Blog No. 235 A Resurrection Story – Dying the Hard Way, Part 6 - 27 April 2025

I took this photo of Margaret in her hospital room when she was dying at Mary Potter.  Even though I knew in my heart that I was losing her, I never stopped hoping Margaret would have a miracle cure – and for a few days, I thought my miracles had come true.

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Blog 234 finished with extracts from my diary entries for Saturday 8 July 2023.  This Blog continues my diary entries from the point where Blog 234 finished.  

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Saturday 8 July 2023 Blog 234’s diary entry finishes this way. [Marg is asleep when I arrive.  I take a photo and do crosswords until she wakes.  When she wakes, Marg is slow of speech but logical and rational.  She is on a regime of pain control relief on demand – and even with this, she is still in remarkable pain.  As she talks, her eyes close and she ceases talking for up to 30 seconds – and then resumes taking at exactly where she left off.  I am depressed and take the tram home at 4.10 pm.  I spend the evening updating friends on developments in Margaret’s health.  I feel very flat and tears well up constantly.  It is now 9.48 and I am going to bed alone..] **** Sunday 9 July 2023 The diary entry for Sunday 9 July 2023 continues. The phone rings at 2.46 am on Sunday 9 July.  I struggle out of a deep sleep.  It is Margaret.  She is confused and thinks it is time for me to get up for my Morialta walk.  She wanted to help me get up.  I gently tell her the time and that I am getting up later than usual today because I am not going to try and do my usual walk.  We chat for 4 minutes and I assure her I will visit as soon as I have finished the walk. I struggle awake again when the alarm goes off at 6.30 am.  I do not want to get out of bed but I am now awake and further sleep is not possible.  I drive to Morialta in the pouring rain, arriving at 7.27 and walk to First Falls.  It is 7.57 when I get to First Falls.  After taking a photo, I start back towards the car.  Phone reception at Morialta is bad, but by some fluke my phone rings at 8.00 just after I have started the return journey.  It is Margaret asking why I am not in the hospital.  Somehow she thought I would be there at 8.00.  Because the reception is bad, I promise to ring her back as soon as possible.  When I ring back, Margaret is clearly distressed that I am not there so I promise to get there as soon as possible.  I arrive in her hospital room at about 9.00 am. Margaret is still somewhat confused but very glad to see me.  I stay until 1.20 pm.  Maurine and Cheryl visit while I am there.  I do not see the treating doctors but it seems Margaret will probably be transferred to a palliative care bed at Western Community Hospital – but only after her condition has been stabilised.  I get home at about 1.30 after promising Margaret that I will return at 6.00.  After getting home I have breakfast, have a shower and meditate for an hour.  It is 5.12 as I type these words and I need to get ready to return to the hospital. I get back to the hospital by 5.50 pm.  Marg’s visitors have now left and she is composed.  She tells me that Jim came and stayed until about 30 minutes before Andrew, Heather and Sue left.  While Andrew, Heather and Sue were there, they placed a whats app call to Anne Ryan in Ireland.  Anne Ryan told Marg about my text to Heather and Sue sent on 22 November 2022.  According to the three of them, my text frightened them and this is the reason why they had ceased coming to our house.  Heather and Sure – but not Anne – had said they were concerned for my wellbeing.  The whole episode had distressed Marg.  I explained that this version of events was completely untrue.  My text was sent on 22 November – the very day that Marg had her first immunotherapy and at a time when her life was hung in the balance.  At the date of the text, it had been 19 months during which the three of them had refused to come visit Marg in her own home.  I said that my text contained no threats at all and simply begged Heather and Sue to ask me for my side of what had happened with Anne and that they had not replied in any way.  If they stopped coming to our place because of fear generated by my text, why had they refused to visit her at home in the previous 19 months. Margaret became distressed and I let the matter rest.  It seems to me that at this last possible moment they are trying to spin a story to Marg to try and justify their cancellation of her.  This phone hookup was certainly generated by my text to Heather in the evening of Friday 7 July saying to Heather that she, Sue and Anne had cancelled Margaret and that this was not good behaviour.  They are now trying to create some sort of justification to present to Margaret.  Perhaps they thought I would condemn them to Margaret before Margaret died.  I was annoyed for the hurt that they had inflicted on Margaret at this stage of her battle to live.  Bastards.  I am not impressed by their claims to be concerned for my welfare.  If they had ever had any concerns for my welfare, I would have heard them express this to me in the 2 years and six months since 26 January 2021.  I was shocked and surprised but I suppose I should not have been.  People always try to justify what they have done and seldom acknowledge they have done anything wrong. Marg was very reluctant for me to go home, so I stayed until 9.10 pm.  I only went home then because she insisted I should.  I offered to stay all night and sleep on the sofa in her room but she refused to let me do this.  She was calm when I left but I have an uneasy feeling.  Was this our final evening together? It is 10.38 pm on Sunday as I write this..

Blog No. 234 - A Resurrection Story – Dying the Hard Way, Part 5 - 25 April 2025

Margaret wanted so much for her former friend Ann Ryan to cease the cancellation of us both, but the cancellation is still in place.  Margaret knew what her former friend had done and she was deeply hurt by it.

Ann knew Margaret was dying, but never found the time to see Margaret before she died.  Ann never found the time to even come to the funeral.

Ann was in Ireland but could have easily flown back to Australia; she had the money and she had the time.  

My personal invitation to Ann suggesting she should say goodbye to Margaret when I took her ashes to Ireland to scattered on Croagh Patrick never got a reply.  Apart from the presence of kind strangers, I scattered Margaret’s ashes by myself.

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Blog 233 finished with extracts from my diary entries for Friday 7 July 2023.  This Blog continues my diary entries from the point where Blog 233 finished.  

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Friday 7 July 2023 Blog 233’s diary entry finishes this way. [Then the ambulance crew checked the situation in the public hospital A & Es.  At this point, Queen Elizabeth Hospital has the least wait for getting into A & E, so Margaret agrees she should be taken to QEH.  Margaret is still in extreme pain when she is carefully manoeuvred into the ambulance.  Before moving, the ambulance crew again checks which A & E is currently moving patients more quickly.  The RAH is now the best option, so we go to the RAH.  By this stage it is about 6.00 pm; it is dark and it is raining.  There are eight other ambulances in front of us, waiting to be able to take their patients into A & E.  The ambulance crew senior member goes into A & E to talk to the triage nurse.  When he returns ten minutes later, he has extraordinary news.  The triage nurse has agreed that Margaret should be admitted immediately into A & E.] RAH = Royal Adelaide Hospital **** Friday 7 July 2023 The diary entry for 7 July 2023 continues. The staff in A & E are wonderfully attentive, but they are unable to give Margaret anything which eases her pain.  Jameson and Charli come into A & E to be with me and Margaret.  They refuse to go home as the hours slowly pass.   I eventually replied to Heather at 8.18 pm while Margaret was in the treatment booth in A & E at Royal Adelaide Hospital.  I think that given the circumstances, my reply to Heather was very restrained.  The reply said this. I sent you a whatsapp message on 25 June saying Margaret’s time was short.  You ignored me.  I will ring tomorrow if you want – when I have an idea how my Margaret is faring.  Sue and Anne Ryan have known Margaret was dying and chose to cancel her because she is married to me.  Not good behaviour. Heather responded to my text almost immediately.  Her text to me at 8.21 was contradictory in that it denied she used what’s app and then said she had indeed used what’s app “recently”.  This is the text from Heather received at 8.21 pm on Friday 7 July while Margaret was in agony in A & E at Royal Adelaide Hospital and I was holding her hand hoping she would not die. Sorry not a regular what’s app user.  Have just gone on it recently as my French group is moving to it. Apart from the obvious contradictions within the message, I knew Heather was lying because she had exchanged messages with me on what’s app in the past – before she cancelled me.  I was not impressed by the lies. The night shift staff commence duty at 10.00 pm and Marg is still in pain but as yet no hospital bed has been found for her.  At 11.45 we are told a bed has been found in the Cancer Ward for Margaret.  After Margaret has been transferred to her bed in room 4, Wards 6E, the doctor comes to tell us the news.  Margaret’s electrolytes are completely out of whack and if left unchecked, the result will not be good.  In addition, the doctor thinks the cancer may have reactivated and spread into the duodenum, but a cat scan will be needed to confirm this.   Saturday 8 July 2023 Jameson and Charli and I leave Margaret at about 12.20 am on Saturday 8 July. When we get to their car, the rain is still thundering down.  They drop me off at home at 12.30 am.  I go to bed at 1.00 am and sleep until 8.00 am – the longest continuous sleep I have had in months.  I have two missed calls from Margaret when I get up.  She says the cat scans did not take place and that the food is rubbish.  A bed is available in Western Community Hospital if she wants it.  I say I prefer that she stay where she is – it is a brand new hospital with a complete suite of medical equipment. I have breakfast and do a walk for the first time in days.  I leave to visit Marg in the hospital at about 2.05 – immediately after I finish typing this entry. Marg is asleep when I arrive.  I take a photo and do crosswords until she wakes.  When she wakes, Marg is slow of speech but logical and rational.  She is on a regime of pain control relief on demand – and even with this, she is still in remarkable pain.  As she talks, her eyes close and she ceases talking for up to 30 seconds – and then resumes talking at exactly where she left off.  I am depressed and take the tram home at 4.10 pm.  I spent the evening updating friends on developments in Margaret’s health.  I feel very flat and tears well up constantly.  It is now 9.48 and I am going to bed alone.

Blog No. 233 - A Resurrection Story – Dying the Hard Way, Part 4 - 24 April 2025

 

Margaret’s legs caused her so much pain.  I took these photos at A & E on Friday 9 June 2023.  There was little that the hospital was able to do about the legs – or about so much else. 

Margaret was dying and her death could not be prevented.

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Blog 232 finished with extracts from my diary entries for Thursday 6 July 2023.  This Blog continues my diary entries from the point where Blog 232 finished.  

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Thursday 6 July 2023 Blog 232’s diary entry finishes this way. [Marg falls asleep as we try and watch tv. She cannot sit in the sofa but can sit in a kitchen chair.  As exhaustion conquers her, her head slumps forward and she is in danger of falling.  I sit in a separate chair beside her.  I love her and I am losing her.  I must keep going. I persuade Margaret we should go to bed at 10.50 and I get her into bed by 11.15 pm.  Tonight she has taken two Panadol for pain plus one Oxazepam to help her sleep..] **** Friday 7 July 2023 The diary entry for 7 July 2023 continues. She wakes at 1.57 am on Friday 7 July.  She is confused but not as much as on the previous night.  She insists that she needs to wriggle her body around on the mattress and that if she does, this will help with the shocking pain she is in.  I try to help her move her legs and eventually persuade her that she can go back to sleep. Marg wakes again at 2.50 am and I ask her for a cuddle before I very carefully help her into the bathroom for a pee.  I feel her bones across her body.  There is no spare flesh left on Margaret.  She is unable to sleep after the pee and I help her use the walker to get into the living room.  We talk about her impending death and what I will need to do to restart my life once she is dead.  She is completely lucid and not at all confused.  Margaret talks about saying good to the staff at Lift after the Palliative Care team make contact on Monday.  I am very doubtful she will still be alive on Monday 10 July, but she may be because the in-home hairdresser Zofia is due at 10.00 am and perhaps Marg will hold on to her life until her final hair tinting is complete.  I promise to personally visit Beckman Deli this morning and thank the staff there on her behalf. At 4.25 am I bring the scales into the living room from the bathroom.  Wearing her dressing gown and with slippers on, Margaret weighs 40.8 kilograms.; her dressing gown weighs about the same as mine.  I weigh myself with and without my dressing gown on.  My dressing gown weighs 1.1 kilograms.  Margaret’s weight without the dressing gown and slippers – and the slippers have very little weight – was about 39.7 kilograms at 4.25 am today.  I wonder if Margaret will die today.  I hope so.  She has suffered far too much.  The hissing of the universe is back.  Margaret is asleep with her head slumped on the table.  I took a photo.  It is now 6.58 am. Margaret is still slumped on the table asleep at 7.26 am.  I hope this is the end; please let it be the end.  No more suffering, please.  I wait and watch.  I have got dressed, not bothered with a shower. Margaret woke at 7.50 am and insisted I go to the bakery and then to the barber for a haircut.  I am permitted to return home after the barber to help her to the bathroom.  After that I am to go to the supermarket.  I go to the bakery and the barber and return home to help Margaret to the bathroom.  She is still in great pain but insists that I go to the supermarket.  I am on the way home from the supermarket at 12.30 when Jameson rings.  He says he is unable to come to our place at 1.15 as arranged because he has a work shift.  I had no idea he was supposed to be at our place.  Two minutes later, Maurine rings and asks how far away from home I am.  I say I will be home in five minutes and she says she will meet me there.  Maurine arrives at the same time as I do.  Jim arrives five minutes later.  Margaret is in the living room and in extreme pain.  She has decided that she needs to go to hospital.  She puts in a call for Dr Bishnoi while Jim rings for an ambulance.  The ambulance arrive about 20 minutes later.  Marg tells them she would prefer to be taken to Ashford.  For 1 ½ hours the ambulance crew try to find an A & E in a private hospital that will let her come in.  No A & E in any private hospital in Adelaide will accept any additional patients. Yoga teacher Robyn rang at 2.13 pm while the ambulance crew were attending to Margaret.  I didn’t answer the call.  I couldn’t.  I rang Robyn back at 2.26 and told her that the ambulance was present and that Margaret would be taken to hospital but that I did not then know what hospital.  The call lasted 5 minutes 18 seconds. At 2.59 pm I received a text from Heather.  The text left no doubt that Heather had indeed blocked my phone number on her phone.  Having received a call from Robyn, she had unblocked me so she could send me the text.  This is Heather’s text. Hi Robyn just rang me and explained about calling an ambulance.  Please pass our love to Marg and would you mind keeping me in the loop? Then the ambulance crew check the situation in the public hospital A & Es.  At this point, Queen Elizabeth Hospital has the least wait for getting into A & E, so Margaret agrees she should be taken to QEH.  Margaret is still in extreme pain when she is carefully manoeuvred into the ambulance.  Before moving, the ambulance crew again check which A & E is currently moving patients more quickly.  The RAH is now the best option, so we go to the RAH.  By this stage it is about 6.00 pm; it is dark and it is raining.  There are eight other ambulances in front of us, waiting to be able to take their patients into A & E.  The ambulance crew senior member goes into A & E to talk to the triage nurse.  When he returns ten minutes later, he has extraordinary news.  The triage nurse has agreed that Margaret should be admitted immediately into A & E.

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A brief explanation about the text from Heather.

Heather had cancelled me and Margaret and had refused to come anywhere near our house after January 2021.  I had tried to keep her informed about Margaret but never received a reply.  I presume she blocked my number to make sure she could not be bothered by getting any calls or texts from me.

Blog No. 232 - A Resurrection Story – Dying the Hard Way, Part 3 - 23 April 2025

Margaret in January 2023, before her final approach to death.  The T-shirt says “I am a Nurse; I stab people and I know things”.

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Blog 231 finished with extracts from my diary entries for Tuesday 4 July 2023.  This Blog continues my diary entries from the point where Blog 231 finished.  

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Wednesday 5 July 2023 Blog 231’s diary entry finishes this way. [I bring a kitchen chair and place it next to her so we can be close and I can make sure she is safe.  Her eyes have black circles around them – as if someone has hit her on the eyes.  I presume it is grim weariness but wonder if it is a sign of an acceleration in her departure from this life.  She struggles to her feet and starts her evening pill parade.  Dr Saunderson has recommended a combination of pain killers plus sleeping pills.  Margaret opts for soluble Panadol and I put two into a glass while she has other medications.  She finds it hard to swallow now.] **** The diary entry for 5 July 2023 continues. I alternate between the state of tranquillity I can get by focusing on the small practical tasks that need to be done and lapsing back into yet another episode of the deep blues.  I love her; I always have.  She will be dead within days at the outside – and there is nothing at all I can do except try and keep her safe and ease her pain.  I feel like shit as I type this entry.  It is 9.38 pm.  In twenty minutes, I can start the going to bed process.  I desperately hope the sleeping pills work.  I have not tried to walk, do yoga or meditate today.  This has been physically very hard and very dispiriting. I get Margaret into bed at 10.15 pm, the earliest time in weeks.  She is asleep immediately. Thursday 6 July 2023 Margaret is moving restlessly in bed at 12.50 am on Thursday 6 July.  I get up and ask her what is the problem.  She is utterly confused and makes no sense.  She has never been like this before.  At various moments, she realises she is confused.  I get her to the toilet to try for a pee but nothing comes.  Very carefully, I get her back into bed.  She is asleep immediately.  It is 1.40 am now. When her breathing tells me she is asleep, I turn off the lamp and go to sleep. Margaret wakes me again at 4.51.  She has swung her legs out of bed but is not awake.  I carefully get her legs back into bed.  She has no awareness of what has happened and is immediately asleep again but without her head on the pillow.  I lie in bed until 5.25 listening to her with the lamp on and then I get up.   I feel this is very close to the end of Margaret’s very long cancer journey.  I get dressed and ring Maurine asking her to come.  She says she will.  Margaret is unaware of my movements or of the fact that I have got up.  She has never been like this in our 25 years together.  It is 5.58 am as I type these words. Maurine arrives at 6.15; Margaret is still in bed and still breathing.  I talk to Maurine until 7.30, when a miracle happens.  Margaret calls me from the bedroom.  She is groggy but wants to get up so I help her make it happen.  Margaret and Murine discuss what might have been the cause of Margaret’s behaviour during the night.  It may have been the result of the impact of the Oxazepam on her system, even though she has had this drug before without ill effects.  Maurine leaves at 8.30. This morning, the district nurse is Michelle.  She too is lovely. Dr Bishnoi rings at 12.15 pm.  Margaret tells him her health has deteriorated and she wants him to trigger Palliative Care.  He will get that process started but warns it may be Monday 10 July before we hear from Palliative Care.  I nap for an hour from 1.00 pm while Margaret is on the phone getting quotes for our contents’ insurance.  What an amazing woman; she refuses to give in to the disease and renews out insurance for $210.00 less that the renewal notice – with a different company. It has been bitter cold today and raining heavily for most of the day.  I pull a quiche out of the freezer for dinner.  I have just realised that the hissing of the universe has stopped; it has been missing all day.  I feel I am falling apart, but I must keep going while she needs me.  This is so very, very hard.  No exercise (walking or yoga) and no meditation today; same thing yesterday. Marg falls asleep as we try and watch tv. She cannot sit in the sofa but can sit in a kitchen chair.  As exhaustion conquers her, her head slumps forward and she is in danger of falling.  I sit in a separate chair beside her.  I love her and I am losing her.  I must keep going. I persuade Margaret we should go to bed at 10.50 and I get her into bed by 11.15 pm.  Tonight she has taken two Panadol for pain plus one Oxazepam to help her sleep.

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Margaret’s sister Maurine cancelled me and refused to have any further contact with me after I cooked dinner for the Redden family on 23 November 2023.  Someone – I believe it was Margaret’s brother Jim – stole the more valuable items (approximate value $40,000 to $55,000) of Margaret’s jewellery in the evening of 23 November 2023.

Blog No. 231 - A Resurrection Story – Dying the Hard Way, Part 2 - 22 April 2025

Blog 230 finished with extracts from my diary entries for Tuesday, 4th of July 2023.  This Blog continues my diary entries from the point where Blog 230 finished.  

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Tuesday 4 July 2023 Blog 230’s diary entry finishes this way. [We are both faced by an impossible situation and we both have to make impossible decisions.  There is no “correct” decision; we can only do the best we can in the circumstances.  My sole wish is to do what I can to ensure her welfare.  She says she sees the exhaustion in my face and wants to try and minimise it.  I say that her staying up instead of coming back to bed is definitely not the best answer to my exhaustion or hers.] **** The diary entry for the 4th of July 2023 continues. **** Margaret is due to ring Dr Bishnoi later today.  We list the things that she needs to tell him. Diarrhoea is still present even though Prednisolone restarted on Friday 30 June.  Inability to eat, very cold hands, extreme lack of balance and worsening in the balance issues; increasing pain levels.  It is 11.37 am as I type these words. Marg goes for a nap at 2.40 and I go for my walk.  Marg has given me her phone so that I can answer if Dr Bishnoi rings while she is asleep.  I get back from the walk at 3.50 and Dr Bishnoi rings five minutes later.  I tell him what has been happening and ask if there are any medication changes he has to recommend.  There are none.  I ask if there is anything I can do that might help Margaret a little more.  There is nothing.  Dr Bishnoi says that perhaps it is time to think about asking Palliative Care to become involved, but stresses he cannot act on this unless Margaret specifically agrees.  I am to discuss with Margaret and he will ring back between 10.00 and 11.00 on Thursday 6 July. Margaret wakes at 5.10 and I tell her about the call from Dr Bishnoi.  She immediately accepts that it is time for Palliative Care.  She accepts without fear, what is to come.  She walks straight towards her final gate without any twinge of fear.  She tells her sister Maurine and brother Jim.  I feel vastly relieved.  Margaret takes all of this in with great calmness.  She has been expecting it, but says it is unusual for this to happen when the cancer itself is still in remission.  She knows her body is getting weaker all the time.  We discuss administrative things that we ought to do while she is still alive.  I cancel my yoga class scheduled for tomorrow.  We watch tv and she keeps falling asleep.  She is ready for bed and it is 10.20 pm. It is 11.10 pm before we get to bed.  Marg has devised a plan to try and help us get a little more sleep.  She takes ½ an Oxycodone with 2 Panadols and I bring the Oxycodone into the bedroom to place it next to Margaret’s bedside lamp.  When she wakes up, she plans to take a full Oxycodone without getting out of bed.  Hopefully, this will send her straight back to sleep. Wednesday 5 July 2023 Margaret wakes at 1.55 am on Wednesday 5 July.  She stays in bed and takes the Oxycodone.  I remove the sleeve bandaging from around her legs; they are hurting a lot.  We both curl up hoping sleep will take us – but it doesn’t happen.  Margaret is in so much pain from the bandages and her legs that while under the sheets, she wrestles the bandages off.  I realise what is happening and get up to help her get rid of the bandages.  I replace them with simple wrap around bandages and we both curl up once again trying to sleep.  By 3.10 am it is clear that Margaret cannot sleep so I turn on the light and help her get out of bed.  Our sleep for the night has finished.  She is extremely frail as I help her use the walker to go down the passageway to the living room.  Fortunately, the papers have already arrived.  I give Margaret one of the papers and make breakfast.  I start eating breakfast at about 4.00 am.  Margaret keeps slumping down asleep with her head on the table.  Eventually, we both nap for an hour at about 5.30 – she at the table and me on the sofa. The nurse (Christine) arrives at 9.35 and she is lovely and concerned that Margaret’s legs may have again developed an infection.  Christine rings our GP clinic but the GP is not there yet.  I send photos of Margaret’s legs to the clinic and the clinic staff promise to bring them to the attention of the GP as soon as possible.  Nurse Christine leaves at 10.30 and I have a shower. My chores this morning are to deliver documents to the accountants and get yet more prescriptions filled.  It is 12.15 pm before I return home.  Margaret has heard nothing from the GP.  It is 1.45 as I write these words.  I am so exhausted that it is as though I am in a trance or a dream.  The tiredness in my body has ceased to mean anything to me.  While I am needed, I have the ability to keep going.  The hissing is still present, but it has lowered in volume Marg goes to bed for a nap at 2.10.  We have still heard nothing from the GP.  I ring the GP clinic at 3.20 and book a phone consultation with Margaret at 4.35 pm today.  I will wake her if necessary. I wake Margaret up at 4.10 for the phone consultation.  GP Saunderson rings at 4.40 and prescribes some sleeping pills plus anti nausea; he is lovely.  Because Margaret does not have a smartphone, I have to go to the surgery in peak hour traffic to pick up the prescriptions.  I get there and pick up the scripts and get them filled in the pharmacy.  I am home by 5.40 pm.  I cook dinner but Marg eats very little; her appetite is deserting her.  I help Margaret to the toilet for her bowels. defecating causes extreme pain in her back.  As we try to watch tv that evening, she keeps slumping into sleep in the chair; she cannot sit in the sofa because her back is such a mess.

Blog No. 230 - A Resurrection Story – Margaret Died the Hard Way, Part 1 - 21 April 2025

 

On Easter Sunday, Christians celebrate the resurrection of Christ from the dead on the first Easter Sunday nearly 2,000 years ago.  

Before he could rise from death and overcome it, Christ had to die and his death was gruesome and filled with pain.

I am not yet dead, but my wife Margaret is definitely dead.  I am still attempting my personal resurrection and new life after the agonising death of the one person whose life mattered more to me than anyone else in the Universe.

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Margaret was in so much pain that she was afraid to come to bed.  I often found her slumped fast asleep with her head on the table – exhaustion overcoming her pain.  In those last dreadful weeks at home, her sleep only took place when the pain could no longer keep her awake.

The word exhaustion does not come close to describing the tiredness that saturated every cell of our beings.  I so much wanted to take her pain off her, but I was not allowed.

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I made daily diary entries in the months leading up to Margaret’s death.

Before today, I have not had the courage to look at what I wrote in those terrible months leading up to her death.

As part of the Easter resurrection miracle, I have forced myself to look at what I wrote while Margaret was dying and I have decided to publish my diary entries as Blogs on the Hankin Redden website.

Here are some words of caution.

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I totally loved my wife and the process leading up to her death was incredibly hard for both of us to endure.  My main issue was always that the wrong person was dying.  Why was Margaret dying when the Universe knew without a shadow of a doubt that I wanted to take her place?  I wanted to have Margaret’s suffering transferred to me so that she did not have to endure it any longer.  But this was the one thing the Universe would not let me have.

These diary entries are filled with the pain endured by Margaret and by me as I impossibly tried to minimise her pain.

If you cannot stomach descriptions of the pain felt by a truly wonderful woman while she died, you should not read these Blogs.

If you cannot stomach descriptions of the pain endured by me while I watched Margaret die, you should not read these Blogs.

If you cannot stomach my stories of the vile Cancer Ghosting that Margaret and I had to endure, in the period leading up to her death and after, you should not read these Blogs.

If you cannot endure my depiction of Margaret’s miracle cure from cancer being washed away before your very eyes – as I most definitely did – you should not read these Blogs.

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My diary entries date back to long before late evening on Monday 3 July 2023, but that is where I will start these Blogs.

Margaret died at 3.16 am on Tuesday 22 August 2023.

I watched her die in the Intensive Care unit.

Margaret did not die as a direct result of her cancer - the cancer had vanished weeks before she died.

Margaret died from a urinary infection.

Dr Bhandari, the caring and competent doctor who looked after Margaret at Mary Potter Hospice, told me her death was a Sick Cosmic Joke.

I think Dr Bhandari was correct.

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Monday 3 July 2023 I suggest going to bed at 9.50 pm but it is 11.00 before we get there. Tuesday 4 July 2023 The bedside clock says 1.57 am on Tuesday 4 July when I hear Margaret call my name from a far, far away place.  I struggle back into semi wakefulness.  Marg says she needs to go to the toilet, then she will have a cigarette in the sitting room and return to bed.  By 2.30 we are in the living room and she has finished her cigarette and announces that she is not returning to bed.  If she goes back to bed, she will have to wake me up again so she can return to the bathroom.  I protest that her body is beyond the point of exhaustion, it will not be safe for her to stay up and that if she stays up, I will have to stay up too.  She is adamant; she will not return to bed, but insists that I must return to bed.  I am equally adamant.  If she is up, I need to be up.  It is unsafe for her to be awake and alone.  I get an outburst about how I am trying to make decisions about her treatment on her behalf instead of letting her make her own decisions.  I should butt out of making decisions about her health and let her make her own decisions.  In my exhaustion and frustration, I say “I am going to bed; good luck.  Try not to have a fall”.  I lie in bed wondering what I have done but fall asleep before I can follow up the question in my mind. I wake up at 6.40 am as Margaret uses the bathroom.  The diarrhoea is still present, although Marg says the severity has reduced. The district nurse this morning is Barbara.  She says she remembers Margaret from when Margaret was a cancer nurse at Flinders Medical Centre.  The bandages on the legs are not saturated this morning and the legs look as if they are trying to heal.  Despite this, Margaret’s movements are slow and full of pain.  She cannot move without the walker and my offers of assistance are always accepted. When Barbara has gone, we talk about our argument.  Margaret says she gets upset when I answer questions on her behalf when they are asked by the district nurse or by a doctor.  I say my only wish is to give information that is as full and detailed as possible.  Margaret tends to understate the extent of her symptoms.  This worries me because I am afraid it will result in her receiving treatments and medications that are less extensive and effective than would happen if the full extent of her symptoms is made known.  I say I will continue to tell the complete truth if this is what I have to do to ensure she gets the best treatment available – even if this means I get a tongue lashing from Margaret. I tell Margaret that I am desperately concerned about the deterioration in her health.  I vastly prefer that I be woken up multiple times so long as this means she gets a little more sleep.  I say I am so very worried about more falls because they will do even more dreadful damage.  Please come back to bed and get as much sleep as possible.  I do not mind at all if this means I get woken up. We are both faced by an impossible situation and we both have to make impossible decisions.  There is no “correct” decision; we can only do the best we can in the circumstances.  My sole wish is to do what I can to ensure her welfare.  She says she sees the exhaustion in my face and wants to try and minimise it.  I say that her staying up instead of coming back to bed is definitely not the best answer to my exhaustion or hers.