Finding Beauty in Death

My husband suffered– while he lay dieing of pancreatic cancer.

For the last three months of Michael’s life, his back pain grew exponentially every day. For most of that time, we didn’t know cancer was ravaging his body.

Once it was determined Michael had adenocarcinoma and only days left to live, his pain intensified to such a degree that we kept him sedated.

During those last few days, there were no more two sided conversations. He was no longer able to acknowledge me when I cried or told him I loved him or when I told him how much I would miss him.

His hospital room stayed quiet most of the time. Few nurses entered, and they only came when called. His vitals were no longer needed. Visitors had stopped coming. Only the people closest to him kept vigil.  He no longer spoke or opened his eyes.

In those last days, I rarely let go of Michael’s hand. I knew as long as it felt warm, he was still with me. But I longed for him to not only be by my side but for him to be present.

I became desperate to find a way to make what little time we had left beautiful.

Then the answer came to me. Music. Michael loved music.

For the last few months, Michael spent more hours with headphones in than I had probably spent in my entire life. Music calmed him, helped him tolerate the pain. It allowed him the space to hold on to the small piece of himself that remained a healthy man.

So I searched for our song, and when I found it, I turned up the volume.

At the first note, with his eyes still closed, Michael smiled, not just a little twitch at the corners of his mouth, but a full toothy grin. He bobbed his head to the beat of Brother Iz’s song, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”. I cried while I caressed the back of his hand.

This was our wedding song, and the lyrics wrapped up our life and what was coming for Michael.

We had lived a life full of seeing “red roses”. We were the “friends shaking hands”. And soon he would fly “over the rainbow”.

But for one more day, Death waited outside Michael’s doorway.

As the song ended, my husband raised his hand and motioned for me to come closer. He opened his eyes. They were still bright blue and still full of so much life. His gaze drew me into his heart. He cupped my cheek and pulled me to him. His lips were gentle and weak. We shared one last kiss as husband and wife.

My Michael’s final moment of lucidity and strength was spent reminding me of the power of our love.

We didn’t have any control over his cancer, but we were able to go back in time to the day we bound our hearts and celebrated the future we had planned.

Death only gave us a quarter of that time, but when you share a life so rich in love, you become grateful for every last moment you are given.

My Metamorphosis due to the Death of my Husband

My husband died. Yes, my loving husband whom I only knew for thirteen years is gone. I can’t string words together to create sentences or even phrases that can amply describe the sadness I feel, even as a writer, there are no earthly words that can capture my grief. All I know is his death has changed me, and it has changed my writing.

Michael became ill in mid-May of 2014. At the time, we didn’t know what was really going on. He was experiencing back pain that steadily got worse. Much to our detriment, we trusted our family doctor. He told us time and time again the pain was nothing to worry about, and Michael would be fine. He was wrong to the worst degree. My husband ended up at Beth Israel in Boston two months later where we were told Michael had pancreatic cancer eight days before he died.

Through all of Michael’s sickness, his hospital visits and stays, his home-bed-ridden days, his tests, and the vials and vials of blood drawn from his body, I stopped writing.

In the hospital, Michael told me to make sure I didn’t stop. I said, “I can’t right now, but don’t worry, it’s percolating” and then I laughed because he frequently used this as an excuse when I caught him playing on his iPad during work hours. My story was in fact brewing, and I now understood that he wasn’t playing hooky.

The moment I had left off in the novel, I had to decide if a main character was going to die.

It’s been two months and a week since my beloved died, and I’ve returned to the opening of the book because I’m not the same person, and I know my writing has changed. While reading chapter one, I was hit with how superficial the novel is. It needs meaning behind the actions and I need to add layers and layers. The page once lived contently as a two dimensional space, but now I can see the possibility of an infinite amount of dimensions, and it’s my job to put words inside those worlds. I don’t know if I’m up for the task yet, but at least now I can see the empty space where as before I didn’t even know it existed.

Just like my real life, I have to find something to fill the emptiness. There has to be more to this world I’ve created than just the words I’ve used to express it. Something lurks beneath my sadness, something greater than my grief, and I think when I search with a bright enough light, I’ll find out just what that is.