Death and dying

8/1/10
I spent this afternoon with a very decent and good man who is dying from lung cancer. He and his wife were seen together some years ago for trauma and a significant loss. His wife died suddenly a few weeks ago in her sleep and he is not long for this world. This is something that I have not gotten used to and probably never will: the fact that many of my patients are sick and die. He and his wife are not the first patients I have lost and will not be the last, of course. It is that his passing is particularly poignant to me. He has been ill for some time now and has known of his demise. He has been accepting and has approached his death from the start with remarkable calm. His only concern has been the impact of his death on his family. His calm acceptance and sanguinity about his death and his coping with his increasing disability has taught me much about the resilience of human beings and the importance of religious faith, especially in his case. It also reminds me that none of us live in a vacuum and how we live and how we die impacts others in ways we can never know. I only hope that my life will impact as many people as his has and in such positive ways. It is not the things that we acquire in life that matters but the relationships we form and nurture.

Sally M. Duffy