Have you ever watched someone die?

I did. There was like something leaving. Freaked me out.

• Watched my mother pass away. At the moment of her death the colour visibly drained out of her face like someone turning a colour photograph into B&W.

• "There was like something leaving."\ \ OP watched his intelligence die.

• No, but several co-workers did during a meeting. I told them I was glad I wasn''t there because I''d never be the same afterward.

• Yes, my dad. Bed-ridden for two weeks and no longer taking food or water, just lying there with his eyes closed mumbling, pointing occasionally and sleeping. %0D\ %0D\ One morning he bolted upright on the edge of the bed, sitting there with his eyes open breathing heavily and then he died while my mom and brother held him.

• There was this one time, in Reno . . .

  Johnny Cash

• I''ve seen both my parents leave and three grandparents. It is something to see. They were all in the hospital when the died except for Grandma. All bedridden with strokes, heart attacks old age. %0D\ %0D\ But when the final "breathing began, and then slowwed and finally stopped there was such an amazing change. Once life had stopped, I could see that they were gone. This body in the bed, wasn''t them.

• R1, I know what you mean. I watched my father die. Something left. I was holding his hand and looking into his eyes. When it was over, it was clearly over. Everything changed%0D\ %0D\ R2 is an ass.

• My cat died in my arms on the way to the Pet ER on Christmas Eve.

• R6, how do you interpret what you saw?%0D\ %0D\ That the soul left the body?

• R8%0D\ %0D\ Oh gurl, what did you do to it?

• I watched my great-grandmother die. After 97 years of hard, glamorous living, she spent the last month of her otherwise healthy life in a hospital battling first a respiratory infection and then a staff infection.\ \ It was a terrible way to go, especially for a woman who had always been vivacious and lively. The whole family gathered around on the afternoon that the decision was made to turn off the machines. I kept waiting for something dramatic to happen-- to feel that feeling that the OP claimed... but there was nothing. It took almost an hour. Her breathing slowed, her heart rate slowed; and eventually they stopped. That was all. It was very unremarkable.\ \ The only thing that left in those final moments was the pain and suffering that she had been going through. And the humiliation she expressed over the fact that the one aspect of her life that she couldn''t control was how it ended. When the waiting was over, I felt a guilty sense of relief on her behalf, but there was nothing ethereal about the process.

• I''m sure I don''t know what you''re talking about.

  Mrs. Patsy Ramsey, formerly of Boulder, CO

• When my father was passing, we elected to turn off the equipment rather than keeping him alive on machines. I left the room, I knew I couldn''t deal with that memory in my head for the rest of my life. That''s not somesomething I think I could deal with well.

• "...battling first a respiratory infection and then a staff infection."%0D\ %0D\ Darling, I''ve had many a staff infection and believe me, I know your pain! You simply have to fire the first one before they ALL become infected. %0D

• I watched my career die when I farted during a presentation.

• A few times, relatives who were terminally ill. I didn''t notice anything that seemed like something "left" their body. Pallor changed as their blood stopped pumping and pooled. They both had short seizures as their breathing and heart stopped. It wasn''t pleasant. I don''t know why some people claim it''s peaceful and there is relief, but I assume everyone dies differently.\ \ R13, I think you did the right thing. I had nightmares about my dad for 4-5 years almost every night; they were only driven away when they were replaced with nightmares about my mom''s illness and death. But some people are strangely unaffected by it, they take it as just part of life, and they can handle it. I couldn''t handle it and I knew that, but the alternative was leaving them completely alone as they died, and that''s no alternative.

• Staff infections can potentially become pandemics. The CDC should have been called.

• I know I saw a filmy image leave. I''m sure it was the soul.

• I work in health care.

• I saw my grandmother a few minutes after she died. It''s very odd to see the body of someone you knew. No one would mistake it for a living person.\ \ When we put my dog down last year, he truly did just go to sleep. I was sobbing uncontrollably, but there wasn''t the same change in what he looked like. Fur hides a lot.

• Yep. I will never forget the sound of "death rattle" breath.

• Yes, my mother. I recall her looking younger and her face smoother the closer she got to the end and I want so badly to hope that it means the pain was leaving.

• I saw George Burns die in Altoona.

• Yes, my father. This happened last August and he died in October. He was my best friend and biggest champion. \ \ Watching someone who''s your favorite person in the world die is indescribably awful--there are no words in anyone''s lexicon to describe it. I had to go into grief counseling soon after his death because I knew if I didn''t, I''d be a basketcase. Fortunately, it did help but I miss him and think about him every day.\ \ I did hold his hand and told him how much I had loved him. At that point, his eyes were unfocused, his mind was an incoherent confused jumble and he was making no sense. He went to different periods in his life, began speaking his native tongue (he wasn''t American-born but spoke perfect unaccented English). He also didn''t know who I was at one point.

• [quote]Fur hides a lot.\ I heart you

• R24, how did he champion you?

• Fur hides a lot.\ \ In regards to Ron Jeremy, not always enough.

• Does Glenn''s career count?

  M

• The "death rattle" is hard to distinguish from the weird breathing that an unconscious person makes in the ordinary course of dying.\ \ My mother was fighting off giant mosquitoes in the early stages. I''ve heard this isn''t uncommon, friends have told me of their loved ones'' passings, and fighting off bees, or spiders, or other insects.\ \ Later on, as acceptance takes hold, maybe, there are more pleasant experiences.\ \ My grandmother thought she was hosting a dinner party or something, in the days before she died, she couldn''t see or hear us, but she kept calling out to dead relatives and smiling and gesturing them to her.

• Oh yeah, but I''m a nurse and I work in a hospital. The first time I saw someone die, I was just out of nursing school and it was 3AM. All the relatives ran out of the room saying they couldn''t deal with it, so I stayed. %0D\ %0D\ I''ll let you know if I ever see a thestral.

  RN

• Back in my volunteer days I helped at a hospice for AIDS patients. As I leaned partially over a sleeping young man one day while pulling his blanket up to better cover his upper body, he suddenly sat upright, threw his arms around me, and let out a heavy, deep sigh. Even before I laid him back down, I knew he was gone. I could just feel the life leave him as he exhaled. It was a very strange feeling.

• The OP of this thread:

  http://www.datalounge.com/cgi-bin/iowa/ajax.html#page:showThread,10151053,1

• So do any of you feel that you saw or felt the soul leave the body of the person who just died in front of you?

• So sorry r-24. I watched my beloved grandmother die. She''d had cancer for years but actually managed to live healthfully and independently until entering hospice one week before dying. In fact, she entered on her bday and we had a big family celebration the day after she arrived, with cake and food.\ \ Throughout the week, we dropped by for visits but was told she was stable--she was up and coherent. In fact we believed she was stable until a call came from hospice--come right now. I went with my sister and partner (parents lived 60 miles away, had returned home, and could not arrive in time). \ \ Got there in time to hold her hand throughout her final hour of life and give her water. I like to think she knew she wasn''t alone.

• I think the OP is The Resident DataLounge Serial Killer who has been noticeably absent as of late but always posts creepy ass threads like this.

• What a strange thing to say, R32

• No one just died in front of me.

• R33, I can say that the living body of an unconscious person is easy to differentiate from a corpse.

• I work in a Hospice. Every person certainly has their own unique death. Physical pain can be controlled-- it''s the psycho-social aspect that''s hardest to deal with. You''d hope that families could put aside their differences at such a time, but unfortunately that''s not always the case. After all, it''s about the dying person, right? I''ve seen some incredibly hateful and selfish behavior, including a pair of sisters getting in a fistfight in their dying mother''s room.\ \ Many people die calmly, and with their dignity intact. Scared anxious patients who feel either great guilt or anger don''t have pleasant deaths.

• Yes OP and I too felt something left. It was when we put our childhood dog to sleep.

• R34, not to be dismiss what tends to be sacred, but once a person dies the person has absolutely no consciousness or recollection that anyone was with them when they died, so I wonder if it really matters to the person dying.%0D\ %0D\ It would seem not to matter to the dying since very shortly later they die and any knowledge of people being with them at death is gone forever.%0D\ %0D\ So really it only matters to the relatives or friends left behind who are still living.%0D\ %0D\ Even if a dying person was fleetingly happy that people were there at the dying point, that tiny bit of happiness doesn''t matter because it is erased forever and is non-existent in the vast eternal nothingness which is death.

• Did this cat die?

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCyTB7KyR3Q

• " I can say that the living body of an unconscious person is easy to differentiate from a corpse."%0D\ %0D\ True, but I think most of the difference is the complete relaxation of muscles, including the involuntary muscles that do things like breathe. When a human (or other mammal) dies the lungs fully deflate, the face sort of sags with gravity, etc. %0D\ %0D\ I''ve never seen anything like a soul or anything else that could be called supernatural, but then I''ve only seen very old people go when they were expected to go.

  the RN who''s keeping an eye out for thestrals

• Beatles! STOP!!!

  Yoko

• Can you imagine having a Datalounger hovering over you as you die!? Oh dear!

  Nurse MARY on duty

• Well, R43, if there were a soul to be seen or noticed, it would not matter how old the dying person happens to be, since if the soul exists, a soul would be possessed by a 10 year old and an 80 year old.

• When a person dies alone, any recollection or consciousness that they died alone immediately evaporates and disappears upon death.%0D\ %0D\ So really surrounding a person on the person''s death bed is just to prove to others in society that the person didn''t ''have to die alone'' because family members surrounded them - it''s part of a show that is put on.%0D\ %0D\ And the being with the one who is dying is really for the benefit of the people left behind.

• Did I miss something? What''s a thestral?

• [quote] Even if a dying person was fleetingly happy that people were there at the dying point, that tiny bit of happiness doesn''t matter because it is erased forever and is non-existent in the vast eternal nothingness which is death.\ \ That''s beautiful, r41.

  Anomynous

• [quote]When a person dies alone, any recollection or consciousness that they died alone immediately evaporates and disappears upon death.\ \ And who are you, Dead McDeaderson?

• R48, it''s fancy-speak for "ghost"

• I would rather be eternal Life McLiferson.

• Isn''t this ''thing'' that leaves the body upon death which some of speak of just the stopping of the blood flow thru the body, the deflation of the lungs, and the lack of breath?

• I am so tired of watching people die. I wonder if I might be the Angel of Death (MARY!...get it over with). I am The Family Member That Does That Sort Of Thing. The rest are pretty much feral assholes who just wait for a check.

• which some of you speak of

• [quote]I would rather be eternal Life McLiferson.\ \ You better stop going to sites like Datalounge, then.

  Cheryl

• r52 has zeroed in on the reason religion exists. The prospect of life after death is just so compelling to so many. They would rather hope for the best. No matter that it''s pie in the sky. They choose to believe those lies because it''s comforting.

  Tarquin

• r41 brings spot remover to parties.

• You don''t need Jesus or any other magical sky faerie to believe in eternal life.

• There are people living now who may never die. \ \ Seriously.\ \ \ The singularity, the point at which computation acquires all available knowledge at an exponential rate, is near.

• r59 You make a distinction without a difference.

  Tarquin

• R59, if you do not base a belief in eternal life on the existence of God, then on what do you base a belief in eternal life?

• R61, the difference is substantial; you''re simply to dull to comprehend it.

• R62, who did the Buddha worship?

• Yes, OP, I had this experience of something having left the body with both my parents. Its strange and touching at the same time. It convinced me of life after death.

• R65, what about it convinced you of life after death?

• I know there''s no God, but I''m scared about Macy dying. Her hip doesn''t look right.

• I''ve heard that Dead McDeaderson is always brought back to life by alley cats.

• if by ''life after death'' you mean heaven and hell, not so sure I buy it. But if you mean reincarnation...that kinda makes sense to me.

• Reincarnation?\ \ Good luck with that.

• [quote] you''re simply to dull to comprehend it.\ \ The irony makes me love DL.

  Tarquin

• [quote]The irony makes me love DL.%0D\ %0D\ You need a dictionary.

  Alanis

• R60 tell me more. I''m feeling your vibe

• [quote]I''m feeling your vibe\ \ Hallucinogenic BO?

• r 66, because the absence of the feeling of them not being there in the body, made me feel that something does inhabit the body like a soul. It made me believe that a body is enlivened with a life ( which I guess is stating the obvious ) except that their spirit or soul for want of a better term was really them and it was beyond death. It''s hard to explain, except only their bodies seemed to die, but they didn''t. It was a very strong feeling and it''s stayed with me.\ \ r69, I am not religious and I don''t believe in hell, that''s for sure. Not sure on heaven, I think you make that for yourself here. On re-incarnation I have an open mind, maybe or maybe not.

• Jesus, r72. It''s ironic that r63 called me [italic] to [/italic] dull to comprehend. To dull. When r63 is the too dull one. And so are you, apparently.

  Tarquin

• R76, the thread topic is "Have you ever watched someone die?"\ \ Please stop being a flame-warring dullard, dear.

• [quote]It''s ironic that [R63] called me to dull to comprehend.\ \ Well you''ve certainly proved him wrong with your multi-post objections to being called "to dull." A fascinating, substantive obsession if ever there was one. How wrong his is, indeed!

• r77, don''t call me a dullard in the same sentence where you refer to me with a term of endearment.

  Tarquin

• Tarquin, you''re dull as a doorknob, dear.

• I always get to good threads too late - after they''ve derailed. I''ll save my story for a future thread.

• I just watched this thread die.

• R82, did you note any signs of a threstral?

• Yes, R83. This particular threstral was wearing a smock and looked like it had just smelled one of these:

  http://lh5.ggpht.com/_zW-F6xczFsE/S7qVfzuPtHI/AAAAAAAAIA0/MrAKjrunzlI/IMG_6630.JPG

• I was sitting at my grandma''s bedside when she died.%0D\ %0D\ I was holding her hand, and watching her face and chest to see if she was still breathing.%0D\ %0D\ Near the end, it became harder to tell, because her pulse got weaker and weaker.%0D\ %0D\ Her hand started getting cooler, until it turned cold, and that''s when I was certain that she had died.%0D\ %0D\ What I found remarkable was how our lifeblood pumping through our bodies keeps us so warm, and when we die, we turn ice cold.%0D\ %0D\ After that, she began getting stiffer, and that''s when I let go of her hand.%0D\ %0D\ It was an "interesting" experience (to say the least), but at least she died peacefully in her own bed, surrounded by family that loved her.

• R85, my condolences. I haven''t experienced it myself, but it''s the coldness that struck people I''ve known who have related similar scenarios.\ \ We don''t generally think of our questing selves and beating hearts as heat sources that can become extinguished like a candle flame.

• You all need to get back to iVillage.

• If you don''t believe in life after death (or do), fine, but I don''t see the reasoning behind saying the last part of your life when you''re ALIVE doesn''t matter, because you''re going to be dead, soon. By that reasoning, NOTHING that happened before death matters since you''ll die, eventually. That''s just silly. Some people aren''t "other" or "atheists" (or whatever) they''re religion is anti-theism. Ironically, like a bible-thumper they think Christians, Muslims, etc have the market cornered on certain beliefs/perspectives and *they* can''t think or navigate outside of that paradigm anymore than a "believer" can. It''s not freethinking or reality based, it''s a religion of non-religion. Just as bad as purported "science-based" people who bash religious people (like they bash us), but when science doesn''t say what they want it to, they say they *believe* it in their hearts to be true (even if it requires fudging the findings). \ \ Yes, I''m an insomniac, and this is my pondering/rambling.

  eh, I type fast

• Time magazine last week said that immortality could be just 35 years away. So that''ll kill threads like this. Providing that some of you nannas can hold on that long.

• R43, go back to nursing school hon. The lungs inflate when you die, not deflate, unless they''re punctured.%0D\ %0D\ The diaphragm relaxes, and the air in the room is at a higher pressure than the inside of the lungs, so they fill up.%0D\ %0D\ Took a gazillion post-mortem chest x-rays. All the lungs were inflated.

  Another x-ray tech who hates nurses who talk shit like they know everything

• [quote]I can say that the living body of an unconscious person is easy to differentiate from a corpse.\ \ Well, obviously you haven''t seen "Weekend At Bernie''s".

• OP here. Thanks for the comments (except R2).%0D\ %0D\ We had been taking care of him at home for about 2 months. He had terminal cancer.%0D\ %0D\ It was a Sunday morning. I was in the backyard watering the plants. My brother saw it happening. He called me to come in.%0D\ %0D\ It was so obvious what was happening, yet nothing was happening. I held his hand and he was looking at me. When he was gone it was so obvious that something left his eyes. It was very peaceful, touching but it haunts me.

• I was there when my partner died of cancer. At the moment of death, he took about 6 gasping breaths, like a fish out of water gasping desperately for air. I can barely think about it.

• R88, the reason the last moments or last hour of your life does not really matter in terms of dying alone or not dying alone is because your last moments have no future -%0D\ %0D\ while all of your life before you are on your death bead has a FUTURE -%0D\ %0D\ so that is the difference you mention - %0D\ %0D\ one has a future, and one does not.

• %0D\ I was with my dad. He had lung cancer. He was home with hospice. No gasping or anything like that, the breaths seemed to just come further apart until the next one didn''t come.%0D\ %0D\ I also think my sister may have OD''d him on the morphine (with the doctor''s tacit approval) we had been provided. A few hours before he died he had been thrashing a bit and my sister called the doctor who authorized upping his morphine. I am totally ok with it but I think it haunts her.

• I''ve seen two. A long time partner and my Grandmother. It''s a really strange thing. When people describe it in glowing terms about "being there" it makes me nauseous. It was wretched. And I hold a strange belief about witnessing the death of a loved one. You will not dream about them.\ \ \ I have very vivd dreams that are almost like reunions. I have not once dreamed about my past partner or my Grandmother. They are completely absent from all my dreams.

• R47, makes some decent points. I just wish it didn''t sound so cynical.\ \ I was with both my parents when they passed away and consider it one of the biggest blessings of my life. I know they were at peace and surrounded with the best possible energy. It erased questions I am sure would have lingered for the rest of my life had I not been there.\ \ I was very aware of the fact that I didn''t want to have regrets about their deaths. They got me here and I did everything within my power to help them when they were leaving.\ \ They passed in very similar ways ... very quiet, no drama, just what I would call an acceptance of what was happening and peace.\ \ Again, I am very thankful.\ \ My Mother passed away at a Hospice Center. I would encourage anyone to go there during the difficult time that a family member is dying.

• I am R47 and R94 - why does it sound cynical, R97?%0D\ %0D\ You say I make decent points.%0D\ %0D\ What were the erased questions that you would have had had you not been present at your parents'' deaths?%0D\ %0D\ Your presence at their deaths was really for yourself and marginally to put on a show so it didn''t look to others in society or at the hospice like no one cared - because one second after each parent died, they had absolutely no recollection and no consciousness of their last hours or minutes on earth, as all consciousness was erased forever one second after they died and when they fell into the eternal nothingness of death. %0D\ %0D\ So your presence was actually meaningless to your parents as they immediately forgot you were even there, and since any memories of your presence do not exist.

• [quote] immortality could be just 35 years away\ \ Still, the wear-and-tear over time would take a toll. Didn''t you see [italic] Death Becomes Her [/italic] with Meryl Streep, Bruce Willis, Goldie Hawn, and Isabella Rossellini? There are practical downsides to immortality.

  Tarquin

• R47 this is R97 ... I don''t disagree some of it was about me knowing what happened but it wasn''t a show. That''s what I think sounds cynical.\ \ My Mom used to obsess over people that had died along ... right or wrong, that''s what she did and felt. I know in my heart that my mother would have wanted to have someone with her. That was done for her and per my understanding of her wishes. It wasn''t for the Hospice nurse. It wasn''t to talk about at the funeral. Ultimately, even though I stand by the fact that I got something out of being there ... it most mattered because it honored who my Mom was and how she felt before she was sick. Years of memories and discussion go into how I feel and that it didn''t get remembered by her really isn''t part of it for me.

• along = alone

• I watched both my parents die (about eight years apart.) My brother and I sat with them and held their hands. Both of them made that "death rattle" breathing sound. It''s horrible. Worst sound ever.\ \ My mom was essentially comatose at the end, but my father''s experience was interesting. He was staring off into space, and reaching out his hand for... something. For a good twenty or thirty minutes, he just stared and reached. He didn''t respond to us talking to him, and I really feel that he just wasn''t "there" anymore. It was very affecting. I am a bit haunted by that experience.

• My morbid friend made his career in hospices. He had so many stories I tired of his company.

• There is only one way to come into the world but a million ways to leave it.%0D

• R103, did any of the stories involve watching a soul leave a body? %0D\ %0D\ (if you happen to remember...)%0D\ %0D\ I''m fascinated by anyone documenting that they saw a soul leave a body.%0D\ %0D\ And I''m fascinated by R102 saying his father ''was not there''.%0D\ %0D

• What is the ''death rattle'' exactly?%0D\ %0D\ What is it and what does it sound like?%0D\ %0D\ Also, so many people are being pumped with so much morphine that I would think they do not know all that is going on and their consciousness is probably minimal.

• R102, are you saying your father was probably reaching out to God or heaven?

• R106, I''m not sure what causes it, but - to me - the "death rattle" sounds like the worst kind of bronchitis or chest congestion. It''s hard to describe, but it''s distinctive. Both of my parents died of cancer, but not lung or respiratory cancer, so I''m not certain why they made that sound or if all dying people make it.\ \ What interesting is that my dad was on lots of pain meds, and much of the time did not have full consciousness, but whatever he was reaching for at the end was a stronger pull than anything else in that room.\ \ I don''t know how to describe it effectively, R107. I don''t know if there is a heaven.

  R102, who is a lesbian for the record

• Marys. Losing consciousness is not unlike falling asleep. Stop projecting your fantasies.

• I was in the room with my bf and his family when his father died. There was no death rattle, but I knew instantly he had died, it was as if something had escaped from his body and only the shell was left behind. I don''t know if that was a "soul" or some other kind of life force leaving, but it was very mysterious and moving, and I think about it a lot.

• Uh, no, Tarquin... If science ever does allow immortality, it will likely involve nanotechnology. The body will have none of this ''wear-and-tear'', since it will be constantly monitored and repaired.

  50,000 Nanobots

• How long ago did he pass, R93?

• Well, anonymous poster at r111, I''m sure you know better what''s to come.

  Tarquin

• The exact same could be said for you, Tarquin. At least my statement has a scientific foundation... Yours has a very nice humanities-oriented ''let''s never challenge death!'' sheen, though.

• One might argue that yours has a science fiction foundation, but I hope you''re right and you get your 50k nanobots.

  Tarquin

• A lot of science fictional technologies eventually come true, buddy... I hope we all get our 50K nanobots, even you.

  H.G. Wells

• The idea kind of makes my flesh crawl, but they''ll no doubt have a medication for that....

  Tarquin

• [quote]You make a distinction without a difference.%0D\ %0D\ %0D\ Could someone smart explain this to me?

• R110, could you explain more. I am trying to better understand what you experienced.

• My mom and a beloved aunt, both from advanced dementias. Mom''s was difficult and sad, aunt Betty''s was unnerving. \ \ Aunt B had been essentially comatose during a rapid decline of a couple days, eyes closed throughout. I left the room for a couple minutes after keeping vigil for those days, alone, and returned to find things unchanged and unremarkable.\ \ I closed my eyes for a minute, opened them, and my eyes met Betty''s. She was staring intently at me. She was quite dead.

• r18, I can tell you what I meant: The poster I was commenting about said [quote] You don't need Jesus or any other magical sky faerie to believe in eternal life. He was making a distinction between organized religion and his belief in eternal life, or, life-after-death, apart from religions. He can split that hair, but it remains that his belief in eternal life is still just that. A belief not based on evidence or scientific theory. So my comment was that it was really no different. Your life, your consciousness, your personality, your identity, your thoughts and memories are all part of the complex workings of your brain, electrochemical interactions of brain cells and their synapses. When you're dead, of course, these processes cannot continue, and you cease to exist. Just like you did not exist before you were born. Not to take anything away from the dignity and preciousness of life. And the value of ones relationships in life. In a sense, you'll live on in the memories of you by your survivors and your contributions to society. Life is short. Make the best of it, because we only get one shot at it.

  Tarquin

• R121, most people are quickly forgotten.%0D\ %0D\ And most people are quite average and do not make much of a contribution to society, if any at all.

• I agree, r122. Just the people who knew you when you were alive will remember you, for better or worse. Then, when they''re gone you won''t be remembered at all, probably. But don''t be depressed. Enjoy your life while you have it. Life is a pretty remarkable thing, really. And you won''t really mind after you''re gone anyway.

  Tarquin

• I''ve noticed that even people closed to you often forget you pretty quickly and rarely think about you, and often put you out of their mind.%0D\ %0D\ For example, married men who lose a wife, often find a new wife fairly quickly and are quite happy in life.%0D\ %0D\ No need to argue that the widowers above haven''t really forgotten the wife who died - they are usually so deeply involved with the new wife that the dead wife rarely enters their mind.

• r11, I read your story with interest, since my own grandmother died at 97 after spending a long, happy, healthy life (aside from contracting TB in the 40s.) \ \ It seems to me that if there''s such a thing as winning at life, living a life that''s 97 years long and then dying after being acutely ill for a month is kind of it. I wish my grandmother had lived to be 100, but how many farm girls born in the first decade of the 20th century ever expected to live into the 21st? Plus having a good time of it for most of a century (mine wasn''t glamorous, but she was pretty damn cheery.)

• Those men are some serious cunts, R124. I can''t imagine that there aren''t people who judge them for moving on so quickly.

• Thanks, Tarquin.%0D\ %0D\ I always enjoy your posts.

  R118

• meant to type: close to you

• Nor really, R126, the husbands are not ''cunts''.%0D\ %0D\ I''ve noticed that other people quite often quickly forget those who have died.%0D\ %0D\ Relatives quickly forget other relatives, wives forget husbands, siblings forget siblings, people forget their aunts, uncles, etc.%0D\ %0D\ Life goes on, and often the dead people are rarely, if ever, mentioned.

• R126, the men who remarry don''t forget their wives. I''ve known several. %0D\ %0D\ They often love their replacement wives a little less, but they need women to take care of them.%0D\ %0D\ You wouldn''t believe how needy straight men are.%0D\ %0D

• All I know is when my parents have died, I''m going to end it all too. I''m not good with change that require mourning.

• R130, you cannot say ALL men do not forget the wife who died.%0D\ %0D\ Just because you know a couple doesn''t mean you can extrapolate to ALL men.%0D\ %0D\ And men (or people) may not forget the wife, but they rarely think about her.

• My husband lost his partner in 1991. He loves me completely, but his late partner is very dear to him still.%0D\ %0D\ Life moves on, and that''s a good thing.

• Yes, that is a good thing in many ways, R133 - but people who move on ridiculously quickly are very suspect. %0D\ %0D\ I still maintain that they''re cunts, R129. Unless they hated their wives, they should be single for at least some time. And no, I don''t think many people quickly forget their loved ones - that''s a very cynical view, and not at all coincident with reality.

  R126

• I was with my father as he took ill at home, lost consciousness, traveled by ambulance and died in the hospital that night. He died of a massive brain hemorrhage in his 90s, and there was nothing to be done. We were so close that I am still in shock, over a year later. By the time we got to the hospital, he was not responsive but was breathing on his own. Later on, he had oxygen, and I sat there with him holding his hand, talking and singing to him. He was able to breathe on his own until the very end. In the wee hours his blood pressure dropped to an alarmingly low rate and the attending idiotic resident, who was unqualified for this kind of thing, and who kept distracting us with stupid ideas and questions when all we wanted was some quiet last time with him, ordered us to leave the room as he was drawing his last breath. I missed the exact moment that he died, which is still very upsetting to me. I promised myself that I would be there when Dad died and I still am so angry at that Dr, but mainly with myself, for not telling him to get the fuck out of our room and not come back until after Dad died. If I had been in my normal state of mind, I would have. Our whole experience at the hospital was so awful once we got out of emergency. I had to insist on a monitor, ("we don't have monitors on this floor")insist that someone suction his throat when he was choking, and resented having to answer questions about what medications he was on to some slow-witted nurse when it was already in his file, and he certainly didn't need anymore drugs. She really enjoyed the fact that I was irritated at her and prolonged it. I ended up writing a detailed letter to the Head of Residents about this experience and they instituted a program to train residents and doctors about the needs of the dying patient and family. You would THINK that a major hospital in New York City would already be training doctors in this, but I guess not. I'm hope that someone else will not have to suffer as I did, but nothing changes the misery of that night, made by worse by Dr. Horrible. I had to start grief therapy immediately and am still seeing a therapist. I worry that the last thing my Dad might have heard was my brother and I arguing with that idiot, instead of focusing our attention on him during his last moments on earth. I still can start crying at the memory of it, as well as his last day, which started out normally. Despite this, his leave-taking was so dignified and quiet, much like he was. He has a good quality of life and was able to live at home until that last day, without pain (until the headache), just getting older and weaker. I hope I will be that lucky.

  Lenox Hill Hospital, you''d better shape up

• When you''re little all the people in your life are older than you; when you''re old your family and friends are mostly all younger than you. You start your life with one set of people who are one-by-one replaced by a completely different set of people who are there at the end.

  Tarquin

• Well, many men are NOT single for ''some time'' after their wife dies, R134.%0D\ %0D\ How long is ''some time''? Many men re-marry fairly quickly.%0D\ %0D\ And loved ones are less put out of one''s mind than acquaintances or famous people or neighbors or even friends - as the latter often rarely come to one''s mind.%0D\ %0D\ I''ve just been made aware of how people who die are rarely thought about once they are gone.

• Can anyone else comment further upon or elaborate further on the rather mysterious leave-taking of what seems to possibly be the soul leaving the body such as what R110 experienced?

• I saw R. Budd Dwyer shoot himself on televisionvb

• "I''ve just been made aware of how people who die are rarely thought about once they are gone."%0D\ %0D\ Bizarre. There would not be such an emphasis on grieving customs in our culture if we ''rarely'' thought about our loved ones who have passed away.%0D\ %0D

• Except for historical or famous people, who that died before 1900 is remembered today by anyone but genealogists?

  Anomynous

• R140, I was refering mostly to acquaintances, neighbors, friends, famous people, people in the public eye.....but also to some relatives and some loved ones.%0D\ %0D\ Many people get back to living and life quite quickly, and more than often, the people who died do not cross their minds all that much.

• "Many people get back to living and life quite quickly, and more than often, the people who died do not cross their minds all that much."%0D\ %0D\ ''Many'' people? ''More than often''? You need to produce some proof for this statement of yours... It''s just far too sweeping in scope.

  Queen Victoria''s Decades-Long Mourning Period

• R140 says:%0D\ %0D\ "There would not be such an emphasis on grieving customs in our culture if we ''rarely'' thought about our loved ones who have passed away."%0D\ %0D\ But the ''grieving customs'' you mention are only for short periods of several months, or at most a year.%0D\ %0D\ Just because you still mourn the loss of your partner or parent or someone else, doesn''t mean that everyone else in the world mourns for lengthy periods like you apparently do, R140.%0D\ %0D\ I''ve learned that most people are basically thought of as fairly disposable and sometimes rather replaceable, and when not replaceable, then ''out of sight then out of thought, out of mind''.%0D\ %0D\ A gay partner would be probably be mourned the most since most gay partners are very difficult to replace with a new partner.%0D\ %0D\ And parents are pretty irreplacement, but the loss usually lessens a huge amount by a year later after the loss.

• My partner was in hospital after a long battle with cancer and terminal after contracting pneumonia, that morning he was however cheerful and he asked to run some errands for him as we though he was actually making a remarcable recovery!, so off I went only to be called back in by the head nurse telling me one of his morphine tubes had come off after he got agitated because some "friend" showed up and insisted in seeing him, after all the commotion the visitor quickly dashed off and my partner was no longer able to speak or see anyone I mean his body had already starting shutting down...no ability to see with his eyes or speak anymore I was informeed..., But I was informed that he could hear and recognize voices...that if I spoke to him he would hear me but would not be able to move or anything...Shocked and crying I rushed back to the hospital to find a crowd of friends all there to watch his "departure' (mind you he was a celebrity sportman) and those who wanted to be in the news wanted to go on record as being there "holding" his hand.%0D I felt outraged by the other family members who sat down all over the place eating sandwiches and happilly chatting away not concerned at all at what we were really there for, it was a circus.%0D %0D I approached my dear partner and what happened next left everyone shocked: My loving partner "lifted" his arm and placed around my shoulders as I cried on his.%0D %0D After a while I moved away and sat on the floor as I had no strengh left in me....my partner then all of a sudden sat up and his eyes gkazed up, he recoiled in a foetal position and that was it, gone.%0D %0D A doctor came in and in shock of the manner in which everyone else conducted themselves told them off the room but asked me to stay.%0D %0D He said he was a moslin, I said I was catholic, he said it didn't matter and invited me to say a prayer together because in the eyes of God we are all the same, after that he asked me if I wanted to bathe and change my partners clothes as he had to send his body to another department, at each stage the doctor asked permission to my deat partner to perform and touch him for what we needed to do to prepare his body.%0D %0D It was a sobering and very conforting watching this special person defering so much respect to my dead partner.%0D %0D That same night the Organ donation called me and asked me for permission to donate his corneas, I explained to them his medical history and they told me it was okay to donate corneas and they scan every organ for cancerous cells.%0D %0D As it was my partners thing in life to always help people and in the past I recollected conversation when he indicated he would like to be an organ donor, so I discussed this with the rest of the family and we agreed to it.%0D %0D Months later I received a Christmas card from a lady (through the organ donation foundation) telling me that her husband was blind and only two weeks after his operation he could already see. The other cornea went to another elderly gentleman who was doing well as well.%0D %0D Altough the memories of those horrible days in hospital are gone I feel conforted knowing that out there somewhere he still helping others.%0D I had much to say but I have waited 7 years to tell this story, get it out my chest and I only came across this site today totally by chance.%0D %0D I loved all the conversations, cheers

  Anonimous

• "I''ve learned that most people are basically thought of as fairly disposable and sometimes rather replaceable, and when not replaceable, then ''out of sight then out of thought, out of mind''."%0D\ %0D\ You are proselytizing for this bizarre belief that you have, one that apparently gets you off somehow. That''s just not true. %0D\ %0D\ "Just because you still mourn the loss of your partner or parent or someone else, doesn''t mean that everyone else in the world mourns for lengthy periods like you apparently do, R140."%0D\ %0D\ You are attempting to suppress recognition of other people''s very different grieving processes to sate your own flippancy. A lot of people do not conform to your strange ideas of how long grief and/or remembrance should last. Some people will always miss their loved ones, and some people will always try to keep their loved one''s memory alive somehow. Case closed.

• Ah, R145, you made me tear up. Much love to you.

• "Bizarre. There would not be such an emphasis on grieving customs in our culture if we ''rarely'' thought about our loved ones who have passed away."\ \ The "grieving customs" are often all about the living and their need for attention.

• A couple of years ago I was looking out my window drinking a cup of coffee. I saw a very fat woman in her nightgown land and crash on my patio furniture. She had jumped from her window on the 10th floor and landed on my large balcony. It was surreal. After she crashed, she just tried to get up but she lost consciousness and died in front of my eyes. I have these images engraved in my mind, in slow-motion...It was established that she commited suicide.

• [quote]Except for historical or famous people, who that died before 1900 is remembered today by anyone but genealogists?%0D\ %0D\ Uh, is there a point to this idiocy?

• R11, I''m not laughing at you or your pain but I couldn''t help but giggle at "staff infection." I''m sorry about your grandmother. \ \ The term is "staph" infection and refers to the staphylococcus aureus bacteria. It''s a danger to anyone in the hospital because it''s naturally found on human skin. People like your grandmother are prime candidates for staph infections.

• Jeez, R149, how rude!

• R146, it''s nice that you want to grieve forever and keep someone''s memory alive forever ......%0D\ %0D\ but plenty of people are thought of as fairly disposable and replaceable....%0D\ %0D\ and they are thought of rarely, if at all.

• You''re fetishizing your worldview, R153. Even your language - the constant use of ''rarely'' and ''disposable'' - holds some kind of talismanic power over you.%0D\ %0D\ Take a poll, and see if the majority of people feel the way you do. I think you''ll be very surprised by what they say.

• You seem to be hung up on a beloved partner or beloved parent, R1146, R154....%0D\ %0D\ but there are vast numbers of people who are not loved and to whom people are indifferent...%0D\ %0D\ siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, acquaintances, parents who are not particularly loved, people without children, maiden aunts, unmarried people, etd%0D\ %0D\ Not everyone is loved or missed. Plenty of people are not loved by anyone and are not missed.

• "You seem to be hung up on a beloved partner or beloved parent..."%0D\ %0D\ I''m fortunate enough to not have had a partner or parent pass yet, R153. I still hold my beliefs that people can leave lasting impacts on others, though.

  R154

• R156, yes, of course, SOME people can leave lasting impacts on others.%0D\ %0D\ Of course, NO ONE WOULD DISPUTE THAT.%0D\ %0D\ But in all of your posts, you act like EVERYONE is not disposable and EVERYONE is beloved by people and EVERYONE is missed terribly and EVERYONE is not forgotten and EVERYONE is honored and their memory kept alive.%0D\ %0D\ It just is not true.

• Psycho/R157, calm down. I never said that everyone is not forgotten. But many people are remembered fondly, and that seems to be upsetting you very much.%0D\ %0D\ Please take your pills now.

  Constant Capitalization = Crazy

• "Of course, NO ONE WOULD DISPUTE THAT."%0D\ %0D\ You disputed this many times, with your reiteration of "and they are thought of rarely, if at all". You''re clearly unbalanced and borderline amnesiac.%0D\ %0D

• It''s too bad that the anonymity of the Internet interferes with what has for the most part been a very thoughtful and respectful discussion that I''ve enjoyed participating in very much.\ \ Save the childish name calling stuff for the vapid threads ... that leaves you 99.9%.

• I''m liked by several friends, but I have no family (once my mom passes), and possibly no partner (although I''m working on it). So sometimes I have a fear that who''s going even make arrangements for my funeral? Everybody just assumes family is taking care of it and everyone has busy lives. But I do get comfort by the fact that I''ll be dead so it really won''t matter. My body could just sit there, I''ll be dead so I won''t know.

• Excellent and brave contribution, R160. Can we assume that you fit into the ''dead people don''t matter'' crowd too?

  Sarcasmo

• Alas Sarcasmo, you are wrong ... if indeed that is possible with such a name. Seems you''ve set yourself up to win either way.\ \ Well done.

• R146, R154, R158, R159 (who are all the same person....%0D\ %0D\ you seem very threatened by the ideas I have presented.%0D\ %0D\ You are so threatened that you resorted to insisting that I am ''psycho'' and ''need pills'' and that I''m ''unbalanced and borderline''....%0D\ %0D\ none of which is true about me.%0D\ %0D\ You need to learn to accept opposing and different ideas.%0D\ %0D\ And you are so extreme that you try to insist that everyone is loved and that everyone will be remembered forever and cherished and kept alive in memories - when there are millions of people living at any given time in the world for which this is not true.

• R158, why do you set up a false argument. It is so low in argumentation.%0D\ %0D\ I never said that some people are not remembered fondly.%0D\ %0D\ And, of course, the fact that some people are remembered fondly does NOT upset me.%0D\ %0D\ You are so threatened that you really step low.%0D\ %0D

• At R157, I should have typed you insist that ''most everyone is loved, missed, cherished by someone, kept alive in memories, or remembered''%0D\ %0D\ emphasia on the word ''most everyone'', not ''everyone''

• R166+ too many to count - you have made your point, now kindly go away. We promise to forget you immediately.

  Enough already!

• R167, you go away. You have not posted even one post on this thread. No one cares what you think and you have contributed nothing.

• I love this thread, but I am crying when I read it. Even though my dad died 3 years ago and mom last year, I am still, i guess, in morning. I miss them terribly and was not present at either of their deaths. This I guess haunts me the most. Life goes on is true, but their memories are right there at the surface for me.%0D\ %0D\ %0D\ Even though I am not religious (jebus and all that), I do believe there is something more after death. I firmly believe we are more than the physical atoms in our bodies and when we die, that "something" leaves and goes???. I don''t need to create a reason for what that is, I just know we are more than what you can touch.%0D

  Thanks

• bump

• I was caring for a patient several years ago in the ICU. Early into my 12-hour shift, a cancer patient told me, as I gave him some Vicodin, "I''m going to die."%0D\ %0D\ He looked pale and balding, and was a DNR, but he was perfectly with it, definitely not imminently dying. %0D\ %0D\ Of course you know he died four hours later -- And I mean, just collapsed in bed and was dead.

  Yet another RN......

• [quote]He looked pale and balding, and was a DNR, but he was perfectly with it, definitely not imminently dying.\ \ I''ve been balding for about 15 years. It''s good to know I''m not in imminent danger of death.

• If you wear x ray glasses when someone dies, you can see a transparent tortellini float out of their stomach.

  Dead McDeaderson

• Another story....%0D %0D A different cancer patient, a middle-aged woman with newly-diagnosed, inoperable lung cancer, was on the ventilator, but totally dependent on it to survive. We had tried numerous times to extubate, and she wouldn't last a minute.%0D %0D One day she just decided to "quit," as it were. She spelled out to her daughters, that she just wanted to die. Perfectly competent to make the decision, so the next day we extubated her.%0D %0D The doctor, her two daughters and myself were there.....I gave her Ativan and Morphine before we started, then as she whispered words to her daughters (of course, with them sobbing uncontrollably like on "Imitation of Life), the doctor kept on telling me to just give more Morphine and Ativan -- I must've given enough to kill a herd of elephants, and finally she died after about 10 minutes. But i'd never seen (and have since never seen) anyone who looked so peaceful after such a decision. She had a faint smile on her face, I thought.%0D %0D I broke out in hives that afternoon, from the stress of basically "killing" someone from giving so much medicine to keep her comfortable.

  Yet another nurse...

• When my mother had terminal cancer, she said she wanted to live through one more Easter. The day after, she took a turn for the worse.%0D\ %0D\ We brought her to Sloane Kettering and the ER doctor told us she could go at anytime. I guess it just wasn''t sinking in. At one point the DR asked my father if they should do anything to keep her alive. He looked at me and I shook my head. I guess he couldn''t make the decision. I looked over at her and she smiled at me.%0D\ %0D\ We stayed with her into the evening, then we all left. She said she was ok. She died in the middle of the night. I have never forgiven myself for leaving her to die alone. I was only 24, but I should have known better.

  OP

• Lord, R174, was the doctor asking you to kill her? I mean did the doctor know giving that large amount of morphine and ativan would kill her?

• R175, yes, but the second she died any memory or knowledge or consciousness of you not being there was erased forever as she fell into the eternal nothingness of death.%0D\ %0D\ And she may have been unconscious anyway before she died.%0D\ %0D\ You have nothing to forgive yourself for.

• R174, once you removed the tube, would she have suffocated to death because her lungs were not working, so that is why the doctor ordered the massive doses of morphine/ativan?

• Not R174, but the doctor told us to give my father as much morphine and ativan needed to keep him comfortable. High doses of morphine are pretty typical for end-stage terminal cancer.%0D\ %0D\ I was curious, I took a 30 mg pill of morphine. Oh my god, it was wonderful!

• R176, not R174 here, but a doctor killed my grandmother by withdrawing nourishment and water while having my aunt keep grandma full of morphine until she basically died of thirst.%0D\ %0D\ Seems to be accepted practice.%0D

• Wow, 177 and the other 6 entries on this page alone, you definitely have some serious issues but of course, you don''t think so. Whatever.\ \ I have posted on this thread, not that it matters, but no one has posted more than YOU have, so I guess you win the prize.

  R167

• R181, I see your post at R135. You are self-admittedly and obviously the one with deep psychological issues. You say that you have been in grief therapy with a counselor for a year or longer over the death of your father.%0D\ %0D\ You and I seem to disagree - so we disagree, now leave me alone.

• R177, you sound really bitter. %0D\ %0D\ Are you dying? %0D\ %0D\ You also sound like one who hasn''t gotten much love.

• R178, most people die within three days after the tube is removed. Some live for months, but they are the exception.%0D\ %0D\ There is a German doctor who has made it his cause to end intubation. It was originally intended to keep people alive who would get better, like car accident victims. However, people who would die anyway are being routinely intubated, keeping them alive for much longer then they would have. He believes this is cruel.%0D\ %0D\ I have a DNR and a do not intubate order. I don''t want to be kept alive by a machine.%0D\ %0D\ My father didn''t have a DNR. We were taking care of him at home and the hospice people (who were amazing) basically told us that if anything happened, not to call an ambulance. %0D\ %0D

• "I have never forgiven myself for leaving her to die alone."\ \ It might have been easier for her to go without you and your father and/or other close family members present.\ \ [quote]Giving permission to your loved one to let go, without making him or her guilty for leaving or trying to keep him or her with you to meet your own needs, can be difficult. A dying person will normally try to hold on, even though it brings prolonged discomfort, in order to be sure those who are going to be left behind will be all right. Therefore, your ability to release the dying person from this concern and give him or her assurance that it is all right to let go whenever he or she is ready is one of the greatest gifts you have to give your loved one at this time.

  http://www.hospicenet.org/html/preparing_for.html

• Not very known is the fact that a good number of the elderly or those with terminal cancer decide that they want to die and stop eating and drinking on their own by their own decision.%0D\ %0D\ When the person decides to die by not eating and not drinking, neither food nor water is given to the person by those in the nursing home, in the hospital, in hospice care, or in hospice care in their own home.%0D\ %0D\ It seems that many people in society do not know that this happens.%0D\ %0D\ My father at 84 in a nursing home decided he did not want to live, and he stopped eating and drinking, and he was dead in a week.%0D\ %0D\ My mother with terminal cancer in hospice care in her own apartment did the same thing and was dead in a week or less.

• Also, my grandfather in a nursing decided he wanted to die so he stopped eating and drinking, and nursing home staff allow the patients to do this.

• in a nursing home

• Oh yes, at Shady Pines we always tell the family the patient chose to stop eating and drinking. Mm hmmm, they chose it on their own.

• I once shot a man just to watch him die.\ \ Then I got distracted, and missed it.

  Jesse James, c/o Dave Foley

• There is a profound difference between motion and rest.

• R181, 186, 187, 188 and too many countless other posts to tally, I ma not not the one who cannot control myself with multiple posts, trying to take over this thread, hammering my point away again and again, until everyone gives yo the validation that you need.\ \ I suggest that you see a therapist as well. It''s been a wonderful help and I am trying to get over the experience I had when Dad died and wish that everyone could afford to do the same, if they need it.\ \ You are angry, controlling and abusive on this thread.

  181/135 and one other - only three

• My Mother who had a friend that work the Intensive Care Unit told her that a lot of times when patients have friends or family watching vigil, they would almost always die when the person or people left the room. Like they were waiting to be alone and not die in front of anyone. Of course the family would feel guilty for not being there but the nurse would reassure them it happens all the time. Any nurses have that experience?

• R192, you are much sicker and disturbed than you know. Now, go away.

• R174 here.... %0D\ %0D\ Yes she was going to die anyway, so it was necessary to keep her sedated, comfortable and not gasping for breath, making it less horrible for both her and her daughters.%0D\ %0D\ It was just the fact that I pretty much hastened her death by giving her those massive doses.%0D\ %0D\ Ultimately it was a kindness, I just had never done it before and it stressed the hell out of me....

  Yet another nurse......

• Thanks for the reply, R195. That makes me curious if that is a common practice - to extubate (which I assume means remove the breathing tube) and then to give large doses of morphine. Apparently, the large doses of morphine keeps one from gasping for breath?%0D\ %0D\ My mother did not have a breathing tube, for some reason - she had just the plastic device in her nose giving oxygen while receiving doses of oxygen - with metastacized cancer including cancer in the lungs

• meant to type: while receiving doses of morphine (not oxygen)

• A few other people mentioned the dying person "reaching out" for something, and I witnessed the same thing with my mother. She held both hands up in the air, like a little kid reaching to be picked up. Her eyes were open, but when I leaned over her bed, she looked right through me. Whoever she "saw" and was reaching to, wasn''t me. Then she put her arms down, closed her eyes, and very soon after, stopped breathing. There was no death rattle. No hysterics. It was like she just... left. Very calmly and quietly.\ \ My mother was not a religious person. In fact, she referred to Christmas as "the Jesus story" (and not in any kind of a devout way). So anyone who thinks she was reaching up to God, probably not. But my dad had died nine months before, and they were a very close couple. So my guess (hope) was that she was reaching up to him. But who knows.

• My dad died last summer. He had stage 4 leukemia and stage 4 pancreatic cancer. When he started turning yellow it was a sign that the cancer had entered his liver. He had a long, excruciating decline. The day before he died, we decided to hire a CNA because my mother and I were exhausted. The day he died, the CNA showed up, got him comfortable, cleaned him up. My mother and I had to run out and get new bedding because there was a lot of blood involved the day before. By this point, he was completely medicated. He refused morphine, and finally the hospice nurse said to give him the full dose. He can't fight you. So he was out. My mom and I came back from the store, and another nurse told us that his blood pressure was dropping and that his breathing was shutting down. We were gone for an hour. When we left his color was ghastly, when we got back it was gruesome. The nurse was monitoring his breathing. There was more time between each breath. She told us that he was going. Finally she said he's gone. My mother, who is not the emotional type got really weepy. I'd made my peace with him dying (as much as I could do). He made arrangements to be cremated. The cremation society came within 45 minutes to collect him. We managed to get him dressed. White shirt, off white summer cotton sweater, blue striped seersucker trousers, argyle socks and his favorite white bucks. He was going to a summer party in my mind. Then they took him away and that's the last time I saw him.

• My partner stopped eating and drinking the last week of his life. He would take a few sips of an Ensure, but that was it. His doctor had warned me earlier that cancer patients stop eating towards the end--they just have no appetite. When he died, he was literally skin and bone. I''m still haunted by those final weeks.\ \ The hospice nurse told me that almost all of her patients reach out and sometimes talk to an unseen presence in the room. Her theory was that people near death have glimpses of the other side even before they die. This "reaching out" is them communicating with loved ones who have already passed on. My partner said he had conversations with his deceased mother in the last 2 weeks of his life.

• R200, it''s interesting to hypothesize whether they are really seeing a truly existing ''other side'' or if they are conjuring up a fabricated non-existent ''other side'' from being ill and on morphine.

• I''m always upset when I hear that someone has an excruciating decline. There''s absolutely no reason that a patient shouldn''t receive all the pain meds they need. At hospice, our top priority is keeping the patients comfortable. Because of this, they frequently rally for a time after arriving, sometimes eating well for the first time in weeks. Being comfortable means that family can spend a bit of quality time with their loved ones.\ \ To the cynic who is repeatedly posting: Hearing is the very last sense we lose, so yes, it''s important that loved ones are present to help ease the dying on their way. Whether there''s an afterlife, or it''s just oblivion when we die, everyone deserves to have a humane death.

• Yes, R202, I can see that you have your definitive point of view and I would certainly not dispute it.%0D\ %0D\ I would think, though, that often very little, if any, talking goes on at one''s death bed from whoever is there. I just picture very little talking going on from relatives at many death beds.%0D\ %0D\ I''m not disputing you and the body of knowledge/experience which you hold dear from being a hospice worker.%0D\ %0D\ Everyone does die alone though. It is the ultimate fact of life that everyone dies alone - as no one is dying with you at your time.%0D\ %0D\ Also, people who die suddenly without warning while they are alone and people who are in fatal accidents all die alone.%0D\ %0D\ Still not disputing what you said and the body of knowledge which you hold dear, R202, so don''t get upset.

• R203, I think it distresses some of us that it apparently the idea of dying alone has such a hold on you.\ \ You are right, we all do die alone.\ \ Billy Joel once wrote a song about it. Sort of. Want to hear it? Here it go.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJBoHa3GArA

• [quote]Not very known is the fact that a good number of the elderly or those with terminal cancer decide that they want to die and stop eating and drinking on their own by their own decision.%0D\ %0D\ Wouldn''t that be a terribly painful way to go? I''m thinking of accounts of prisoners that have died while on hunger strikes. %0D\ %0D\ I can''t understand why we make death easier and less painful for family pets in the U.S. than we do for human beings. Not that I want any creature to suffer, but why is it OK to ''humanely destroy'' a terminally ill animal while people have to linger in agony for weeks?

• R132,R137,138,etc., is the sickest DLer I''ve met since MHB, and that''s saying something.

• R203-- you're projecting a bit. I don't hold this knowledge dear. Very strange choice of terms there. It's an opinion based on my personal experiences, as well as those of others. Working in a hospice facility is very different than working in a hospital or nursing home. Facilitating death is what we do-- making it go as smoothly as possible for the patient, and hopefully their family as well. We see quite a few deaths every month. Because we offer a high degree of one-on-one care, we become well acquainted with both the patients and their family members. Yes, everyone dies alone. More importantly, everyone does it their own way. But what a poster above mentioned is quite true: In most cases (not all, mind you), it's very helpful when the family is able to be there and let their loved one know that they will be alright when he/she passes, and if their loved one is ready to die, then that's okay. It's very true that many people wait for their family members to either leave the room (even briefly) or to fall asleep, and then they'll die. They may seem like they're in a come, but there's more going on there than we know. One of the great mysteries.

  R202

• R206, I will give you an example. My mother''s sister (my aunt) died at age 65, and my mother who lived to age 85 never mentioned her again.%0D\ %0D\ I never heard my mother even mention her name in 25 years.%0D\ %0D\ The thought of the dead sister may have infrequently entered my mother''s mind, but she certainly never brought the dead sister up in conversation or refered to her in any way for 25 years after the sister died.%0D\ %0D\ And my grandfather lost siblings, but he never mentioned them for a couple of decades, never mentioned them in conversation, and appeared to almost never think of them. My grandfather also never bothered to speak to them while they were alive.%0D\ %0D\ This is all I meant. %0D\ %0D\ And people who re-marry and are very happily remarried, often do not dwell upon their first spouse much at all whether lost by death or divorce.

• R205, good question you pose.%0D\ %0D\ My father and grandfather quit eating and basically drinking, although they had some sips of water. %0D\ %0D\ Each died in nursing homes within a week of ceasing eating. Neither had cancer - they were just elderly and decided they did not want to live anymore.%0D\ %0D\ I find it shocking too, but it seems to be quite common.%0D\ %0D\ To answer your question, though, I don''t think it is painful as they fall into a almost constant sleep or coma.%0D\ %0D\ My mother did not eat her last week of life due to metastacized cancer, and she was on morphine so that made it not painful for the most part.

• I've witnessed the deaths of my Mom, my Dad, and my best friend/cousin.%0D %0D My Dad had pancretic cancer and drifted into a coma. His breathing became slower and slower until he just stopped altogether. We spent a couple of minutes waiting for the next breath before we realized he was dead.%0D %0D My Mom was on life-support for 12 days and was disconnected. It took about an hour for her to die. She was still connected to the heart monitor so we got the alarm when her heart stopped. I'd forgotten about the machine so it scared the crap out of me. I watched her color change and was morbidly facinated. %0D %0D My cousin died after four years of breast/tumor/bone cancer. Her lungs collapsed. Her death was very violent and terrifying. There is nothing like watching someone who cannot breath. I never expected to be with her when she died as she had closer family members and a husband. Being with her was unexpected but I just felt I couldn't leave that night. Watching someone suffocate is horrible.%0D %0D My Mom and Dad were both unconcious when they died and I accepted their deaths for the most part. My cousin was awake and aware and I watched her eyes change from alive to dead. Her death will always haunt me.

• I watched my mother die. She was home on hospice with and had gone to sleep in her chair on a Friday and we had trouble waking her. By the time we moved her to a bed it took 3 of us to get her to the bed. She was "asleep" and basically unreachable for 6 days. During this time my sister and I never left her- her sister and my brothers all visited. When my brother was leaving- the last time he saw her alive- as he was going I said Mom, do you know who was here? She didn't open her eyes but out of the blue she said, Of course I do!! That was the last time she spoke. All the time she was out she couldn't wake but she was aware. If my sister or I got too upset she would fret- we promised in front of her that we would be okay, no more tears. A day before she died when it was only me with her I told her she didn't need to fight, we would all be okay, I would do the things she would do, take care of everyone for her- I would see to it. She died the next morning- I was out of the room when she started to go but we all quickly got to her beside and she lasted about 5 minutes more. There is really no way to describe the moment that her spark left her body- leaving just a shell. Her death was an awful moment but an extremely precious one to me and I am thankful that I was there with her. I don't know where Hospice nurses find the strength for the job they do but thank goodness for them.

• I saw somebody brain-die this morning. He''s probably been taken off life support by now

• My friend Andre had been sick the summer before he died with bronchitis that he couldn%E2%80%99t shake. In the fall it got so bad that he couldn%E2%80%99t breathe. He ended up in the hospital on a ventilator for about a week. He got well enough to be off the ventilator but still had to remain in the hospital. His doctors could not figure out what was wrong with him and thought he had pneumonia. Andre was a drag performer and while recuperating in his hospital room, had a sewing machine brought in to sew costumes. The doctors were still puzzled as to what was wrong with him. Finally after about another week in his hospital room another friend and I asked a nurse if they had tested him for HIV by chance. The nurse told us she couldn%E2%80%99t disclose that because of regulations. When we went back the next day to visit Andre, I noticed he was hooked up to an IV of the drug Bactrim. Bactrim is a drug that is administered to HIV-positive people with pneumocystis pneumonia, as opposed to pneumococcal pneumonia that not HIV-positive people come down with. Andre saw me looking at the name on the IV bag, our eyes met and I knew he knew that I knew. It was mind boggling that he%E2%80%99d been in the hospital three weeks now, sewn dresses in his room, had many flamboyant visitors, and the hospital had not tested for HIV. Andre requested that I help him with his healthcare and become power of attorney in the event that he was not able to take care of his own needs. A few days later he was back on a ventilator and pretty much in a coma. About four days later on a Saturday his Dr. contacted me and told me there was nothing more that they could do for him. The doctor said that as the best case scenario, even if he came off the ventilator he would possibly have brain damage from lack of oxygen, if he could even live off of the ventilator. The doctor suggested we turn off all support. I conferred with his mother and we decided that we should indeed turn off the support. The nurse asked us to stay outside of his room while she removed the ventilator and administered morphine %E2%80%9C for his comfort%E2%80%9D. He didn%E2%80%99t last long after removal of the ventilator, by the time we got back in the room, a matter 30 seconds, he was gone. My friend and I looked at Andres face and both noticed a tear streaming down his right eye. I am certain that even though he was comatose he understood what happened. Another odd thing, it was late October and minutes after he passed it started snowing outside for just a few minutes.

• t

• "There's absolutely no reason that a patient shouldn't receive all the pain meds they need." Absolutely true, r202. But I've known a few people (cranky old men including my father) who absolutely refuse to cooperate with treatment. My dad was always like that. If he complained about a headache, I'd ask if he'd taken an aspirin. No. Why not? I don't believe in taking drugs. We had outstanding care from home hospice nurses. They adored him, but even they were getting frustrated with his refusal to listen to them. Everything he was supposed to do, he'd respond to with NO. Their patience with him was extraordinary. But it was his choice to be a pain in the ass. The last two days of his life were gruesome. It wasn't his choice to die a gruesome death, but it was his choices which led to it. He was in great pain, but refused to take morphine. Finally one of the nurses said, he's not in control here any longer. Give him the full dose - he's in no condition to fight you. The day he died, a cousin called to offer condolences. He put up a good fight, she said. Yes, and all he did was fight us. So in my experience, the resources for quality of life were there, but my father just said no because he was always a pill.

• I wonder what the psychological malady is behind men who refuse all medication all during the decades of their lives - %0D\ %0D\ they will not even take aspirin or ibuprofen for aches and pains.%0D\ %0D\ Anyone hazard a guess on what the psychology behind that is?

• Actually, everyone around you is dying, some just a bit faster than others...

• R215 and R216-- I''ve seen women do it as well, and you''re right, their deaths can be awful. Once pain reaches a certain point, it''s incredibly hard to get ahead of it with the pain meds.\ \ Some folks are just contrary. They''ve been that way their whole lives. Others that I''ve seen don''t take the meds because to do so would be admitting defeat.

• \ I remember the look on my fathers face just moments before he died. It was the look of complete and utter shock..Even though he had been very sick for months I believe his death came as an absolute surprise to him. Smothering him with that pillow was the best decision I ever made.

  Mr Chiffon LaMay

• Yes, it was like something separated from the body. I didn't "see" the spirit, just the fact that there was such a strong separation from the body. The body had an immediate reaction, and took about 10 minutes to slow down and the breathing stop.

• "There was "like" something leaving"? No, there was something leaving. Unless you wouldn't say life is something.

• Was in the room when my father took his last breath on August 9, 2012. he was in hospice and was non-responsive for the last 36 hours of his life. Can't say I felt something (spirit) leave, but it is an image I will never forget.

• A minister acquaintance was visiting an ill parishioner who happened to pass away while he was there; the guy wasn't in great shape but not quite expected to go so soon so uit wasn't a "deathbed scene" specifically. He said he cannot put in in words exactly, but he sensed the energy shifting.

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  tubbi

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  therapist

• I remember stress filled days leading up to my Mom's passing. Seeing pain on her face in the final days, and it seemed like a blur to me now, but very near the end, her face looked calmer and I felt a calm come over me. When the vitals stopped, I know she was gone and there was no place I would have rather been. Odd to say it was a beautiful experience. Afterwards, it was just a body. My sister had gone "brain dead" and we had to make the decision to shut off life support. It seemed to me that while she was on life support, she had that "just a body" look and there was no transition when the vitals stopped.

• I watched my dad die.

• It was on Market Street in the Castro near Peets Coffee. I noticed a man, dressed up for work, who seemed to be looking for something under his front steps. He appeared to be kneeling on the third step, with his hands on the first step, and his head tucked under as though looking underneath. I was about 50 feet away but the reality changed as I walked toward him. I realized he wasn't moving at all. He seemed to be frozen in that position. By the time I reached him, I knew he was dead. I went to a couple of shops to report it, asking them to phone 911 (before cell phones). No one would. Finally someone in Peets came out and did it. I OD'd a terminal friend on morphine. "When they get to this point, it's okay to give them a little more than usual," the nurse said the night she dropped off the bottle.

• When my cat was put down, I was in the room, and she was in my arms. I watched the light fade from her bright green eyes, and I can say that I for sure won't ever forget that moment.

  Benny Boy

• My mom. It was intense and very sad and haunts me to this day. That awful death rattle was a presence in the room for hours and hours leading up to her death. She had one eye closed and one eye open staring blankly at the ceiling. There was a little blood coming out of her nose as she was very low on platelets. My mom and I were always very close. Many people---my friends, friends of my mom, my siblings-- all told me that I needed to tell my mom to let go otherwise she would continue to hold on for me. I did ask her to let go once she was moved to hospice but not once did I truly mean it. It was not until a few seconds before she finally died, that I begged her to let go and meant it. It was horrible to see her in that state. And in only a few seconds, the death rattle stopped and I knew that she was dead. She had been talking to her sister for days leading up to her death. My aunt died of liver cancer 11 years before. Also, she only spoke in Spanish, her native language. It was such an eerie, bizarre time and one that has completely changed who I am and how I look at existence.

• This is not the PETA boards, r229. But thanks for playing.

• Just a few times, sadly; but I do look forward to my upcoming opportunity with George H. W.

  %22Pancakes%22%20Barbara%20Bush

• I feel for you r230, I truly do. I was there for both of my parents at the end, and before that two close friends. You will never be the same, but you now have a much deeper understanding of life. Don't let it immobilize you. Go out and live.

• That happened with us, r202/207. My aunt, a wonderful woman, died much too young in her early 50s. Family and friends had all but moved into the waiting room on her floor for a week. And at night, her daughter, her fiancee, and/or her ex-husband were there, sleeping. That week, she wasn't alone in her room a single moment. In the hours leading up to her death, the day before, we sat there in rotations, silently and in the dark — so she would have no stimuli, no reason to wake up if the drugs weren't strong enough. And we watched her every labored breath with unbelievable suspense. (Was that the last one? No. Okay ... Was that the last one?) She died that night while everyone was asleep. I wondered if it was her choice, or if the nurse slipped in and upped the morphine while everyone was asleep. I wonder if they do that a lot, as a secret kindness. Either way, I had prayed that it would be as peaceful and non-traumatic for my cousin as it could be. The next morning, I was one of a few people left to see her body and say goodbye. It is a remarkable thing -- to see the body of someone you love, without them being there. I do believe we each have a soul. Not for any logical reason. It's an innate feeling. I miss my aunt very much. I don't know if I will ever get over the tragedy of her death at such a young age.

• My dad was a minister and he saw quite a few people die, but the one he always talked about was Baby Tommy. Tommy was sick from birth. He was probably just under two when he died. The night he died, both my parents were with he and his mother. Sadly, his father was on the road working. My parents say right before he died it seemed all the pain and sickness left him. They both said it sounded cliche, but they said he looked like a little angel. (And my mother is not sentimental like that) He looked so peaceful and they both felt guilty because they were happy for him that he finally out of pain. Of course, they didn't say that to the mother. I went to his funeral and I hadn't been to that many funerals, but I think I can safely say that a baby's funeral is one of the saddest things ever. Years later when we THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON... SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! . . . . . . . . . . . When Benjamin finally dies as a baby, it really tore both of my parents up because they said it immediately reminded them of Baby Tommy.

• I think we need, as a society, to change our perceptions of death. It is natural and has been going on for millions of years. It's not a "bad" thing.

• R229, completely know what you're talking about. The light does go out of their eyes and you can very much see the difference.

• r34 - i disagree wholeheartedly.

  d.%20owens

• Just yesterday 5/3/13 my grandpa passed away a few hours after I left his apartment. He seemed so alert, much more than when he first came home from the hospital after his stroke. He was alot more responsive than normal and recognized people better. I wasnt there when he took his final breath but my step mom, his wife( my great grandma), my cousin, aunt, and grandma were. They said he woke up from his sleep and started breathing as if he was choking but there was nothing constricting his airways; so my step mom looked into his eyes with her flashlight iphone at and she said his eyes were glazed over and dialated. He continued to breathe heavily and non rhythmically untill he took his last breathe, and they knew he was gone. They are still today telling this story(only a day later) and each time they do they dont explain anything heavenly or spiritual like. But ya never know r.i.p grandpa ;/

• We were on a trip with local seniors. We entered a gift shop after bird watching at a local beach. It was the third in our trip to four beaches to watch the wildlife. There was my Aunt Myself and my Uncle from my family. My Aunt never purchased anting of value with out our approval,so she had found a georgous pair of ear rings and shown them to me and I preceded to get my Uncle for his approval. He approached from her right side a asked 'Yes love what have you found.' She held them up for approval but as she did he slipped to the floor. She said his name no response. Then someone went to assist him Aunt said 'He went peacefully and happy as he wanted please let him have dignity now and she bent down kissed him for last time and he was gone. This was and forever will be the most peaceful passing I will ever witness. During this time the fest of the seniors formed a ring with their backs to my uncle to keep gawkers away extremely respectful. Out of respect for this the store owner asked all to please stay but outside. My Aunt cradled his head and the only time in 83 years I saw tears fall from her face onto his as if her love for him was flowing out her eyes onto his face. Parameds came she said please let him be it is as he would want they agreed. I was going to buy the earnings for her to have as keepsake store manager said please my smallest of cotrbutions to this woman is for you to please take the for her I did. She has them and the bow tie which he was never without in a special box for when her time arrives. My Aunt GOD bless her has now passed and as sh lies the she holds the box that I call her love of my Uncle box in her hands. Now they can Rome the vastness of heaven together...

  loved%20nephew

• A friend who had been hospitalized for eight months. Continuing to get infections she asked the doctor to let her go. I was there they injected something into the line. We talked for a while. She closed her eyes. I held her hand until she flat-lined four hours later.