A Lesson in Death
She woke me the next morning with a knock on the door telling me I had time for a shower and breakfast before we left. I quickly showered, dressed and went downstairs. She introduced me to her brother and son. Her brother watched her parents while she was at work and her son was in school.
Her brother had the looks that the rest of her family had; red hair, long and lanky. Her son was blond and at thirteen, and nearly six feet tall, looked well on his way to basketball player height. Neither of them looked surprised to have an overnight guest. I guessed that Kelly brought home strays on a regular basis.
After a breakfast of hotcakes and sausage, we climbed in her car and started the day. She was dressed very differently from the night before. She had on acid green cargo pants and a scrub top with bright crayons on it. The effect was cheerful but a little painful to the eyes.
She explained that she had five patients to see, all very close to death. The first was a man in his eighties who had severe kidney disease. He was still up and walking with a cane and answered the door himself. She greeted him with a hug and a kiss on the cheek. She introduced me as a rider interested in hospice care. He seemed to accept the story she gave. She did a quick examination of him then they sat and talked for almost an hour. Most of what they talked about wasn't about death. He told her stories of his time in the Army, she told him stories of her time in the Air Force. They traded jokes. When she asked him if his funeral arrangements were ready, I stiffened. He told her that he was still looking for some pictures but the band was booked. He said that he wished he could be there for the party but he'd made sure that everyone would have a good time.
I left the house dazed. She explained that when he was admitted, he had been depressed to the point of suicide. It had taken her four months of working with him to get him to look at his death differently. He still had days when he felt sorry for himself but he knew that he could call on her to come over and cry with him. After letting out his fears, he usually felt much better. The band at his funeral was his own idea. He had been famous for his parties before he got sick and he wanted to go out with a bang. She had already planned to be at the party and invited me to go. I wasn't sure that I would be welcome but she assured me that her wouldn't mind a party crasher. He believed the more, the merrier. She promised that it would be a great party.
The next patient was a stately woman with a bearing that would have outclassed the Queen of England. Kelly treated this woman entirely differently than her first patient. She exuded a calm dignity and caring attitude that Ororo often had. The questions she asked this patient were the same ones that she asked the first one but delivered entirely differently. It was like she was a different person. The woman evidently had a tumor in her stomach and had refused treatment. She sat there, quietly crying, and asked Kelly how the end would come. Kelly told her that one day she would begin to vomit blood and she would die soon after. She cautioned her to call as soon as it started and not wait for her daughter to call when she got there. She got up and hugged the woman and said that God would protect her. It was the first time I heard Kelly say something I expected from a hospice nurse.
The next patient was a woman who lived in a seedy part of town. She was dying from lung cancer. There was a cluster of roughs on the corner that made me concerned for Kelly's safety. She told me not to worry about the gang. They knew she was a nurse and she had told them the first time she came that if anything happened, she knew most of the ER nurses in the city. She could get back at them when they were lying in the emergency room and were in no position to stop her. The threat evidently worked. None of the punks bothered her. Most looked afraid of her.
The woman we were here to visit was confined to bed, her husband hovering over her. Kelly did something I didn't expect. She removed her shoes and climbed into bed with the woman. Cuddling the woman close, she began to sing softly. The husband handed a bottle to Kelly and she drew a dose into the dropper and gave it to the woman. Continuing to sing, she rocked the woman until she began to relax. She sang and stroked the wiry hair until she fell asleep.
Kelly stayed in the bed with her arms wrapped around her patient while she questioned the woman's husband. She asked a lot of the same questions that she had asked the others but concentrated on pain. The woman's husband was reluctant to give the massive doses of pain killers that had been ordered for her. Kelly told him that relieving the pain was the most important part of her care. If the pain could be controlled, the woman would be happier and more alert. He said that he understood but he still had problems with the dose. Kelly assured him that she may become dependent to the drugs but she wouldn't become addicted. She urged him to give small doses frequently to control the pain and to allow her more quality time with her family.
I questioned that later. Kelly told me that the woman was prescribed Methadone for pain. They had found that Methadone was more effective than morphine in controlling end of life pain. The reason the used Methadone was that heroin couldn't be legally prescribed, even if Methadone was ineffective. She told me that if she could get away with it, several of her patients would be on heroin.
I have to admit I was shocked. She explained that the comfort was the name of the game in hospice. If massive doses of pain killers were needed, they were prescribed. Most of the time, the doctor in charge allowed the nurses to use their judgment and experience in regard to the dose. She had never been refused an increase in dosage, even it was usually a lethal dose. If you increase the dose slowly, there is no such thing as a lethal dose. She'd been doing this for a long time. The large amounts of narcotics may have shortened the life of some of her patients but they died comfortable. It was then that the call came that truly changed the way I think about death.
The patent was young, around twenty-five. She had been diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor during her pregnancy and delayed treatment until after she had given birth to the prettiest baby girl I had ever seen. The woman was thin but I could see the beauty she once was. She had lost consciousness only about an hour before we arrived. Her husband was stressed to the point of uselessness. Kelly asked me to see to the baby while she saw the mother.
Now, I'm not totally helpless when it comes to babies but the only thing I could think of was that this beautiful little girl would never know her mother. I changed the diaper with shaking hands and grabbed a bottle from the ice box. I returned to the room just in time to witness the woman's last breath. Her husband collapsed in grief and Kelly followed him down, gathering him in her arms to grieve with him. I stood there, stunned, feeding the baby. My mind shut down. I could only watch as the family shattered.
Kelly held him, cooing, not really saying anything, just making noises. What could she say? At a time like that, there were no words that could give any kind of comfort. They stayed like that for a long time. Slowly, she got up from the flood and helped the man up. She took the baby from my arms and handed her to her father. Guiding him to a chair, she sat him down. He pulled the sleeping child close and wept.
I followed Kelly out of the room and watched as she made calls to the families of the woman and her husband. She sat down at the kitchen table and pulled out some papers from the binder she had carried in. The scent of her grief was sharp in my nose. I went to place my hands on her shoulders to comfort her but she stopped me.
"Don't touch me, Logan. If you do, I'll lose it. I have to do this now. I can fall apart later."
By the time she had finished her paperwork and called the funeral home, the rest of the family had arrived. I don't know if you are familiar with how Hispanic families handle death but it isn't pretty. The women were wailing in grief, the men stoically silent. Kelly comforted everyone. They all passed through the room that held the body. Most of the women collapsed in tears and were lead out by their stone faced men. The baby was passed around the room at least twice. By the time she came back to us, she was soaking wet with the tears of her loved ones. I took her to the nursery, changed her clothes and diaper and put her down for a nap.
Looking down on that angelic face, I realized what Kelly had been trying to pound into my head. This is what it's all about. The beginning of life and the end of life. They are the most important events of your life but they happen alone. Having a loving family around for both events makes them easier. Having someone like Kelly around can make them beautiful. Having someone around to welcome you into the world and someone there to comfort you as you go out is what makes life worth living.
We left the house after the body had been removed. The family remained to comfort the husband and child. Kelly and I stood beside the car lost in thought.
"Now?" I whispered. She nodded. I gathered her close and she began to sob. "Do you do this every time you lose a patient." She nodded again. "How can you stand it. I would be a wreck." She pulled back and looked at me with watery eyes.
"I think about the beauty in their lives. No one dies without leaving their mark on the world. A lot of the time they have long, eventful lives. She didn't. But she did contribute a beautiful little girl and a wealth of love to her family. Her life wasn't without meaning."
She dropped her head onto my shoulder. "Love makes life worth living." I couldn't argue with that.
We sat in the coffee shop of my hotel drinking coffee. She said that she really didn't want coffee but she needed time to settle down before she saw her last patient. There was a message waiting for me at the front desk. Chuck wanted me home for a mission. I didn't want to leave.
She asked me if I'd learned anything. Loaded question. I learned that with all of the deaths I've seen and all of them I have had to deal out, I knew very little about death. I knew even less about life.
"Everyone will die, Logan," she told me. "Even you." My head snapped up at that.
"Thank the other X-Men for me. You are good to sacrifice yourselves to protect us from each other."
"You knew?"
"From the beginning."
"Most people won't even walk on the same sidewalk with a mutant."
"I'm not most people." I couldn't agree more.
She got up and dropped a five on the table. "I'm going to leave you here. I suspect you're needed at home and I have another patient to see. Just remember this: Family is who and what we make it. Don't be afraid to tell them you care. Don't be afraid to love. Don't be afraid to die. And don't be afraid to live life the way you want to. You don't get a chance to redo yesterday." And with that, the strongest woman I have ever met walked out of the door and out of my life.
I've thought long and hard about what Kelly taught me. She was right. A lot of things happen between birth and death and if you have love, anything is possible. Death isn't an enemy. It's the end of a long journey no matter how is happens. The trick is making the journey as meaningful as possible. I started to tell the people closest to me that I cared. The change was dramatic. I began to feel more comfortable around people. I accepted that I love Jubilee, maybe not like she wants me to but I admitted to her that she was the most important person in my life. I felt more comfortable in crowds. Oh, I'll never willingly go into a crowded building but I no longer felt trapped when I had to deal with large crowds. The most dramatic improvement was with the nightmares I've been having for as long as I can remember. They became less threatening. The memories of the pain still scared the bejebies out of me but I didn't feel afraid that I would die.
Chuck was curious about the turn around in my attitude and I told him about Kelly. He wants to invite her to the mansion to talk to the rest of the team but she has refused so far. She'll come eventually. I have a very good nose and her son smelled like a mutant. Sooner or later, she'll ask for help controlling his powers. I'll keep in touch with her and when she's ready, I'll be there. It's the least I can do.