Today I asked Moshe his thoughts about going to the Blue House, as it’s called. And he told me that he, in his life, had the sad moment of putting a few dogs to sleep. Dogs that he really loved, but they became unhealthy and he had to take them to the vet and end their lives. He said he saw how peaceful it is. And how that made it clear to him that his death would also be peaceful. So, you know, it’s the same process. The dog doesn’t know what’s happening, of course. As a human being, you know. “I know what it will be. I know that there will be a medication. I know that there will be deep sleep. I know that breathing will slow. At some point it will stop. I know the heart will stop. But I’ve seen it and there’s no stress. Everything looks very, very peaceful. I’ve seen it many times,” he said.
And I thought that most of us don’t witness dying that much anymore. Think to yourself, how many people have you witnessed at the end of their life? A long time ago, when we lived in small communities with larger families, people would gather at the house of those who are terminally sick. They would bring food and help and be there at the moment of sickness and participate and know what was going on. Maybe that also created a lower level of fear. And now we have movies, but most of us have not experienced being at the bedside of somebody who’s taking their last breath. The experience Moshe described of witnessing the end of the life of his dogs is not very common. Maybe more for dog lovers than not. But maybe we need something like this. Maybe we need to witness the end of life to change how afraid we are of this.
We will see. I will tell you on the other end of this about my own fears. Actually, I can tell you already because I was there with my mother when she passed away. I wasn’t that afraid before, but it was very comforting to see that my mother did not suffer. That she basically went to sleep and overnight her sleeping got deeper and her breathing slowed to fewer breaths per minute. It became slower and then it just stopped. There weren’t any signs of stress or pain. It was comforting.
I’m sure this will be painful (for me). My mother’s end of life was painful and sad and I cried a lot. But it was also comforting to know that it’s not a gasping for breath and the feeling like you’re drowning.
