I was accompanied to the hospital to pick up my late father’s belongings. ‘What belongings?’ I thought to myself, they don’t belong to anyone anymore. Occasionally, I would look over at my younger siblings, wondering where they were getting their strength from and why I was finding it hard to stay put together. Death brings out another form of you, one you don’t recognize. These thoughts occupied my mind on this endless journey back to the hospital.
It was daunting to go back to the same building where my father lost his fight to live. Along with his death certificate and a bag, the hospital staff handed me a diary. My Dad’s name was handwritten on the front. It seemed a little peculiar how now he was just a name. From the day he set foot into the emergency room until he passed in the Intensive Care Unit, every day for over a month, the nurse in charge wrote in this diary. A documentation of my Dad’s progress, or lack of, as he slowly maneuvered from life to death.
At first, I thought it was a thoughtful gesture. It wasn’t until I opened the pages and began to comprehend what was inscribed; I realized this was an etched piece of painful history. With each word I read, I began to re-draw the scene I had tried so hard to forget. Memories of the Critical Care Ward flooded back, and the image of his helpless body fighting for life filled my vision. The sounds of the monitors echoed in my ears, and for a moment, it seemed like I was right there at his bedside. I could smell that sterile hospital odor, the pale walls that matched the gray floors. The white coats that shift from one patient to the next. The ticking of the clock that hung in solitary confinement. I was right there again, watching him in a deep slumber with a blurred vision, a prayer in thought, and the sickly massacre brewing in my stomach of not knowing the outcome. I heard again the unforgiving beeps of the machines that were keeping him from taking his last breath. I remembered the painful decision of having to let him go.
‘Your family has been sitting at your side, they are praying for you,’ the diary read. I sometimes wondered if he even knew I was there. Or any one of the familiar faces that also waited their turn to see him. Faces of despair would pay visits, and at times, I wanted to tell them all to go home. There was no room for more misery. Even as he lay there with no recollection, I prayed because he was with me in body. I could tell him things even if he couldn’t hear me. At least I could hold his hand and feel the warmth of his fatherly figure.
Each day as the lights went out, we too would bid him farewell. The following morning, we’d greet him, holding hope’s hand, only to discover it too was giving up. I didn’t want to lose hope; hope left him, it left because he had no will left in him to try. His time had come, and even though I knew, it was still hard to say that final goodbye. The one where you are left wondering what you did to deserve this, you are left wondering why you were chosen to lose yet another parent.
His death taught me that the kind words that are being said now should have been echoed when life existed. We never speak ill of one who is preparing for transition to the next world. Yet during one’s life, we aren’t so forgiving, are we? Life takes on a whole other meaning when you are at death’s bedside. Yet somehow it still seems like a selfish encounter; you don’t want them to go because you will be the one left alone. Left to pick up the pieces of a story that didn’t end in your favor.
Each sentence in the diary hit me like a bullet initially, but it showed how hard everyone tried, even the ones that didn’t know him; they meant nothing, but they did their job of making him comfortable. The nurses who knew not one thing about his life were brave enough to write about his last days. ‘I see your family so sad as you are passing, rest in peace.’ When he entered a coma, I knew we wouldn’t get him back. I had that gut feeling that never leaves, even when you try to fight it. When I sat beside him, I wondered how his absence would make me feel. I didn’t want him to suffer, but did I want this?
Death is an ultimate test, cruel and painful, yes, but for those left to deal with the absence, death becomes a test of your own life. The key to dealing with death is acceptance. The sooner we are willing to acknowledge that the process is a part of our existence, that it’s the final path we all must walk, the sooner we can pass through our own life with some gratitude. Being thankful that we, too, have a life that was in some insane way meant to be a part of the departed. Accept that it is a privilege to know those we loved and accept what is when they transition to the next phase.
It was gut-wrenching to read what they had documented in my father’s diary, and now there’s nothing left but these pages and memories and my gratitude that I was a part of his life. My father used to tell me that we enter this world alone, and alone is how we will go, practice detachment, he’d say. As I sat there in silence, holding his hand and waiting for him to breathe his last breath, that is when I understood his message.
