good. For example: