Ernest Becker has like death anxiety as a core motivation and I could argue opposite that some people have life anxiety
that’s sort of what Robin brought to the picture and
the death anxiety sort of I could link that to how we don’t honor the Dignity of people who are old and close to dying
but also we don’t honor each other’s dignity because we don’t recognize that life can be very hard
some people have a bias of Life anxiety
and we don’t give them space because
and we don’t give ourselves space where we see how life is hard
so sort of like the balance between the two and
a better relationship with death
has a benefit because it makes things real
I was playing with the idea
it’s linked to our sense of time
and that’s been interspersed with different, full life, not enough time
I’m working with a hospice patient right now who’s going through chemotherapy to try to slow down her progression
but she’s just facing her mortality
but the price of that is that she’s got all these treatments every week and
time is like drugged out too so she’s trying to get more time quantity
but just the enduring every day of the treatments makes time in the short term torturous
so the nitty-gritty of dealing with life and death is dealing with our sense of time
and it can be stretched where it can be intolerable
maybe that’s when death hits you in the face it’s intolerable because reality and time is just heavy
It sort of kills your ability to make meaning
because you can’t fit that into Concepts
like Joe talked about let’s have a negative view of death
death is sort of the scape goat or the mystery to stand in for the weightiness of existence
I’ll project that onto death or the bad guy
the struggle with the patient I’m working with is that
how do you die gracefully your how do you face mortality gracefully
and that’s not even in the picture now because she’s dealing with her treatments the headaches of many different things she’s trying to manage because she has no kids and her husband died first
but a life skill of
if we can face death and learn from death and learn from each other’s experience of death
can we learn to face our mortality and help other people face their mortality more gracefully
instead of saying did you live well are you able to die well
that would be even more impossible of a task
can you face death can you face other people’s mortality with dignity with grace with softness
can you soften into that that be one of Roshi Joan Halifax’s soft front strong back some metaphor
so what if the exposure to death and mortality and caregiving with no return
I’ve seen people who have that faced a sudden death or it’s quick or and then there’s medium my dad was about two and a half years and then there’s extended like dementia that might drag out for 10 years or 15 years and that sort of
the short-term sudden ones or this like suicide deaths that are surprises that’s a giant Time Bomb so there’s the suddenness of the experience and the unmet expectations and the Mystery is Amplified because it happened so fast
then the long drawn out ones
you’re so tortured if you’re the caregiver or you’re trying to navigate that mess of the situation
that’s torturous but also
if they’re dealing with a medical system that’s feeding them and their mental decline all that stuff that’s also torturous or potentially lack of quality of life because of the long drawn out time and
sometimes there’s like relief at the end of death that long drawn-out period because caregiver fatigue compassion fatigue its, it can wear on you
but maybe the Adaptive quality from a practice standpoint orthraproxy is that
being in the practice of caring for somebody who you know only has so many days left or is closer to death
you have to give maybe with less return
you’re providing service and it’s going into the void
in many different ways financially energetically
you could be caring for someone with dementia and they don’t see you they forget you
you’re investing in stories and it just
and that exposure to that it softens your ability to face mystery, tolerate uncertainty, for you and also the person who’s dying,
so a gift of extended slow drawn out death
especially with like dementia and they start forgetting themselves and regressing to childhood
that’s a psychological preparation per transition
Jungians probably can spend it better
so this is like rich territory probably
but we don’t talk about this this sort of liminal space in between
the void part was maybe talking about
was it John Didion or one author who was able to capture that
when you’re a caregiver for dementia
you sort of merge with that loss of sense of self so
you’re in this sort of
the practice of being a caregiver where there isn’t a return there isn’t something to grasp onto or narrative
that puts you in this sort of Transcendent State that’s hard to describe
but one of the books was able to describe
and that was part of a potential
that’s the time bomb issue
you get a taste of this Timeless aspect of time
which can be interpreted differently
yes in working with my husband
he’s not here but he’s here
I have lost him but he is here
and I take care of him
