A death
I have been using all of my daily allotment of words elsewhere of late, spread between a stupid email thread and a spectacular email thread and an intriguing & exciting family discussion and a dull & painful work document. So there have not really been words left over to talk much here.
But one of those email threads is quiet for a bit and I'm trying to active ignoring the other one (which is really just an instance of someone being WRONG on the internet), and so I have some free words.
My grandfather died last week. To be a little more specific, he suffocated to death with pneumonia after having his ventilator tube removed. A ventilator tube that was never supposed to have been inserted, because he was almost 96 years old and suffering from advanced dementia & not doing well physically. My father had already had to make the hard decision to move to palliative care only, and then he had to make the decision again to specifically remove the tube. I cannot imagine.
I flew down last Tuesday so that I could be with my dad on Wednesday as he watched his father die. His father, who really hasn't been in there for a while, but whom my dad's been taking care of as well as possible regardless. I cannot imagine.
There's a Poi Dog Pondering song, "U Li La Lu", with the lyric 'A friend of mine once said.... / "If you're ever around when someone dies, / look up and wave, they'll get a big kick out of it.")' And so I did, last Wednesday, after my grandfather had taken his last gasping breath and his heart had stopped beating. I looked up and waved.
And I hope that he got a big kick out of it.
There's a rant to be made here, a rant about how we so often treat our animals more humanely than we treat our humans, but I'm a little tired of ranting about it and a little defeated for now. I'm sick of people who believe in life-at-any-cost, and I'm done with people telling me that they're sorry my grandfather is dead.
I'm not sorry: he was almost 96, and he was active and doing what he loved doing until he was 92. And whether you believe in a soul or not, it was time for him to go. If you don't: he wasn't in there any more. If you do: he was in there, and trapped in a body that could not even effectively communicate.
I'm not sorry: in his belief system, he's with his God and my grandmother, filled with joy. In my belief system his matter and energy and soul are already being recycled.
Except for his needless suffering, I'm so happy for him.
But one of those email threads is quiet for a bit and I'm trying to active ignoring the other one (which is really just an instance of someone being WRONG on the internet), and so I have some free words.
My grandfather died last week. To be a little more specific, he suffocated to death with pneumonia after having his ventilator tube removed. A ventilator tube that was never supposed to have been inserted, because he was almost 96 years old and suffering from advanced dementia & not doing well physically. My father had already had to make the hard decision to move to palliative care only, and then he had to make the decision again to specifically remove the tube. I cannot imagine.
I flew down last Tuesday so that I could be with my dad on Wednesday as he watched his father die. His father, who really hasn't been in there for a while, but whom my dad's been taking care of as well as possible regardless. I cannot imagine.
There's a Poi Dog Pondering song, "U Li La Lu", with the lyric 'A friend of mine once said.... / "If you're ever around when someone dies, / look up and wave, they'll get a big kick out of it.")' And so I did, last Wednesday, after my grandfather had taken his last gasping breath and his heart had stopped beating. I looked up and waved.
And I hope that he got a big kick out of it.
There's a rant to be made here, a rant about how we so often treat our animals more humanely than we treat our humans, but I'm a little tired of ranting about it and a little defeated for now. I'm sick of people who believe in life-at-any-cost, and I'm done with people telling me that they're sorry my grandfather is dead.
I'm not sorry: he was almost 96, and he was active and doing what he loved doing until he was 92. And whether you believe in a soul or not, it was time for him to go. If you don't: he wasn't in there any more. If you do: he was in there, and trapped in a body that could not even effectively communicate.
I'm not sorry: in his belief system, he's with his God and my grandmother, filled with joy. In my belief system his matter and energy and soul are already being recycled.
Except for his needless suffering, I'm so happy for him.