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Death as the central flame
As a nurse I have a fair mount of experience with death — one might say a familiarity even — after over a decade in hospitals. Sometimes I hold people’s hands as they take their last breaths (and I mean this quite literally, trite as it sounds); sometimes I am the one to find that they have died; sometimes I prepare the body before bringing it down to the morgue. Some of the deaths I have witnessed are violent, unexpected ends when working in Emergency Departments. These leave the team drained after an exhausting time spent trying to save someone’s life. Other deaths are quiet and calm. Often, I care for people in the months and weeks leading up to their deaths, reducing suffering as much as possible as they prepare to die. Some deaths strike me more than others at the time, some stay with me more than others in the long run.
The first sudden death I ever saw — possibly the first death I witnessed — back when I was a student nurse on my first practical placement in the Emergency Department, has certainly stayed with me. The patient was a man in his 50s who had been out shopping at Ikea and had a heart attack. He collapsed, an ambulance was called and he was brought in to us. The resuscitation team kicked into action. The other students and I were each given a chance to do chest compressions, so that we could see what it feels like on a…
