MEETING DEATH
I woke up on Monday feeling
light, relaxed. Like most mornings, it took me a while to be fully awake and
feel my body. It seemed fine. I rose to sit up but could not. There was a sharp
pain in my lower back. A vertebra had pinched a nerve. My body tightened; it
did not let me turn to either side. The pain went up the spine until it reached
between my shoulder blades, behind my heart. A stabbing sensation shortened my
breath to a minimum. My neck was next. The immobilization now was total. A soft
moan, some tears. I tried to push my head and shoulders backwards to expand the
chest. It did not work. Instead, the effort made my body slide off the side of
the bed. I hit the floor with the weight of a dead body.
My husband heard the noise and
came to my aid. He massaged and aligned my body with care. My back cracked like
fireworks as he stretched it. I spent the next couple days with my body armor
on—lower back, upper back, and neck straps and holders. Lying down was
uncomfortable, so was sitting, standing was the worst. Discomfort, much
discomfort, reactivity, flashes of nervousness and irritability. I felt like
screaming and screamed some, and took painkillers.
By Thursday morning, I felt much
better. I took the straps and holders off and was able to walk with care, to
turn slowly and to sit with my back straight and turn at the waist. My neck
continued to be quite stiff but there was a bit more flexibility. Everything
was definitely going back to normal.
For many years, from time to time
I had had similar arthritic episodes. Although each had been getting more
painful and incapacitating over time, I had grown kind of used to them by now.
Nevertheless, they bothered me all the same, every single time. Aging is a
persistent teacher.
Thursday evening when I was
resting on an armchair watching a movie while waiting for my husband to finish
some reading and join me for dinner, from one moment to the next, I felt ill,
very ill. It was not the bones. This time it was my belly. It did not feel like
food poisoning or bladder or kidney stones. I recognized all those. This was
not anything I knew.
In a matter of seconds, an
excruciating pain spread all over my body. My senses got blocked. It was as if
a thick transparent cover, which stopped all connection with the outside world,
enveloped me. I only heard, felt, inside me. A metallic, nauseating noise rang
in my ears and a vibration like tiny ants walking everywhere shook me. It was
hard to think; I just embraced myself, held myself the best I could. My head,
heavy as a rock, pulled my torso forward against my legs. I tried to sit up,
but it was impossible. The pain brought me to my knees, onto the floor. My
husband was only a few yards away, in the next room. I tried calling him. My
voice was low, inward. I managed to say his name. Caught up in his reading, he
asked me what I needed but I was barely able to speak. After what seemed like
years, I was able to repeat his name.
Time dissolved. I do not know how
long it took for my husband to get to where I was; I was going in and out of
consciousness. I remember looking sideways at one point, and seeing him looking
at me with a worried expression. He was unsuccessfully trying to keep my head
up and kept calling my name. My husband was scared. The noise in my ears,
inside my head, got louder. My voice went lower, to a murmur. This pain was
strange, indescribable. I felt a boiling heat running through my nerves, my
veins, and my muscles. It felt like a powerful invisible hand tightened and
twisted my upper body, my head, and my legs, like one does with a wet cloth
about to be hung on a rope under the sun.
However, slowly I became aware
that there was a deep silence and calmness inside and all around me. I was
absorbed in this silence and calm more and more, such peace. The mind was
thoughtless. My eyelids, heavy, kept closing, wanting to fall asleep. There was
sweetness in the air. There was stillness. It felt like a delicate caress. I
tried to tell my husband that everything was all right…the pain did not matter
any more. Nothing mattered, nothing. I felt lighter and far away. In that
moment, I knew I was dying. My husband knew it too.
The room felt empty as if I were
alone, not lonely, but alone. A prayer came to my lips. With the little
awareness that was left, I breathed in and out the mantra, the name of God, and
tried to be with the moment. Something in me wanted to stay conscious. It was
difficult. In my heart I called my Teacher, his Teacher, and her Teacher’s
Teacher, our spiritual lineage. I prayed that they helped me and stayed with
me. I felt with God. I felt ready.
All the while, my husband
desperately continued trying to help me get up and was wondering aloud how he
could make me feel better. He brought me some water, wanted to call an ambulance,
a doctor, anything. I just mumbled no. I had fought my way back into health
every time sickness or illness had stricken me. This time was different. The
pain did not upset me; neither did it anger me or make me afraid. There was no
resistance in me, only acceptance.
A few minutes passed, maybe
hours, maybe more. I do not know how or why but I did not leave. I am still
here, very much alive. It took me several days to get better. I continue to
feel tired easily.
A few days after my collapse, I
remembered a dream I had the night before it occurred. In it, a man gave me a
medicine that healed me. The dream did not seem important at the time and I had
quickly forgotten about it. But once I recalled it, it made me wonder. What did
it mean? Could it have been that this man’s medicine was what kept me alive? Or
could this dream have been an announcement, a warning of what would happen that
evening? Or did it point to something else I might find out in the future? Hard
to know for sure…
Death did not want me after all,
not yet. But I am glad she came. On our brief meeting, I learned from death
something aging had not been able to teach me in all these years—surrender.
by Alex Warden