Category: Death Curiosities

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Death and the Irish: A miscellany

 Do we ‘do’ death best?

Collection features 75 perspectives on death in Ireland and whets appetite for further study

“The Humours of an Irish Wake as celebrated at St Giles London.” Original artwork: engraving by Thornton, published by Johnson c 1750.

By Bridget English

[T]he Irish wake is nearly as celebrated and stereotypical an Irish export as Guinness, leprechauns or shamrock. Its reputation as a raucous, drunken party that celebrates the life of the deceased is now regarded internationally as a desirable way to mark the end of one’s life, even for those who claim little or no Irish heritage.

It is conceivable, then, given the famous link between Ireland and death, that the Irish “do death well”. Where does this association come from? Do the Irish really “do” death better than anyone else? These are some of the questions behind a new collection of essays, Death and the Irish: A miscellany, edited by Salvador Ryan, a professor of ecclesiastical history at St Patrick’s College Maynooth.

The collection is part of a recent surge of academic interest in death and dying, as is evidenced by the publication of edited collections such as Grave Matters, Death and Dying in Dublin, 1500 to the Present (2016), edited by Lisa Marie Griffith and Ciarán Wallace, and Death and Dying in Ireland, Britain and Europe: Historical Perspectives (2013), edited by James Kelly and Mary Ann Lyons, both of which explore these themes from a historical perspective.

>Subtitled “a miscellany”, Death and the Irish is different from these publications because it features a medley of 75 perspectives on death and the Irish from historians, hospice workers, geographers, sociologists, anthropologists, theologians, priests, librarians, musicologists, and funeral directors, to name a few. It also covers a vast time span, taking readers from the fifth century to the present day.

Entertainment

The brevity of the essays (around three to four pages, including footnotes) and their pithiness, though a departure from the extended discussions commonly found in academic anthologies, is true to the form of the miscellany, which was originally intended for the entertainment of contemporary audiences.

Death and the Irish will interest readers looking for interesting tidbits of information on death and provides ample fuel for those searching for inspiration for further research.

Some tantalising morsels from the miscellany include: the tale of a young woman buried with her horse sometime between 381 and 536 AD; the variety of terms for death in the Irish language; social media’s role in keeping memories of the dead alive; an analysis of Stuart-era funerary monuments and what they reveal about women’s role in society; the 18th-century Dublin practice of laying executed corpses at the prosecutor’s door; a quirky account of the discovery of James McNally’s death by elephant in Glasnevin cemetery’s burial registers; and the story of a young cabin boy’s death by cannibalism.

Given the number of entries included in the volume, it is not possible to provide a detailed account of each, but a few entries are worth mentioning. Clodagh Tait’s Graveyard folklore and Jenny Butler’s The ritual and social use of tobacco in the context of the wake are particularly thought-provoking accounts of folk practices and the material cultures surrounding death. Tait’s gruesome description of the pieces of human remains that were collected for charms and the dead man’s hand that “could be used to make churning butter less onerous” provides readers with images that they are unlikely to soon forget.

One downside of Death and the Irish is that the experience of reading such short essays can be frustrating for anyone (particularly students) coming to the collection looking for an extended discussion of death practices in a particular era. Organising the entries by time period or by theme (burial, folklore, historical figures or events, etc) might make for more streamlined reading, but to do so would also destroy one of the collection’s main strengths, which is to bring disparate approaches together, taking interdisciplinarity to an extreme, provoking new ideas through a multilayered view of death in Ireland.

Under-represented

Despite the inclusiveness of Ryan’s miscellany, certain disciplines, such as history and theology, seem to dominate, while others are absent or under-represented. Philosophers have certainly shaped the ways that modern secular society conceives of death, yet there are no entries on the relationship between Ireland and philosophy.

Irish film, literature and drama feature some of the most insightful and humorous portrayals of death and dying in western culture, yet there are only three entries on literature, and these are limited to poetry (Irish language poetry, bardic poetry and 18th-century elegies).

These are minor criticisms and on the whole, Death and the Irish: A miscellany is commendable for its inclusion of marginalised groups such as Travellers, and for the links made between Irish practices and Jewish and Muslim beliefs. The Irish may not necessarily “do” death better than anyone else, but as this volume makes clear, the history and rituals surrounding death offer a rich and complex area of study, one that has much to tell us about Irish attitudes towards mortality and treatment of the dead.

Complete Article HERE!

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Songs of farewell

In her new book, Hallowell Singers founder Kathy Leo tells how music comforts the dying, and offers lessons for the living

By Richard Henke

BRATTLEBORO—Kathy Leo, the founder and director of Hallowell Singers, last month published On the Breath of Song: the Practice of Bedside Singing for the Dying, a book that offers guidance and insight into the practice of singing for the dying and their families.

Through the telling of true stories and over a decade of experience in song and spirit with the Hallowell hospice choir, Leo has written a guidebook for anyone offering end of life care or helping a loved one die.

“After many years of teaching workshops to newly forming or active hospice choirs, the decision to write a guidebook through personal experiences of being with the dying became clear,” writes Leo at the Hallowell website, www.hallowell-singers.org.

“On the Breath of Song is a way to get close to the bedside to explore your personal relationship with death and dying. It serves hospice singers, music therapists, chaplains, compassionate caregivers, hospice workers, and palliative care professionals.”

Birthing and dying

Although Leo has now been working with hospice care for over 15 years, she was a midwife in the Southern Vermont area for more than a decade before that. She didn’t find the change too great.

“You are in the same space: birthing and dying have similar energies,” she explains.

Shortly after Leo began her volunteer work for Brattleboro Area Hospice, musician Peter Amidon and others were invited to the bedside of a Putney woman under her hospice care to sing for two nights.

Leo writes about the experience: “In a small house on a back road in southern Vermont, a woman is dying at home surrounded by her loving family. It is a winter evening in 2003, a few days before Dinah’s last, a group of friends from the community and her church, gather around her bed to sing. She joins in. She mouths the words when her voice fails her …

“As we sing around her, Dinah is held up by her loving husband Fred, a daughter on either side of her. … [Hallowell Singers] formed after two visits to Dinah Breunig’s bedside in her home, her family welcoming and present, during the final days of her life on earth.”

Hallowell is a chorus of volunteer singers trained to practice the therapeutic art of singing for the dying. Based in Brattleboro, the chorus serves hospice clients through its affiliation with Brattleboro Area Hospice and the greater community by request.

Leo, who had been Dinah’s hospice volunteer, answered the call from Noree Ennis, the patient care Coordinator of Brattleboro Area Hospice at the time, to create and organize a “hospice choir” that would be available as a service to anyone who desired singing at the end of life as an offering of comfort.

Peter Amidon and Mary Cay Brass agreed to serve as musical directors.

‘Gifts of grace’

Almost 40 singers signed up to be trained and taught how to sing at the bedside of a dying person. Usually 4 to 6 singers go to the home of a man or woman in hospice care.

“We do not want to overwhelm the space,” Leo says. “We know how to make ourselves small in energy. Before we enter a home, we quiet ourselves internally, which can take a lot of work initially. Once there, we offer songs that are gifts of grace for everyone involved, the dying, their family and the singers.

“Beautiful things happen with music. Singing also creates a special space for a family to come closer with the dying. So much happens in this space that is rich with life, death, and mostly love.”

Leo explains that Hallowell doesn’t call these events performances, but rather, “sings.”

“We tell people not to applaud, that is not what we are here for,” she says.

The name for the Hallowell Singers comes from a song Brattleboro therapist Stephen Spitzer wrote about a friend from Hallowell, Maine, who died from a bee sting. “What he wrote so embodies the spirit of our mission that we took it as our title,” Leo says.

Since its inception in 2003, Hallowell has served hundreds of families in the Southern Vermont community.

“Little did we know at the time that as Hallowell grew and evolved, it would become a central ’practice’ in our lives, a way to learn how to live fully and with deep gratitude,” Leo writes. “Our songs and our quiet presence bring comfort and offer support to the dying. The response of those we sing for is often emotional and calming.”

Hallowell still works very closely with Brattleboro Area Hospice. “They are more like family, really, and they helped to shape and form us through support and training,” Leo confesses.

But Hallowell also has its own hospice training.

A careful approach

Leo felt the need to address specific issues that arise when singing at dying persons’ bedsides. Hallowell trainings deal with how to prepare for a sing, both individually and as a group, how to involve the family, and how to approach what Leo calls “the sacred space of dying.”

“We need to learn to enter and leave the space seamlessly,” she says.

Soon enough, the word about the special work that the Hallowell Singers were doing began to spread.

“We were asked if we could do a workshop on how to start a choir in Middlebury,” Leo says. Soon more groups were forming choirs that asked for Hallowell’s help.

“We have also helped to launch a still growing number of hospice choirs throughout the New England region and across the country by teaching workshops, offering guidance and counsel, and being available for continued support for developing hospice choirs,” Leo writes. “We are honored to be a strong model for the growing movement of the practice of bedside singing for the dying.”

Besides the numerous smaller workshops, for the past six years, Leo and Amidon have given a weekend “deepening workshop” once a year at the Rowe Center in Massachusetts.

“These are always well-attended, and people come from all over the country, even someone from New Zealand who wanted to start a Hallowell choir there,” Leo elaborates. “This movement, which began in Putney, now is spreading all over the world. Who can explain it? Perhaps it was just the right time, but it is pretty amazing.”

True stories of tenderness

Leo has often been exhorted to write a book offering guidance and insight into the practice of singing for the dying and their families.

“I first was asked to write up a guidebook years ago, but I kept telling everyone and myself, ‘It wasn’t the right time, it wasn’t time, it wasn’t time,’” she says.

But finally Leo realized that she had no real excuse for delay, and the result was On the Breath of Song.

Although the book is intended to help others working with hospice choirs, this is definitely not a book a rules. Instead, Leo says she has written a book of true stories filled with tenderness and emotion.

“Singing for the dying is intuitive, where strict rules have no place,” Leo says. “Consequently, when I came to write down all that I have learned over the years working with Hallowell, I realized that the best manner was through stories which inform the teaching. At the heart of these stories are the songs we sing, and the spirit of love we bring to this practice.”

Complete Article HERE!

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Hearts removed from corpses and Renaissance mummies rewrite Europe’s history of death

Bodies were embalmed in the Renaissance not for secular but for religious purposes.

By

Lead coffins containing the skeletons found in the Jacobin convent.

Hundreds of burials discovered in a convent in Brittany, France, have shed new light on medieval and Renaissance funerary practices. Archaeologists have identified mummified corpses, as well as hearts and brains extracted from the deceased bodies that suggest that burials were still deeply rooted in superstition and religious belief.

In 2015, a team from the French national institute for preventive archaeology (INRAP) fully excavated the Jacobin convent in the city of Rennes, which had been founded in 1368 and served as primary burial site for the local aristocracy.

The archaeologists encountered around 900 burials spanning two periods – the 14th to 15th centuries and the 16th through to the 18th century. A number of studies backed by major historical evidence have previously suggested that funeral rites in Europe evolved from the Middle Ages to the Modern era through a process of gradual secularisation.

Another coffin discovered within the Convent in Rennes.

Embalming was a rare practice, usually reserved for the bodies of kings. During the Renaissance however, surgical interventions and embalming was seen as a common preparation for the display of the deceased’s remains, one that had no religious or symbolic value. Thus, archaeologists believe that burials became more secular as years went by.

But the study recently published in the journal PLOS ONE has contradicted these hypotheses. It proposes a new view of the history of death in Europe and of the rituals that go with it.

Extracted hearts and mummies

During their excavations of the Rennes convent, the researchers came across a range of notable burial practices and used imaging and autopsies to study the remains. They were able to identify more than 600 skeletons, as well as two very well conserved mummies from the Renaissance.

For the first time, the archaeologists also documented the practice of heart extraction. They found five hearts which had been removed from the bodies and placed in heart-shaped urns, dating between 1584 and 1655. There was also evidence that the brains had been extracted from some of the corpses as some skulls had been opened.

The scientists conducted autopsies on the corpses to find out more about how they were buried.

Louise and Toussaint

In some instances, the hearts had been placed in the coffin of the person’s spouse. This was the case for Louise de Quengo, a benefactor of the church who was more than 65 years old when she died in 1656, during the Renaissance. The heart of Toussaint de Perrien, her husband, was placed on top of her coffin. He had been buried in another convent in a separate location.

While the team notes that embalming and surgical operations on bodies did occur in Renaissance burials, it is unclear whether this was done for secular and medical purposes or not.

“Louise de Quengo’s internal organs had not been cleaned, no padding had been introduced, the skull had not been cut into, and there were no incisions on the upper or lower limbs, as was often recommended in medical treatises of the period,” they point out.

The removal of the heart and the good state of conservation of the bodies rather served a spiritual and symbolic purpose. In the case of Louise and Toussaint, the idea may have been to honour them in two religious sites of which they had been benefactors. The husband’s heart on the wife’s coffin also suggests the strength of their marital love.

Hearts were removed and placed in heart-shaped urns.

The fact that Toussaint de Perrien’s remains are present at two different religious sites means that he honoured different religious orders, even in death. It also means that a greater number of prayers could be made in his name, giving him greater chances of entering heaven.

The scientists also believe that the presence of well conserved Renaissance mummies at the site echoes the Council of Trent’s affirmation of the “Resurrection of the Flesh” – resurrection would come with the Last Judgement and so preserving bodies would ensure the faithfuls would rise from the dead. Bodies were embalmed to be preserved for religious purposes, but not to be displayed.

Investigations in the Jacobin convent in Rennes shows that Renaissance society’s attitude towards burials was still influenced by age-old, religious practices, while the secularisation of burials likely came later.

Complete Article HERE!

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5 places: Where you can’t die

By Himanshu Yadav

[A]s you know, death is inevitable. But there are places where humans have made the laws which prohibit a person from dying. Dying or giving birth was banned for religious reasons in 5th century BC, on the Greek Island of Delos. Here are some places where dying is not allowed.

1. Itsukushima, Japan

The island of Itsukushima is considered a sacred location in Shinto belief, and is the site of the Itsukushima Shrine, an UNESCO World Heritage Site. Purity is of utmost concern in Shinto worship, and because of this, the shrine’s priests have attempted to keep the island free of the pollution of death. Immediately after the Battle of Miyajima in 1555, the victorious commander had the bodies of the fallen troops removed to the mainland, and ordered that the entire battlefield be cleansed of the blood that was spilled, to the point that buildings were scrubbed and blood-soaked soil was removed from the island. No deaths or births have been permitted near the shrine.

2. Sellia, Italy

Five hundred and thirty-seven people live in Sellia, a medieval hillside town right on the ball of the foot of Italy. In the 1960s, it was three times that, and today most residents are over 65. As a result, Sellia’s laws are also developing a medieval flavour. Last month, in response to its demographic crisis, the mayor, Davide Zicchinella, signed Ordinanza 11 which makes it expressly “forbidden to get ill within the municipality” and insists that “dying is prohibited”. Those who selfishly refuse to take the necessary steps to comply with this law by attending health checks can expect to be fined 10 Euros a year.

3. Lanjaron, Spain

Death has been prohibited in the Andalucian town of Lanjarón. The village, with 4,000 inhabitants, is to remain under this law until the government buys land for a new cemetery. The mayor who issued the edict explains that the awkward new law is his response to politicians urging him to find a quick fix for a long-lasting problem. The edict has become wildly popular amongst residents, even amongst political opponents of the mayor who issued the law, and was received with a sense of humor from most.

4. Longyearbyen, Norway

The frozen town of Longyearbyen in the Svalbard Islands of Norway has a completely different reason to ban deaths in the area. The bodies there never decompose. Due to permafrost, dead bodies were completely well preserved and did not decay. In fact, live samples of the virus of the Spanish influenza epidemic in 1917 were taken from bodies buried there. People who are gravely ill or about to die are taken to different parts of Norway.

5. Sarpourenx, France

Three settlements in southern France have prohibited death. The mayor of Le Lavandou outlawed death in 2000, after planning permission for a new cemetery was turned down due to environmental concerns. He described the new bylaw as “an absurd law to counter an absurd situation”. In 2007, Cugnaux also prohibited death, for similar reasons, and was subsequently granted permission to enlarge the local cemetery inspired by the town’s success, Sarpourenx was next to follow suit, in 2008.

Complete Article HERE!

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Dying of a Broken Heart

[I]s grief powerful enough to kill? The world is mourning the death of actress Debbie Reynolds who herself was in mourning following the death of her daughter Carrie Fisher just one day earlier. Could that grief have played a part in the stroke that killed her? “I was not surprised to hear of her death,” says Katherine Supiano, PhD, LCSW, FT, Director of the Caring Connections Grief Program at the University of Utah. “This is an uncommon phenomenon, but it does happen. Even the American Heart Association has recognized ‘broken heart syndrome’ as a cause of death following the death of someone close.”

The American Heart Association is not the only organization that has looked into “broken heart syndrome.” A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2014 found older adults who lost a partner saw their risk of dying from a heart attack or a stroke double in the 30 days following. One reason may be that stress raises the level of cortisol in body. Increased levels of cortisol have been linked to cardiovascular death. Other hormones may play a role as well. “Emotional stressors can also lead to a significant release in adrenaline,” says John Ryan, MD, a cardiologist with University of Utah Health Care. “This can have an impact on the cardiovascular system.”

Physical changes in the body are not solely responsible for the increased risk though. People make behavioral changes while under stress or suffering from grief. These may impact their health. “They may not be taking care of themselves,” says Ryan. “They may not be taking medications for underlying conditions, or they may be eating poorly, or start smoking again. All of these can raise their risks of cardiovascular problems.”

The nature of the relationship lost may also be a factor. A close caregiving bond may be harder to lose, especially if that caregiving relationship has been long standing – like that of a mother with a child. “We all know that Carrie Fisher had several difficulties in her life,” says Supiano. “Reynolds may have been in the role of emotional caregiver. When that role was no longer available the stress may have become overwhelming contributing to her death.”

Supiano says that in situations like these it might not just be grief and stress, but also a feeling that now caregiving is no longer needed that the work of the caregiver is done. “We do hear people say that,” she says. “And in some cases, very quietly, their lives end.”

While grief may make a person feel they want to die – the vast majority do not. The levels of stress hormones will dissipate over time, and behavioral patterns will return to normal. Life will go on. “People are hard wired to be able to grieve,” says Supiano. “The majority of people are actually highly resilient and given enough time, and social support most people navigate this pretty well.”

Complete Article HERE!

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A Dying Man’s Wish To Donate His Organs Gets Complicated

By Karen Shakerdge

Dave Adox, right, and his husband Danni Michaeli at their home in South Orange, N.J., in the fall of 2014. Adox was diagnosed with ALS at age 42 and became almost totally paralyzed within six months. He died last May.

[A]t 44 years old, Dave Adox was facing the end of his two-year battle with ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. He needed a ventilator to breathe and couldn’t move any part of his body, except his eyes. Once he started to struggle with his eyes — his only way to communicate — Adox decided it was time to die.

He wanted to donate his organs, to give other people a chance for a longer life. To do this, he’d need to be in a hospital when he went off the ventilator.

“I was always interested in organ donation and had checked the box on my license,” Adox said last spring at his home in South Orange, N.J., through a machine that spoke for him. He laboriously spelled out these words, letter by letter, by focusing his eyes on a tablet. Adox had spent a career with words that now came slowly — he was a freelance reporter, including for public radio, then went on to work in advertising.

“When I got diagnosed with ALS at 42, and the disease paralyzed my entire body in six months, I definitely developed a greater appreciation of the value of the working human body,” he said.

Adox and his husband, Danni Michaeli, made a plan. They would go to University Hospital in Newark, where Adox often had been treated, and have

Family members surround Adox on the day that he died last May. His wish to die in a hospital so that he could donate his organs turned out to be difficult to fulfill.

his ventilator disconnected. The doctors there had reassured Adox he could ask to come off the ventilator anytime.

In May his family and friends flew in from around the country, and joined neighbors for a big celebration of Adox’s life. They spent one last weekend with him, planting a tree and painting a big, colorful mural in his honor. Some wore T-shirts printed with Adox’s motto, “Celebrate everything until further notice.”

But their plan suddenly changed when University Hospital’s attorneys intervened.

“At the 11th hour, they emailed us and said their lawyers had stopped the process because they were afraid it looked too much like assisted suicide,” Adox explained. “I was crushed.”

Every day, physicians withdraw life support on behalf of patients in hospitals who choose to refuse care. That’s generally not considered physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia — the key being that the patient is already in the hospital.

But Adox was asking to be admitted to the hospital specifically to end his life. And despite the planning, his request made some people uncomfortable.

Dr. John Bach, a professor of physical medicine rehabilitation and neurology at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, which is affiliated with University Hospital, was Adox’s primary physician, and understood and approved of his patient’s plan to end his life and share his organs.

“I could have given [him] a prescription for morphine and he could have been taken off the ventilator at home,” Bach says. “But he wanted his organs to be used to save other people’s lives!”

Other physicians at the hospital supported Adox’s plan, too.

“We have an ethics committee that approved it 100 percent,” Bach says. “We have a palliative care committee — they all agreed, 100 percent. But it didn’t make any difference to the lawyers of our hospital.”

Adox before he was diagnosed with ALS. He decided to become an organ donor so that other people could enjoy a longer life.

University Hospital has declined several requests for comment, but Bach says the hospital’s attorneys were concerned about liability.

“The legal issue is: What is euthanasia?” Bach explains. “Are you killing a patient by taking him off a respirator that’s keeping him alive?”

Adox had an advance directive that stated, “I do not want medical treatment that will keep me alive if I have an incurable and irreversible illness and the burdens of continued life with life-sustaining treatment become greater than the benefits I experience.”

Having an advance directive on file is especially important for ALS patients, Bach says, because they can eventually become “locked in,” unable to express their wishes.

“To be locked in means you cannot move anything at all — not a finger, not a millimeter,” Bach says. “You cannot move your eyes; you cannot move your tongue; you cannot move your facial muscles at all. You cannot even wink to say yes or no.”

In this particular case, the hospital wouldn’t have had to rely on the directive, Bach noted: Adox was still fully capable of expressing his wishes clearly. It deeply troubled the physician that his patient’s wishes could not be met.

“Myself and all the other doctors who took care of him in the hospital were almost as upset about it as he and his husband were,” Bach says.

Dr. Joshua Mezrich, a transplant surgeon at the University of Wisconsin Hospital, has had patients with ALS who, like Adox, wanted to donate organs. He believes hospitals need to create protocols for these situations — even though such cases are rare.

Mezrich acknowledges this could challenge a key principle for physicians: First, do no harm. But that mandate can and should be interpreted broadly, he believes.

“I think it’s fair to say that doing no harm doesn’t always mean making people live as long as possible — keeping them alive no matter what,” Mezrich says. “Sometimes, it means letting them have the death that they want, and it means letting them give this gift, if that’s what they want.”

Still, planning one’s death to allow for organ donation raises some thorny questions, says Arthur Caplan, director of the division of medical ethics at New York University and author of Replacement Parts: The Ethics of Procuring and Replacing Organs in Humans.

Adox and Michaeli with their son, Orion, in the winter of 2015.

Typically a separate team of physicians or an organ procurement team discusses donation with family members after a patient dies, to avoid any tones — whether real or perceived — of coercion or conflict of interest, Caplan points out.

“You’d have to change the culture of critical care and say it’s OK to talk with the person about organ donation as part of their dying,” he explains.

This issue may get bigger, Caplan believes, as states move to legalize physician-assisted death. Although, so far, there has been little public discussion because “it’s too controversial.”

“If we went in the direction of bringing more people who are dying — whether it’s ALS or whatever it is — into settings where we could have them consider organ donation because they’re on the machines, we’d probably have a bigger pool of organ donors,” Caplan says.

But that approach would have a downside, too, he continues. People might perceive doctors as more focused on “getting organs” than caring for dying patients.

Adox takes one last walk with family and friends in New York’s Central Park before going to a hospital to be disconnected from the ventilator that kept him alive.

There is at least one hospital that has established a policy for patients with ALS who want to be organ donors. Froedtert Hospital and its partner Medical College of Wisconsin, in Milwaukee, approved such a policy in May.

About a year ago there, a patient with ALS wanted to donate her organs, but the hospital wasn’t able to honor her wish. The experience prompted physicians to develop a multistep system that includes evaluation from psychologists, an ethics review and considers technical matters such as transportation or insurance coverage.

“Obviously we’re all sensitive to any perception of assisted expedition of death,” says Dr. William Rilling, vice chair of clinical operations of radiology at Froedtert Hospital. “But, at the end of the day, the patient’s wishes count for a lot.”

After University Hospital declined to admit Adox, he and his husband reached out to six other hospitals through various intermediaries. They waited for days to hear back.

In the end, LiveOnNY, the organ procurement organization based in New York City, stepped in to help. The organization’s medical director, Dr. Amy Friedman, went to visit Adox at his home to vet his suitability as a donor.

“There was a hospital partner,” Friedman says, “that felt very supportive of this circumstance, understood the challenges that they would be faced with, [and was] prepared to be supportive of what Dave wanted and would be able to provide a bed.”

Finally, on the palliative care floor at Mt. Sinai Hospital on May 18, Adox and Michaeli prepared to say their goodbyes.

“We sat; we listened to ’80s music. I read Dave a poem,” Michaeli recounts, close to tears. “And when they were really sure — and we were all really sure — that he was in a deep state of sedation they disconnected his breathing machine.”

And in the end, Adox’s wishes were met — he was able to donate his liver and kidneys. Michaeli says he felt “an incredible swelling of gratitude” to the hospital team who helped make that happen.

“The person we were trying to do a direct donation for was a match,” Michaeli says. “And he has Dave’s kidney right now.”

Complete Article HERE!

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After a 73-year union, two hospital beds pushed together offer the best comfort

Retired Army Col. George Morris, 94, is receiving end-of-life care at Fort Belvoir Community Hospital (Virginia), where his wife, Eloise, 91, is a “compassionate admission,” lying beside him.

By Tara Bahrampour

[F]or 73 years – through wars in Europe and Asia and civil rights battles at home, through the assassination of a president and the rise of rock-and-roll – they shared a bed.

He’d be gone sometimes, flying missions during World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars, but he always came back to her.

So now, as he lies in a hospital bed unable to say or do much, she lies beside him.

Like many hospitals, Fort Belvoir Community Hospital, where retired Army Col. George Morris, 94, is receiving end-of-life care, allows family members to sleep in a patient’s room on a fold-out couch. But for George’s wife, Eloise, 91, a cancer survivor who has suffered two broken hips and a broken shoulder, that would be hard.

So the hospital made a special exception when they admitted him this month: They admitted her as a patient, too – a “compassionate admission,” their doctor calls it. Standard rooms are normally private, but Eloise’s hospital bed was rolled in and pushed up against George’s – a final marriage berth for a husband and wife who met as teenagers in rural Kentucky in the late 1930s.

He spotted her first.

“I was a sophomore in high school, and I’d gone to see a play in a country school,” said Eloise, sitting up in her reclining bed, a birdlike woman in oversize bifocals whose hair is hardly touched by gray. George rested in his bed beside her. “He saw me and went home and told his mother, ‘I just met the girl I’m going to marry.’ He said, ‘I looked her over real well and I couldn’t find anything wrong with her but one crooked tooth.’ ”

A movie date and a picnic followed. Eloise can’t recall the movie – she was too distracted by the thrill of holding his hand in the dark.

The picnic, however, was unforgettable.

“Here comes George and he had something in his hand with a crank on the end and I wondered what this was.” It was something she’d never seen before – a portable phonograph, and when he turned the crank it started playing “Sweet Eloise,” a popular song at the time. He turned that crank all afternoon. “Oh, I thought that was great.”

The town of Russell Springs, Ky., where she lived on a farm, was eight miles from Columbia, where he lived. He didn’t have a car, so he’d walk the distance to see her. By 15 she was wearing an engagement ring and had no doubts about what she was doing.

“He had thick eyebrows and devilish eyes, and I hadn’t seen any guys my way that good-looking,” she said. “I thought that he was more intelligent than any man I’d ever met.”

They married and had two sons and a German shepherd who played outfield in family softball games. After stints in Tokyo and Alaska, they eventually settled in Annandale, Virginia.

Eloise Morris, married 73 years, wears a ring she chose after she lost her original wedding ring. (It was found many years later.)

Those legendary eyebrows are wispy now, the devilish eyes half-closed as he lies beside a tray of juice and apple sauce. But every now and then as she spoke he chimed in, his voice rising alongside hers like an echo.

“We had some lean times but some great times,” she said. “We didn’t have a lot of material things, but we could sure have a sweet time. There was lots of love around. George could always make me feel so protected.”

It was a stark contrast from her youth – her father left her mother before she was born, and she grew up an only child, helping her mother and grandparents tend to the sheep and cows and chickens.

As partners, the two complemented each other. “He was strong-willed. I don’t mean bossy-bossy. But his father would say, ‘Eloise knows how to make George think he’s boss.’ Some people might call that tricky, but I know how to keep people happy. I know how to keep George thinking that he’s making the decisions.”

Being married to an airman had its challenges. He took her up once in a P-51 Mustang fighter plane and it nearly killed her. “I couldn’t hear and I was very sick to my stomach. When he did the roll, that was fine, but when he did the loop, well, I kind of blacked out and my mouth opened and I just couldn’t stand it.”

George had a lot of friends who didn’t come back from the wars. During Vietnam, “he said one of the saddest things was when he brought the dead soldiers home – he said that was heartbreaking because they were so young.” He retired in the 1970s.

The secret to seven decades of love? “Be happy, whether you’re happy or not. Laugh.” Like they did the time they were posted somewhere new and they arrived before their belongings – including their sheets and pillows.

“We cut up the newspaper and put our heads on one duffle bag, and every time we moved, the paper in it would rattle and we laughed all night,” she said, grinning. “We really, really loved each other. We were lonely, lonely when we were apart, and when he’d come home, it was just heaven.”

Their sons have since died – the older one three or four years ago, the younger one several months ago – and most of their grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and a great-great-grandson live in other towns. Although they visit sometimes, it is mostly just the two of them.

Admitting Eloise so she could be with George was not a hard decision, said the couple’s doctor, U.S. Army Maj. Seth Dukes. “We take care of the people who’ve taken care of our country,” he said. “And we extend that to their loved ones.”

At this point, Dukes said, George is dealing with a combination of medical issues, and the goal is to keep him comfortable.

For Eloise, it’s hard to see him unable to talk or eat much. “The expression on his face has changed; his eyes just look fixed,” she said. “It’s heartbreaking to see somebody lose everything, especially the days that he doesn’t know me.”

But her presence seems to comfort him. “He talks in his sleep, and when he starts I just put my hand on his and he stops.” And during the day, she talks to him. “Even though I don’t know if he can hear me, I always thank him for looking after me so well.”

An aide peeked in. Eloise seemed tired. So she did what comes most naturally: She lay down beside her husband and reached for him, their hands now mottled and roped with veins, but their fingers still knowing how to intertwine.

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