How to die- random musings

It had been months since I had thought of dying. That ghost had been at my elbow for a long time but had largely faded away in the past few years as the prognostications of the doctors failed to materialize and I continued with my life.

Then suddenly the ghost was back again. And two completely contrary events caused this. One was the visit of my little grandson for a few weeks. The utter joy of that visit did a lot to drive all brooding thoughts away and gave me a new lease of joy and life. The second was the shingles attack that often left me willing for the end.

And now both are over and I am left to again plan my life and death.

I recently learned of a protocol called the Liverpool Care Pathway for the Dying Patient, which was conceived in the 90s at a Liverpool cancer facility as a more humane alternative to the frantic end-of-life assault of desperate measures. Today the  Hippocratic oath just drives clinicians toward constantly treating the patient, right until the moment they die,” said Sir Thomas Hughes-Hallett, who was until recently the chief executive of the center where the protocol was designed. English doctors, he said, tell a joke about this imperative: “Why in Ireland do they put screws in coffins? To keep the doctors out.”

The Liverpool Pathway brings many of the practices of hospice care into a hospital setting, where it can reach many more patients approaching death. “It’s not about hastening death,” Sir Thomas said. “It’s about recognizing that someone is dying, and giving them choices. Do you want an oxygen mask over your face? Or would you like to kiss your wife?” The fact is that people would prefer to die gently, loved and knowing it, dignified and ready.

As one patient said “I have fought death for so long. It is such a relief to give up.” We should all die so well. Perhaps one day the Hippocratic Oath -- "First, do harm" -- will mean refraining from aggressive, painful and pointless efforts to prolong life at the expense of the quality of those precious few remaining days.

Morrie in (Tuesdays with Morrie) advises: “Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, ‘Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be?"

The truth is once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.

Most of us walk around as if we’re sleepwalking. We really don’t experience the world fully because we’re half asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do. 

The utterly brutal fact is  "Learn how to die, and you will learn how to live.”