in these arms

In all the years I have been on this earth I have seen more than my share of corpses. Even as a child I remember seeing dead bodies at funerals. I'm almost incredulous when my middle age friends tell me they're enduring their first loss.

But in all those years I have never been present when someone actually dies.

Not until yesterday.

A short time after I wrote the last blog I went back in to check on Tad. He had told me he wanted to stay in bed - a notion that frightened me a bit since we both knew it was a sign of his body slowing down. At my prodding he ate a full breakfast then took all his morning meds. Truth be told he and I agreed to slip him a few extra meds beyond the hospice agreement - some antibiotics just in case he got an infection.

He told me he was going to stay in the bedroom because he was feeling "icky". When I asked for more details he said he had new pains in his limbs -which didn't surprise me- but also he felt nauseous and had a headache. He said he didn't feel good. His words were more garbled than they had been an hour earlier. This frightened him.  I grabbed a bowl for him to throw up but he didn't - he said he couldn't. He had been sweating more that night than previously so I found a washcloth and tried to soothe his agitation by bathing him gently and holding his hand.

He told me, "If I'm going to feel like this I can't keep going. I want this to end."

I looked him in the eye and named it more explicitly: "You mean you are ready to die?"

When he said yes I assured him he had all my support. For months now he has been concerned that he will let his family down by dying.

The new symptoms frightened me. The pains in the arms were edemas caused by broken blood vessels much like the new blood clot on his tongue. But the headaches and nausea only made me think of a burst vein in his brain. His speech began to get more slurred - and he told me so.

"Something's wrong. I can't do this." He was crying, flailing and asking for help.

I called the hospice nurse who came immediately and assessed the situation. She stood by lovingly and told me that this was just part of the process.

I felt my Mother Lion come up and wanted to scream at her: "Do something!! Make this stop!!" But I didn't. I lied down next to Tad.

Later our friend Carl who I had texted to come to the house quickly told me that - while I was conferring with the nurse in the living room Tad --despite all of the heaving, the nausea, the unbearable pain, the difficulty speaking-- looked at him and with gestures and words said: "I (pointing to his chest) am OK (making the OK gesture with his fingers) to die (moving his hand across his adam's apple). How is Greg?"

Within minutes of this he began to have what some call a deathbed "rattle" - that is his breathing changed completely and he began developing an enormous amount of fluid. I personally have seen people stay in that state of rattling breath for days, even weeks. To that end the nurse had called in to have a hospital bed delivered to the house. With Jorge - the in home worker - and Carl we were imagining different geometries in the living room so that we could fit it in there comfortably. we were wondering how we could get Tad who weighed 200 pounds from the bedroom to the living room via the narrow corridor.

Then his rattle changed to a gurgle. There was more fluid in his system than I had ever heard before. All I could think was "he's drowning! we have to do something". This was the most painful part for me - all we could do was turn his head and help the fluids flow out of his mouth on the side.

I am torn between anger at the fact that the nurse didn't intervene more to keep the fluid from backing up in his lungs and relief because he had said more than once that morning "I am ready to go."

There was a moment of peace - but to get to it he had to go through the turmoil of gasping for breath until no air could be found.

I lie there next to him, my right arm around his chest, my left behind his head, my face against his shoulder while Carl and Jorge sat holding his hand and arm - the nurse standing lovingly behind them. I felt his heart accelerate wildly, I watched his jugular pounding just below my chin. Then we all got very quiet. His heart slowed down. At some point - some unknowable point - his heart stopped.

It was absolutely uneventful. No angels played trumpets. No spirit lifted from his body and floated upwards. His heart was beating one minute then it wasn't. I looked up at everyone and said, "I'm not sure but I think he's gone"."

The nurse searched for a pulse and finding none acquiesced. Carl burst into tears.

I have no words for what I felt - I am still not sure what I feel. I imagine the emotions will become more and more identifiable as time goes by.

For the next four hours I spent a lot of time with Tad - Tad's body. I'm not sure which it was. I took off his boxers and bathed him with a warm towel and rose water. I caressed him. I talked to him. Jorge and Carl made lunch and we all sat around him and had lunch telling stories about Tad, the sun filling the whole room for the first time in what feels like years.

I kept coming back to his gentle lips, the hair on his chest, his beautiful warm hands that loved to find mine and hold it -- I couldn't stop touching his body even though I could feel the temperature dropping, the sweat drying up, the color changing.

Amazingly all of this happened with sweetness and serenity. I went out into the garden to be away from him then found I needed to be near him some more. I called his dad first then came back in to get one more glimpse of his beautiful green eyes before I shut the lids. His pupils were enormous. Every time I came close I could swear I saw his chest lift - to pull in air - a movement I had scrutinized over and over again so many times. At some point Astra had climbed up on the bed and fallen asleep between his legs.

When the agreed upon time came the cemetery folks took his body away through his gorgeous garden in the bright Santa Cruz sun. When I mentioned I didn't want to be separated from his body Carl reminded me that I had every right to keep it there for a few days if I wanted; that we could send them back and have them come another time. There was no law stating I had to have him sent to the mortuary right away. I was tempted but I knew that I had to let go. I was clinging to a corpse - to a physical sensation - I was clinging to a Tad who was no longer. The sooner his body was gone the sooner I could start connecting with the Tad inside me, the one that will live with me no doubt til the day I myself die.

My friends are here - surrounding me with love and support. This morning we will go to the mortuary and begin the plans for the cremation. Tad asked me to organize a memorial here in Santa Cruz and another in Tucson where he was born. It's my deep honor to take his remains there and to represent the Crandall - Rowe family among the much larger Westmoreland - Crandall clan of Tucson.

Today our bedroom where I just spent a sound night is full of pictures of Tad and me as well as flowers brought in by Carl. The ring I gave him for our commitment ceremony is solidly fixed on my left hand next to the one he gave me.

I have many big decisions to make in the near future but for now I can relax. I went out for dinner with two of his friends last night and felt so much serenity not having to wonder about whether he was safe or not, whether we are at the right hospital getting the right care, whether he will live or die. It was sweet to just be out in Santa Cruz with friends - to come back to a world where in appearance no one is sick.