Pierre passed away on April 2nd, 2019. He died like he always lived – by his own will. When he was first diagnosed with lung cancer, he expressed his intentions to forgo chemo-therapy, surgery and radiation. He didn’t want to exchange one sickness for another. But sickness came nonetheless and in the end, in constant respiratory distress, he refused supplementary oxygen. Amid the warm hug of morphine, he peacefully suffocated. As he took his last barely audible breath, we could almost hear him say:
-I had One Life to live and I have no regrets.
My mother and I were present by his side for merely five minutes – even the nurses had been surprised at how fast he had declined. Between sobs, I reassured him: “We understand and respect your choice.” Holding his limp hand in mine, with my mother’s head over his chest, we both told him how much we loved him.
I’ll always remember the moment his One Life left him. It is the most tragic of magic to witness how something so ethereal as a Life – as a Soul – can be so noticeable when it goes…
With his diagnostic, he knew that his end was near. All he asked was to live a few more months in peace with my mother. For Pierre didn’t fear death. What he most feared was to be disabled, to lose his dignity, to be a burden on my mother, dependent on her for his basic needs. Arguably, he had increasingly relied on her for the entirety of their relationship, ever since he lost an important share of his eyesight in January 1996. Still, autonomy comes in various degrees and he warned us – quite forcefully – that he’d depart this world when his body would finally fail him.
– What’s the point to live when there is no quality of life?, he’d ask rhetorically.
For two years, he kept his mobility – now motorized – and peacefully co-existed with his cancer. He did less and less, went to bed earlier, but still led life to the fullest of his capacity. He spent both winters in his condo in Florida. Pragmatic, I enquired about his health insurance. Pierre pointed that: “One can’t get insurance when their house is already on fire!” Touché. Anyway, he could afford a trip to the emergency room or even a private plane to bring him home.
Throughout his decline, he maintained a brave face and an unwavering strength – what mattered most was to live as with as much resolve as ever! He settled his affairs. I wrote this book. He shared with me: “I never thought that I’d so successful, so fulfilled.” By questioning him, I discovered how he became the man I met almost twenty-five ago. In his answers, I could hear how much I tested him over the years. Quickly, my writing revealed how profoundly my fate had always been interwoven with his.
Only in the last month of his life was his respiratory distress such that he couldn’t function normally. Still, he lived with complete acceptance of his eventual demise. He wanted us to be stoic him. He wanted us to behave as if he wasn’t dying – not in denial of reality but total acceptance of it. Pierre wanted us to celebrate his life instead of despairing! For my mother, this request was the hardest to accept – she wanted to cry in her husband’s arms, to be comforted by his touch. Even if she genuinely supported his decisions to die as pain-free as possible, she hated to see him disintegrate before her eyes.
When I could be alone with Pierre, I sometimes scolded him to be so stiff with my mom. I reminded him:
– It’s not because we do not like to talk about feelings that we do not have them! We talk about our emotions not because they can solve anything but simply to feel close.
We experienced an intimacy we rarely shared before. Even in his matter-of-factness, in all his rationality and meticulous planning of his estate, I obviously knew that my mother was the love of his life, his joy and jewel. Everyone could plainly see their devotion to each other! She had given her life to him and thus, waves of sadness were bound to wash over her. But all he could muster to say was:
– I had One Amazing Life!
In his gaze, we discerned the unspoken: “It was amazing because you shared it with me!” He really was a man of a few words.
Eventually, the day came when he felt himself becoming a burden. My mother, now his nurse as well as his wife, called me to tell me how both of them could no longer sleep. He had fallen and broken his nose, which further hampered his breathing. He couldn’t walk to the washroom on his own. He was losing his grip on reality and slurred his speech. Because he always led the way, made decisions and demanded them to be respected, it was hard for my mother to convince him that he needed to be in a hospital. He was always a stubborn man but now, his lung capacity was so low that he was asphyxiated. He could no longer think.
Since our last major conflict, my relationship with Pierre had evolved to the point where he trusted my judgement like his own. Thus in his last day, I was to be his mirror, his pillar, the voice of his conscience.
I arrived by his side on Monday night. At first sight, I felt horrified – with my fresh eyes I could see him already in the process of dying. I tried to relieve my mother from her nursing duties for a night but he preferred her. Still at home the next morning, he finally sleep while I held his hand and read Aristotle’s Ethics.
The home-care palliative nurse arrived at 11am. I translated her concerns in clear terms: “Yes, he should go to the hospital”, though one could see in her hesitation that she was concerned with Pierre’s consent.
He was reluctant. I deciphered in his grunts and one word answers that he didn’t want any more tests, just to talk to his doctor. I could hear him wonder: “Is it time already?” My intuition was clear: he needed his doctor’ reassurance that indeed, it only went downhill from here. We do not know if his doctor visited him that last night, precipitating his choice to refuse oxygen. Either way, he died in peace.
In the aftermath of someone’s demise, it is tempting to be revisionist of their lives. As friends and family warmly hug my mother or me, they exclaim: “Pierre was such a good man!” My sole reply is to embrace them tighter. He certainly was a loving, generous, most of the time patient person. But he was also rough and demanding. He was often silent when he should have spoken from the heart. Yet in his actions and choices, he was transparent. If I had the strength to be honest, I’d answer: “Pierre was more great than good.” He was as complex as a man can be.
Pierre was an epic hero – a nobleman of a bygone era – and yet, the modern antihero of my own life. Just like Odysseus, he ruled and vanquished. He navigated the challenges of his time with his wit and sheer strength of will. Since he spent everyday of his life self-actualizing – simultaneously being and becoming increasingly more himself – his life exemplifies the most complete paradoxes of humanity…
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