Six Years Later

One day recently I met John, who was sitting up in a chair near his hospital bed. His wife Kate stood by his side, her hand on his shoulder, while his daughter sat on the couch across the room beneath the window. During our visit, Kate told me how she and John had made it a practice for many years to pray together, because it not only strengthened their faith, it also strengthened their relationship with one another. We all prayed together holding hands, and I left the visit with the buoyant feeling that comes from an encounter with other deeply spiritual people.

A few days later, John went into Code Blue status and was taken from my unit to another critical care unit upstairs. I found this out from the night chaplain, who happened to meet Kate in the elevator during an early morning visit to another area. Kate was weeping, and our naturally sensitive chaplain spoke to and prayed with her. I had known that John had a lot of problems; he told me himself that it was all but impossible for his lungs to function without some sort of artificial help. Still, I was a little taken aback that this had happened so abruptly. After seven months as a chaplain, though, I have learned not to be optimistic anymore, while at the same time not to be a pessimist, when it comes to my patients and their situations. So I was better prepared when the news came two days ago that John’s family had decided to withdraw life support. He was no longer a patient in my assigned unit, but because I’d established a relationship with the family I followed up, with the assigned chaplain’s blessing.

John had a tube placed in his mouth so that air could be forced into the lungs that weren’t strong enough to work by themselves. When care is withdrawn, the tube is removed and the oxygen machines turned off. During my first weekend as a resident here, I observed a similar situation in this same unit; a woman who stayed alive only because of the machines made the indescribably brave decision (with her sister’s tearful agreement) to do the same. These patients are given a sedative drip so that they are in supreme comfort well before the tubes are taken out and the air turned off. It’s not an instantaneous process; the respiratory therapist I spoke to that first day told me that every person is very different – the longest she knew of had survived thirty DAYS after the machine was taken away. The average, though, is about one or two hours. On that first day, the lady in question took her last breath only 25 minutes after support was gone. The young intern who’d had to tell the family there was nothing else she could do was devastated, as this was the first family with which she’d had such a discussion. I gave her a big hug while she cried afterward, telling her that if I’m ever in a similar situation, I want a doctor like her – someone who gives a damn about me as a person, who cares enough to cry. Knowing people love us and care for us is something we all crave.

John had a dozen family members in the room during this end of life process, people of all ages standing, sitting, holding each other, posing stiffly – every type you could think of. Kate sat at his bedside, softly stroking his hair and at times kissing his forehead. Their son stood on the other side, holding his father’s hand. Seeing the love expressed for him by his family really got to me; it’d been a rough day all around. We were repeatedly paged to witness tragedy, discord and despair….yet in the midst of it all here was a man who was so loved that he inspired grown men to weep like babies over his imminent death. John was a strong one; he took his last breath just over two hours after the machines were turned off. I was not able to talk to Kate again until she and her extended family were back in the waiting area; she was sitting slumped in a chair with tears running down her face. I knelt and took her hands, telling her not only how sorry I was, but how glad I was that she had had a chance to prepare herself for this – that it had not come from out of the blue, leaving her so at a loss that she couldn’t function. She agreed, telling me that it had been like a gift to have those last days together knowing that they could talk about everything. So many couples don’t receive that.

It made me think of another funeral I attended six years ago for a beloved nursing professor, one who didn’t get this chance. She was quite young, but over 500 people from around the country attended her wake; I was humbled by her far-reaching impact on the world. It was also extremely depressing at the time because it made me realize how much I’d missed out on, the love I’d avoided over the years, for fear of being hurt….I thought there was no way I’d ever have that many people upset over my own death, because I simply didn’t take the chance of loving others. I wanted another chance more than anything, a chance to try to have the type of connection with other people that she had made. Today I myself am 44, the same age Cheryl Malernee McGaffic was when she was murdered. Since that day, I have given up my job, my home, my pets and a comfortable way of life to move nearly 2,000 miles across country so I could begin wrestling that blessing out of the messenger of God, as Jacob did. Now a seminary graduate, a much more emotionally open woman, far more sociable again, and successfully learning my way into the human portion of ministry (having attained the academic understanding of same), I realized in the midst of my depression that afternoon that I can no longer claim not to have made an impact. I’ve made friends in Chicago, friends in Phoenix, and friends in New Orleans, the three cities where I’ve lived since then. At last, I can truly claim that there would be people outside my family who would miss me, who would cry over the loss of me in the world. It’s not vanity; it’s knowing that someone gives a damn about you. Feeling alone has been such a habit for me for so long that I did not realize until this day that it’s no longer accurate. John, I can’t thank you enough for helping me to understand how much I really have changed. It was such a privilege to meet you and Kate, and I’m so happy that you two had time to express yourselves to each other before you went forward to that House with Many Mansions. It seems that the habit of praying together strengthens all human relationships, not only marriage.