A palliative care nurse once told me that people can be very private about dying and want to do it alone, possibly not to distress their loved ones. She said they hold on while others are around them but once their loved one pops out to get something, go to the loo etc. they quietly slip away.My family were gathered at my mum's deathbed in hospital. We were miles from home and getting quite deranged with lack of sleep.
Then suddenly my brother stood up and said "right we're going home". I didn't question this in my trance-like state, like I would do normally, so we went home and another relative decided to start the long drive home to see to their children. There was one person left behind.
A short while after I got home the phone rang - it was the hospital to say mum had died.
I went round to my brother's to tell him in person. He was lying on the bed looking stunned and when I walked in, he said "I know, she's just been here". "She gave me a hug".
I asked him later why he'd been so insistent that we go home from the hospital. He said it was like an order. Someone telling him to go home.
A few weeks later something got in my bed behind me. I'm sure it was mum.
I think mum decided who she wanted by her side when she died. Someone who she didn't see much of and didn't want them to feel left out. So they got the honour of being there when she died.
I was told similar by a nurse a long time ago. My friend was in hospital very ill. The doctor called us out to advise us there was nothing they could do and he was end of life. When we went back into his room his breathing was funny and a nurse told us this was it. Then his breathing became normal again and we were still sat with him 12 hours later in the early hours of the morning. A nurse came in and said she had been doing the job for a long time and whilst some people would hang on waiting for their loved ones to arrive some would hang on waiting for them to leave as they didn’t want to go with them there and upset them. He was very selfless and never wanted to bother anyone so his sister and I decided to leave to give him the chance to die alone if that was what he wanted. It started raining and he used to like to sit outside in the rain in the night so I told him this was his chance to go. I also told him that if he was still there by 8am I was coming back and he would be stuck with me. A hour or after I left his sister called to say he was gone. I felt glad that the nurse had told us that and we gave him the space that he wanted so he went on his own terms.
My mum did that. Popped away in the five minutes that the care home overnight nurse spent dealing with another resident. The nurse was doing her paperwork while sitting with Mum, with no indication whatsoever that she was close to the end.
Strangely with us discussing this particular subject, but I'm currently reading a recommended book by a neurosurgeon (Eben Alexander), called Map of Heaven, which has deathbed stories in it like ours.
There is something so beautiful and peaceful about this.
As soon as the nurse said what she said I just knew that was who he was and what he wanted. It was hard because his sister and I both felt awful going and wanted to be there at the end. It wasn’t about us though, it was about him. He was very into music and this was before iPods and the like so they wouldn’t let a cd player in without it being PAT tested. I went and bought a load of batteries so he could listen to his favourite music. He died far too young, it was only fitting that he was able to go listening to his favourite music, with the sound of the rain outside, on his own as he wanted.
Are you on the right thread?
Nope! This happens quite often. No idea why. I definitely didn’t post it on this one. Deleted now
thank you x
I love this. My friend just lost her mum to cancer, she died at home and my friend was sleeping downstairs when it happened. She was really upset that her mum was alone. But maybe that is why.
