As we, of the “Baby Boomer” Generation, begin preparation for the “Final Journey”, we must remember to stay aware. We are the ones who have “found ourselves”, “sought the light” and pushed the boundaries of “Practice” of all types of spiritual paths. We have thrashed the education systems, stopped a war in its tracks, invented the Internet, and brought humanity into its next developmental state. And now the Event Horizon of our passing approaches. We resist, we balk, and yet…and yet…we will all die. Our mothers have already gone before us. Our fathers, too. Now it is that our friends are beginning to go as well. So, this blog is dedicated to the discussion of this event that, along with our birth, is the single uniquely powerful experience of our lives, that each and every one of us shares. This is the story of my mother’s last days:
My mother gazed at me with level eyes from her hospital bed. “I’ve always been a bit cynical”, she said. She had been very ill. (I would have said then, before we went there for real later on, that she was at Death’s Door.) She was right, of course. She was right with bells on. My mother was known for her slicing sarcasm, her ability to find the fault, the flaw, to wither with a glance. As lying to a gravely ill person seems cruel, I agreed with her assessment.
“Yes” I said, simply.
“Well”, she said, “It’s all gone. Gone. I’ve been sitting in that tunnel, looking for the Light. Well, I can’t find it. Now I am here again, and the cynicism is gone. I look around for it, but I can’t find it. You know, this day is beautiful. The people here are really trying their best to be wonderful—and they are succeeding! It’s just beautiful.” She had given up her shield of the cynical. Surrendered it…had just let it go.
My mother had moved to a retirement home here in Seattle two years before, coming from Rochester, N.Y. She was in the hospital, now, for the second major health episode since her arrival. After her first episode, she told me she wanted to find ways to participate with the others at the retirement home. This solitary woman, holding herself apart from others over the entirety of my life, had given up isolation, had just let it go, and had discovered friendship.
Hers had been a life of health issues, and chronic pain, which impacted her enjoyment of life. She still hurt, as she lay there, and she was very, very tired. The cynical part of her, however, had simply vanished. In the hospital bed, so quiet as she lay there, I saw she glowed. I had never seen such a thing before. The light seemed to come from within her, pooling around her head and shoulders, her skin translucent.
From then on, our talk was direct, clear, and honest. Something hard had truly given way; in its place came delight and calm. My sisters and I agreed: each time we saw her, she seemed “better”, though continuing gravely ill. “Better” seemed to each of us to mean light, direct, loving—-and still fiercely intellectual.
Several days later, she called a meeting of her four children: my brother and the three of us sisters. She offered no negotiation: the meeting was to be held on THIS day at THIS time. She had reserved the staff break room on her floor of Swedish Hospital. She had dressed for the occasion. For the first time in weeks, she wore a blouse, slacks, socks and shoes. We wheeled her into the break room, where she held court, as she could do. This time her court was different from the past. No longer rigid, but firm. Not commanding, but simply deserving, respect. She explained her position. She had been told that her kidneys were essentially non-functional, and that the doctor had scheduled dialysis for her. She asked us then to give her, each of us, our permission to stop the dialysis after six months, if her quality of life was not, in her opinion alone, worth the effort of the dialysis.
To give permission to my mother to die. Permission. Time became elastic—yawning before me, simultaneously collapsing to nothing. Permission to die. The term rings in my mind even now, months later. And I gave it to her. Lightly, lovingly, knowingly. As I heard my mouth saying, “Yes”, my inner mind cried, “No!”; reeled back time, trying to force life back into the moment. And yet in my deeper, inner mind I saw her. I saw her fatigue, her pain, her disappointments, her fears and her yearning.
I also knew she was lying. I knew that she would not put up with six months of dialysis. She would not put up with one month. I knew I had no right to ask her to stay.
From my diary: Feb 3, 2001: “I am sitting in my mother’s apartment, the oxygen machine regularly sighing. She is sleeping. Sometimes she glows with a wondrous light, sometimes she is like fine dust, gray and quiet.
She is dying. Her last dialysis was last Monday; her choice, our acceptance.
She birthed us all by removing us, one by one, from within her. She births us again, simultaneously, by removing herself from us.
I cry and cry; standing in awe. My heart is heavy, yet colors are more vibrant. There is a terrible beauty to this time.
I dreamed I wanted to see what time it was. The light in my watch failed, and when I could finally see the face of it, the hands had fallen to the bottom and the face was off-center; springs gone: Time had run out.
Being with my mother in this time produces such a longing, and a sense of flowing back and forth, back and forth. I am learning about loving and being loved in this time.”
From my diary, later: “PM: I had not realized the strength and courage it takes to attend the dying. I want to run, disengage, distract. I see her slipping around words, fighting to help one hand find the other. The increasing pressure, the very presence of death astonishes me. I want to comeback next week—this is like labor in childbirth: inexorable; glacially determined. Other people ask about her and say, ‘She’s such a remarkable woman!’ And so she is.”
It is the concept of the presence of death, and the strength of life that stays with me. Her life force faded daily, yet remained stronger than ever I had understood. It was still her apartment, generic kamagra medium;”>her clothes, her furniture, her bed, on which we siblings sat for comfort.
From my diary: 2/5 “I am home. Phil is with Mom. Her voice fades on the phone and her ability to finish sentences slips away. All that was ever harsh or judgmental has gone. The love and her humor are remaining, strong. She is afraid, too. Afraid that the people she loves will not accept her when she wants to join them.” She had spoken of this, her old rejections—her deep fear that those she has loved and wanted to be with would reject her in death as she felt they had in life. Still, she longed for them: her mother, our father, old friends, her father.
From my diary: 2/7 “ She had a dream. She and Dad were at an antique mall of miniature Xmas trees and wonderful, tiny ornaments. It was time to go but they were having fun. She and Dad sat on a bench and he said he had to go. And he said, ‘You can’t come with me just yet.’” She took comfort from this dream, believing Dad would welcome her as the dear friend she felt she was to him.
I watched more pieces fall away from her. She surrendered parts of her life, her self, bit by bit, rhythmically: her strength, her concentration, her ability to finish sentences. I saw aspects calving off her Self as a great glacier melts into the sea. Her use of her hands simply stopped—she no longer reached out to hold my hand. This was a physical surrendering. She become frail, delicate, sinking deep into her living room chair where she lay, the door ajar behind her. “I always loved life,” she said. And she did. And she loved light. We held the shade back, keeping the air around her light and free. She sank deep into herself, surrendering movement, surrendering speech. The Hospice nurse sat with her, and Mom asked about the shaking of her hands. The nurse assured her the shaking was a normal part of the last stages. She said, “Shhh, don’t tell the children.” The nurse patted her hand an told her, “They know, and its alright.” Mom smiled, then, and said, “It’s so exciting! I can hardly wait!” Those were her last words as she surrendered speech altogether.
There was a psychic surrender as well. No longer able to follow our words or concepts, she closed her eyes or looked away. Her mind remained clear, however, her love for us shining through her eyes. She thought, and the familiar expression of her emotions or conclusions crossed her face like spring weather.
I sat with her, holding her hands, our heads close. Her breath was shallow, delicate. She slept, and I wondered how much more she would surrender. She awoke, pulled me to her, and looked sharply, (so sharply!) with one open eye. She had something to say, something she needed to communicate, but was so far inside herself she could not. She was deep, deep within. The black of her pupil was bottomless; too, too deep for her to surface and communicate. I put my mouth next to her ear and said: “Philip loves you very much. I, Kath, love you very much. Elise loves you very much. Barbara loves you very much. We are all going to miss you and we are all going to be alright.” Her eye squinted as she considered this. Then she let go of me, sighed a deep sigh, and slept. She had surrendered communication, and tried no more.
From my diary, 2/8: “last days (?) I dreamed I was on a ferry; a very small wooden one with a convex deck. Precariously perched, no handrails, trying not to slide off. I saw a great ball of light cross our bow underwater and head for the open ocean. I knew it was Mom.”
acomplia prices style=”font-size: medium;”>From my diary: 2/10: “Li and Phil and Alyce went to the beach today. Li built a little Stone-Henge and then a Spiral, for life and death, and then 4 rays for grounding the spirit. This was just before 2PM. Phil was watching 2 dogs playing on the beach and thought of Mom. Same time.” At just before two PM, I was suddenly fixed with a need to find a certain photograph, and got up to search for it in the hall closet. Looking back, I realize now Mom needed her children to be busy, away from her, to allow her the privacy she so loved and needed to get done what needed to be done. I heard a little cry from the caregiver and went in. She was gone.
From my diary 2/10: “and Mom let go the rope at 2 PM, slipped out smooth and cool…not a ripple. I sing and cry. Barb begins the 49day Ceremony for the Dead.”
Jess, my daughter, was by her. She lept up and said she needed to open the door “for her to get out.” The apartment became strange—vaguely unfamiliar—as all that was her, our Mother, vanished. Our Mother lay utterly still; hugely, profoundly quiet.
The last thing you surrender is the breath.
The last thing you surrender is the breath.
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