Life and Death Etc., Part Two

By Friday 26 February I was on my way back up North. I had gigs booked at the new Frog and Bucket Comedy Club in Preston - booked way back so that I could have a free weekend home - and planned to stay at my Dad’s flat. I got an early train and dumped my case before catching the bus to Blackpool Friday afternoon.

When I got to Victoria Hospital I was a bit concerned to see my Dad on the oxygen again. I asked him what was going on and he said they told him he had pneumonia! Nobody had mentioned this to me during any of my calls since I left on Tuesday lunchtime.

He was talking with a very raspy voice, having ripped the trachae tube out of his throat twice during the week. At least I could understand him now. I found a nurse and asked what was going on. She got the registrar to talk to me eventually and I was told that he did indeed have pneumonia and when I asked why nobody had told me when I’d rung in the morning he said it wasn’t diagnosed then. Hmmmm

I sat with Dad, holding his hand. He told me he was tired and that he’d had enough. I think he knew that he didn’t have long - knew more than me that’s for sure! I was still convinced he would live.
What I wasn’t sure about anymore was the quality his future life would have. I think his dream of returning to the flat and living independently was just that now, a dream. I believe now that he knew that too.

I left eventually, in tears, I had to get back and get to my gig. The bus back to Preston was one of the gloomiest journeys I’ve ever had, and when I got in I sobbed my heart out. I looked at the time and went to start getting ready “the show must go on” and all that. Next thing I knew I was on the floor. I must’ve collapsed.

I got up off the floor and rang the Frog to cancel the shows. I hated dropping them in it as such short notice but I wasn’t sure I’d even make it out of the flat.

I got into bed, took some sleeping pills and managed a few hours. Saturday I was up and out early. To add to my hassles there was no bus to Blackpool and the trains were fucked up too. I did get a rail replacement bus and dashed straight to the hospital to see Dad. His bed was empty, and a nurse told me he’d been moved onto the regular heart ward.

I took this as a good sign, after all he must be getting better right? Why else would they move him to a ward where he would receive less care? I eventually found him and my optimism was dashed. Jesus he looked rough.

For the first time I kicked off. I’d bitten my tongue when they fucked up the orginal op, I’d said nowt when they held off fixing that for 72 hours cos they thought he might die, but this was too much!

He told me he’d been awake all night, freezing cold and when he rang for the nurse nobody came. Well I made sure somebody came now! I demanded to see the registrar, and Dr Roberts the original surgeon.

Within an hour he was back on CCU and both of us were receiving apologies from Dr Roberts. He had no idea why Dad had been moved, he stopped short of saying that it shouldn’t have happened.
They upped the dose of anti-biotics and gave Dad a go on the nebuliser. His breathing was shocking. To think he’d started this whole fiasco cos he was breathless and they assured him he’d be fine after the intial op!

When everybody left, I held his hand, told him I loved him and told him that from this point on I was with him for as long as he needed me. I was gonna cancel my gigs for the forseeable future and cancel the planned trip to Thailand. There was no way I was gonna leave him to the mercy of these people.

He just kept saying he was tired, that he wanted to go home. He asked me to take him home so that he could die. He’d not eaten for two days, but I managed to feed him some soup and bit of ice cream, and we sat together sometimes in silence and sometimes reminiscing about the past, about my mum who died 4 and a half years ago nearly.

Eventually, he calmed and his breathing seemed to ease up. About 7pm on Saturday night I left him fast asleep.

I made sure the nurses knew to call me whatever time, if there was any change - good or bad - and they promised they would. They were gonna try some intense treatment with the oxygen and anti-biotics to blast the pneumonia out of his lungs overnight. I left the hospital with a heavy heart. Having been so sure he was gonna recover for the last three weeks, now that hope was gone. I could see the light in his eyes was dimming. He’d stopped believing.

Somehow I got home, on a coach full of young people all laughing and joking after their day in Blackpool. I was kinda numb and really exhausted. I remember getting to the flat and falling into bed. It was gone 10pm.

Sunday morning I was awake reading replies on Twitter when they were interrupted by a call on the iPhone from Blackpool Victoria Hospital at 6.10am. I froze as I answered it. There was a kind voice on the other end telling me that Dad was refusing all treatment and kept saying he wanted to die.

The nurse suggested I get over asap. I said I would but as I got out of bed I was kinda dawdling till it hit me that this was serious. I threw some clothes on and phoned a cab to take me to Blackpool.
By 7.30 I was at my Dad’s bedside, I could see he was determined to go. He was clearer and more lucid than he’d been for some time. He said he was tired and he wanted to die. I told him I loved him and that if he really had had enough, I wasn’t gonna try and talk him round.

He was the most determined I had ever seen him, it was really uncanny. He said he’d rather go back to the flat so that he could die there, and at first I gave him some b/s about how if he ate some breakfast he might be strong enough to go home. He just looked at me, and I said ‘Fine. The truth is Dad, if you die at home it means all kinds of hassle and extra paperwork for me’. He smiled and said ‘Ok then, I’ll stay here’.

In between visits from nurses and the doctor on call, Dad and I chatted about his funeral. The only thing he really wanted was “Let The Good Times Roll” by Louis Jordan to be playing at his funeral.
My cousins Karen and Alison along with my second cousin Carla came over from Preston. Alison was great. Somehow she hid her distress and had Dad laughing. Just as she has done all her life.
I’m not that close to my family really, mainly of account of me living away from Preston for so long, but I tell you one thing, at times like this they’re the best support in the world.

As the day wore on I realised that in my mind I always imagine life is one big drama after another, whereas the reality is, it’s lots of little events occurring one after the other, all quite simple at the time.

I expected my Dad’s death to be this real big deal, with a weeping and wailing and a gnashing of teeth etc., but it wasn’t. The nurses gave him a couple of doses of morphine during the course of the afternoon. Dad got quieter and quieter.

About 7.0pm I was sitting holding his hand. He’d not spoken for a while and neither had I. We were just there, together. He squeezed my hand so tight it must’ve taken whatever strength he had left. I wept silently but remembered what my Buddhist book of Living and Dying said about keeping things peaceful, so even tho I was kinda screaming inside, externally I appeared calm.

About 8pm his breathing began to slow down. He seemed to be asleep and all I could do was hold his hand and tell him how much I loved him, how I forgave him for the past, and thanked him for letting me be with him.

I told the nurses his breathing had slowed and they disconnected the monitor in the room to give us some peace and quiet. They could still see outside what was going on, but it stopped the alarms going off.

Over the next hour or so, his breathing got slower and slower and shallower and shallower. There was no drama, no fuss, it was like watching your iPod running out of energy in a bizarre way! At 9.15 there was no more breath. He was gone.

He really did look at peace and it really did look like he was just asleep, slowly the colour drained out of his face, but his arm stayed pink and warm for a good hour! I know cos I was sat with him, holding it.

His chest seemed to still be moving even though he’d been pronounced dead, and the nurse told me that when you die everything doesn’t just shut down all at once. This was the powerful force that was Joseph Smith coming slowly to a halt.

It might sound gruesome, but actually it was all rather beautiful. I am so glad I’d been with him for most of the last month of his life, that he hadn’t suffered too much, he’d been unaware of a lot of what he went through thank God!

At the end of the day, he was an 83 year old man who lived life to the full and then some! He died peacefully after a short illness. That’s how its meant to be.

Jason Wood, dead at 38? That’s the tragedy.