Tag: hope

“To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow”


“Who wants to die? Everything struggles to live. Look at that tree growing up there out of that grating. It gets no sun, and water only when it rains. It’s growing out of sour earth. And it’s strong because its hard struggle to live is making it strong. My children will be strong that way.” ― Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

I spent the weekend packing up Vic’s flat and working in the garden.  I bought new herbs for my herb garden.   I changed the outlay (or started) of the back garden.

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This year may be easy or it may be a struggle.  I know that there will be days of profound sadness but I also know that my sadness will be put to good use.  I believe that, by putting my grief to work, I will find a way to get through my sad day.

In the words of Robert Frost – “In three words I can describe everything I’ve learnt about life.  It goes on.  Despite our fears and worries, life continues”

My “profound sad days” will remind me why there is a Stepping Stone Hospice and why I do, what I do, at Stepping Stone Hospice.

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I do believe in tomorrow.

I do believe that this will be a year of healing.

I do believe that it will be a year of recovery – at every level.

 

What can we hope for when there is no hope?


When Brendan (Vic’s gastroenterologist) took me into the passage, outside Vic’s hospital room, and said “No more.  This is the end of the road” my heart stopped.  How can there be no hope?  Brendan has been so brave until that moment.  It was not easy for him to sentence Vic to the “No Hope” section of her journey.

Where does hope live when we hear the words announced to us, “There is no hope”?  We cannot return to life as it was.

Immanuel Kant, who lived and wrote in the 1700s, thought a lot about the kind of subjects we might label as “the eternal verities”: hope, ethics, God, morality, the meaning of life. Kant came up with three questions that he thought expressed the central human concerns. Here are his famous questions:

What can I know?
What can I do?
What can I hope?

What can I know?
“A large part of Kant’s work addresses the question “What can we know?” The answer, if it can be stated simply, is that our knowledge is constrained to mathematics and the science of the natural, empirical world. It is impossible, Kant argues, to extend knowledge to the super sensible realm of speculative metaphysics. The reason that knowledge has these constraints, Kant argues, is that the mind plays an active role in constituting the features of experience and limiting the mind’s access only to the empirical realm of space and time.”  http://www.iep.utm.edu/kantmeta/

 I know I can only address this on an emotional level. 

I know that life is unfair and difficult! I know we are scared – not only of Vic’s painful journey but of what lies beyond her release from pain.  I know I hate seeing my child suffer and losing her dignity. 

I know I love my child more than life.  I know she wants to live.  I know she wants to love, be loved…..  I know she wants the frustration of facing peak hour traffic on her way to work or back.  I know Vic wants a job.  I know Vic wants financial independence, a trip to Italy.  I know Vic wants to attend her sons 21st Birthday parties, see them graduate, and meet the person they decide to spend their lives with.  Hold her grandchild..…grow old gracefully.  I know Vic wants to walk on the beach, see the sun set over the sea….. 

 I know that Vic is tired of the pain.  I know she wants to die.  I know she wants to live.

 I know dying is a lonely journey.  I know it is impossibly difficult to watch Vic grow weaker every day.  I know I am tired of being sad.  I know I want the boys to be happy…..

What should I do?

I know I should honor Vic’s wishes.  I know that I should try and stay positive for the boys sake.  I should fight harder for Hospice intervention.  I should remain cheerful and snap out of my depression.  I should concentrate on the positive moments in our lives.  I should endeavor to find a way of giving Vic peace – enough peace to let go.


What can I hope?
 I wish her pain control will continue to work as well as it is now… I hope that her suffering will come to an end.  I hope that the boys will heal in time.  I hope that we will laugh again.  I hope that Vic will find peace. 

I hope that my beautiful little girl will fall asleep and not wake up.  I hope that God will be with her when the time comes