Love Is Watching Someone Die*
Part I The Picture
Introductory Sound Effects:
Gurney wheels sounding a rhythmic ‘whack whack whack’. The sound of the wheels stop, a sharp slap of a hand on a metal plate. Slowly electric doors open to the hospice. A few seconds of silence followed by the repeating ‘whack whack whack’ of the wheels much slower and muffled. The doors close with a soft thud.
Mark: speaking to the orderly: “It’s very silent. Not like it was upstairs”
Orderly: speaking in hushed tones “I come here and it’s like this isn’t the hospital. Like it’s somewhere else, y’know what I’m saying?”
Mark: much softer “I know peaceful (beat as he takes it in) “Without all the machines beeping, staff moving quickly, and the families laughing talking. It feels…”
Orderly: “I know. Upstairs is for people who’ve got things to do. In hospice you become quiet, like you know where you are. You get it.”
Snippets of muted conversations.
“Dad seems so out of it. What happening?”
“Will we know when mom is going to ?”
“We are here to make your mother comfortable free from pain.
“Room 34B has not had a visitor today can someone request a volunteer to read to Mrs. Jenny?”
Mark “Do you frequently bring patients here? (Beat as he thinks this through) It must make you sad?”
Orderly: “Once or twice a week, maybe. It’s not what I thought a hospice would be. I always thought that would make me run, y’know? Like where people are dying. This kinda seems like a rest stop. A place of peace before... Just keeps me from, you know, (almost a whisper) hospice.”
Narrator voice over: “Hospice never feels like a safe harbor for hope. There is hope in hospice. Hope is not the magic of compounds, machines, or science. Hope in hospice is the beating hearts of those who care for the dying and the loved ones standing vigil. It is simple at diagnosis you find hope in medicine delivered by people. In hospice you find hope in people managing death.”
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Part 2: Caregiver to Loved One
Voice Mail Message: “Donna you have terminal cancer and six months to live. Please call me.”
Narrator voice over: “That was the day I started to grieve. We knew this story would have no happy ending. Donna gave me her disease so she could live her life on her terms. My caregiving gave her time free of burden.
Caregiving replaced my grief with purpose, meaning, and a role.
Caregiving is crushing. Each task whispers the truth.
Caregiving is comforting. Each caregiving task connects us to every moment of our 27 years.
Mark: “Donna we’re going to be late for the CT scan.”
Donna: “Stop being annoyingly OCD. So what if I miss a scan I’m the terminal one not you. We’ll grab a cab.”
Mark: “I’m just trying to keep things moving. The scan will tell us how the treatment is working.”
Donna: “Shut up. I know the science and medicine. Just get a cab.”
Sounds of cars, horns, city noise.
Mark: “Stand on the curb while I get a cab.”
Donna: “I’m not a cripple yet. Stop treating me like one get a fucking cab.”
More street noise
Donna: “There that one see. Get it.”
Mark: “Stop pushing me. Are you trying to get me run over?”
Donna: “Got it didn't we and we wont be late. (A little laugh) So there.”
Narrators voice over: “The ivy tendrils of caregiving that held us together for three and half years fell on the other side of the hospice doors. Caregiving slowly molted away replaced by the familiar rhythm of a loved one. Before the voice mail we would drive to Maine. Sit in tender silence like starlings on telephone line feeling the wind from open windows waiting to lift and fly. In hospice it was the same, without wind.”
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Part 3 The Take Away
Narrators voiceover: “You cannot reason with death.”
Mark speaking with the Hospice Social Worker: “You know what I see in the mirror? A goddamn zombie. (A beat and speaking softly) CS Lewis, said that when people look at him they must know that one of them will look and feel like him one day. Or me.”
Mark: “My brain is shouting ‘You’re a failure.” Soft sigh
Social Worker: “Mark, you took the responsibility of Donna’s cancer and paid a price. Caregiving is a jigsaw puzzle with no box we blindly assemble. (A beat) We are not rewarded with a rainbow sunset happily ever after picture. Caregiving robs us of being loved ones.”
Mark: “Was I selfish wanting caregiving to be my meaning and purpose? In the end here at death the full spectrum of love is lost in her drug induced surrender and my fear?”
Social Worker: “Love is not lost. Hospice returns you and Donna to the state of being loved ones not caregiver and cared for. Our work our purpose is not only for Donna’s peaceful passing but, for your healing. Say, help. Scream help. Let us help so you can love Donna now freely with out the burden of caregiving.”
Narrator: “Hospice wants our memories of a loved one to flourish after death. After her death brightly colored ribbons were loosened on the gift of memories as a loved one and one who loved.”
Donna’s death and her memories are the gifts we’ve given each other because of hospice.
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*”What Sarah Said” By Death Cab For Cutie