One Year On - 17th August 2012                                                         

“I have been so low and have felt many times like ending it all.  But I am afraid I am a coward.   I would do so, if I knew what would work successfully without pain. Hahaa.  People who say, ‘Ah yes!  She took the easy way out,’ haven’t a clue.  It takes enormous courage, which I have not had to this point.”

These words were written in an email to a friend less than a year before Gurli Bagnall passed away. 

I had many discussions with Gurli about euthanasia and how she might assist herself in bringing an end to it all. Her illness brought to her a slow deterioration in all aspects of her being.  The absolute hardest to cope with was the unmitigated pain and the frightening breathing difficulties that she suffered for many years. And all she had in her arsenal was Panadol and morphine.  Due to traumas in her earlier life she was not prepared to take any drugs that would impact on her cognitive abilities.  It’s likely that something would have eased the unrelenting pain but she was terrified of losing her mind as well. Being highly intelligent, for her, was a double-edged sword.  It meant she had a good grasp of what she was going through and what her options were. It also put her off-side with her doctor. The ego can be fragile when suggested treatment is questioned by a smart patient.

She trawled the internet looking for help, for ways in which she might take matters into her own hands when she felt she couldn’t take anymore.  We discussed it at length, how people suffering as she was, have nowhere and no one to turn to when they’ve had enough. How callous to leave someone suffering so!  We have rules in our country to protect animals from cruelty but no such provision is made for humankind. What kind of society do we live in?

New Zealand has debated this issue before and all we’ve had, in this democracy of ours, is a ‘conscience’ vote, when the 2003 ‘Death with Dignity Bill’ was defeated by 60 votes to 58. A vote that was cast by people who likely have never been in a situation where someone close to them is suffering. More recently National Party MP Maggie Barry has stated that our level of palliative care here in New Zealand is so high that we don’t need the option of euthanasia. Ms Barry speaks from experience because her father received excellent care in a hospice. Well, I am so very pleased for her family that this was the case. In my mother’s case ‘there was no room at the inn’.  As I discovered, a hospital is not a great place for a dying person. Without the support of hospice nurses and their valuable input with hospital staff things would have been considerably worse.

I’m left feeling that I let her down because I wasn’t willing to risk my freedom to help her. I shouldn’t feel guilty about this but I do. I wish I’d had the courage to help her as other people have helped their loved ones. It shouldn’t be this way. One year on and I still feel traumatised by my mother’s last terrible weeks and the horrible way she was treated in hospital after failing to cut her wrist deep enough to do a good job. Call that taking the easy way out? Do you have any idea of the courage it took for an elderly, weak, sick old lady to do that? I am so proud of her for trying where no one else would or, to be fair, where no one legally could, give her a hand.

Gurli suffered terribly and was an enormous inspiration to those she met. She was incredibly courageous. Watching someone you care deeply about suffer so much was heartbreaking.  Gurli is the woman I was proud to call ‘Mum’.

Rest in peace, Mum. You’re the bravest woman I know.  It really is time for the voting public to have a say and put a stop to this barbarism.

Flowers for Mum

In Memory of Gurli Harriet Bagnall

2/12/1934 - 17/8/2011

For many years my mother couldn't tolerate plants in close proximity because they caused her breathing problems. She suffered for years from ME and the associated horrors that accompany that disease. As a result we tended not to have around us things that smelled too much because we lived on each others' doorsteps and I didn't want to cause her any more discomfort than she already had.

Nearly two weeks ago, late at night on Wednesday 17th August, my mother passed away. What I had thought would be for me an extremely sad time, has turned out to be an occasion to be celebrated. Mum's suffering was so acute, so painful, so misunderstood, so poorly managed...I could go on. And so desperate was she for an end to it all, that she tried, unsuccessfully, to end it herself.  The relief for her that it is all over is so immense that it would be mean of me to deny her that and to be sad about it.

She had wanted to go for quite some time but the laws in our country don't allow for humanity towards humans. Had I subjected a pet to the pain and suffering she endured, the SPCA would have hauled me across hot coals and into court, and in a very public way dealt with my cruel behaviour. But no one will be called upon to explain why a mother, grandmother and great-grandmother was made to suffer the way she was.  Such is life in our 'civilised' world.

As for the after-life - I know all religious groups reckon they know what comes next. But for my mum here is what happened. The days after her death I drove her motorised wheelchair out onto her deck so she could sit in the sun and toast her toes before embarking on her journey.  Her eyes had become so terribly light-sensitive that sitting in the sun was not something she could comfortably do without a serious cover-up. But now she can.  I've also made sure that the chaise lounge on our veranda is well placed to catch the morning sun should she prefer that particular spot. The wheel chair has been taken away now and it's sad to see the empty space. Once she had finished sunning herself she flew across the sky up to the snow-capped mountains to make 'snow angels' because of course she is an angel now!

Some may find my behaviour rather eccentric but one does what one does to cope with situations and this was my way of letting mum go. For her final earthly 'production' (she did tread the boards in her younger days) I selected a bright blouse she had made in blues, greens and yellows and teamed it with a yellow sarong I made. The whole outfit was pulled together (as designers would say) with a scarf, and buttons and a brooch that she herself had made from modelling clay. This is her outfit for sitting on a particular beach in Mocambique and eating mangoes with my father and friends who have gone before her. 

And do you know? I just don't feel her around much now and it's only two weeks later. Is it because I was happy to let her go? We were so close and I always imagined I would hurt far more when she went. But the truth is I'm so grateful that her suffering has ended.

I am happy. Rest in Peace, Mum. I love you more than words can say.

Krissy

XXXX

PS I hope you have enjoyed the flowers that  friends have sent in your memory. Some smell divine, all are beautiful, and they are here for you to enjoy! :-)

Starting off

I've encouraged a few others to start a blog and now finally I'm writing my own. After suffering finger trouble and causing who knows what problems out there in the ether with google, I seem to have a page to call my own. I am even a follower of someone. Let's call her Hope!

I decided to call this Wait for Me because life seems to be passing far to quickly, which is what it does when you reach a certain age! When you have grandchildren and start to get a handle on life and think it would be nice to live to 150, you suddenly realise that this life is not forever. But if you belive in reincarnation then all is not lost although I do think it would be helpful to remember the past if only to stop you stuffing up again in the future.

My belief in reincarnation was instrumental in helping get rid of a tenacious 7th Day Adventist when we lived in Swaziland many years ago. She was a lovely woman and I made the mistake of inviting her into our home. She returned. With reinforcements. No doubt she mistook my enthusiasm for a good conversation, for interest in things celestial because she returned with a woman some years her senior, presumably with solid experience in converting the unsaved. I can remember ducking below the window and crawling on the floor, and calling in a loud whisper for our maid to tell the lady I was out. She could obviously smell success and returned a week later. I felt so mean and invited the pair in and this was when I dropped my bombshell. I revealed that I believed in reincarnation because after all, what god would be so mean as not to give you a second shot at getting it right? They left, their little heels kicking up a veritable sandstorm as they shot down the driveway to their car parked on the roadside. I hate it that these people make me behave rudely but it is often the only way to get rid of them. I did enjoy the lively, albeit short, discussion!

I think that's enough for the 1st post. I'll try and edit my profile, maybe put a photo on. On the other hand I might just cruise around Facebook for a while. I have encouraged a few friends onto Facebook but have yet to hear a Thank You from them! They hate it! It's confusing, and where do all these people come from? Strangers want to be friends...and so it goes. I love it that Facebook has put me back in touch with old friends, that I can share photos with family and friends overseas and it doesn't involve weighty emails. And I'm so scared of getting left behind in the networking / communication game. I used to like writing letters but this is a million times better. :-)