The Thirty Sixth Blog Of Trig - Painman

Hospital rooms are not very nice places in my experience. It depends where you are of course, and how much money you have. If you had the money I’m pretty sure you could find a ‘super-Bupa’ somewhere, where the nurses work topless and offer more than nursing. But generally, even in the richer countries, a hospital is a cold sterile place that no-one in their right mind would choose to die in, but that was exactly what Amber had chosen. The doctors told her that the cancer in her stomach had spread to the rest of her body, that she had only a few months to live, and that those months would be painful and unpleasant.

I had been a porter at the hospital for six months when she arrived, wheeled in by another porter called Terry. She had been a pretty woman before the cancer, with powerful blue eyes and long light brown hair, short with a sweet pretty face and a curvy figure, but now the shadows on her face sketched the bones beneath her pale skin to make her look like some kind of apparition. But she was still beautiful.

She was very distant at first. After we met I did my best to make her as comfortable as possible, and I visited her more often than I might have other patients, talking to her and making gentle attempts to make her smile or laugh. After a short while I managed to get a smile from her.

She had moments when something would make her forget where she was, and her face would light up with life, her grey eyes shining through some of the warm blue that they had once shone. But then the numb shadow of pain regained her attention and she seemed to wither before my eyes.

“Are you afraid of dying?” she asked me as I brought her breakfast to her one morning.
“No,” I replied without hesitating, “I don’t see any reason for anyone to pre-occupy themselves with fear, especially fear of the inevitable. It’s something we all have to face. Life is an amazing experience…in all its’ joy and pain, and it should not be wasted by living in fear.”
She smiled for a moment, and then her eyes lowered and the smile vanished.
“But I’m not living, am I Anthony. I’m dying. And I’m in terrible pain.”
I looked at her for a moment with a split-second of despair, and then took her right hand between both of mine and thought about how to respond. She waited, looking into my eyes longing for answers, but I couldn’t think what to say. I felt completely helpless for a moment, and I just looked into her eyes and attempted a gentle sympathetic smile. As I relaxed and stopped trying to decide what to say the words came out naturally.
“When I am in pain, rather than fighting it, I direct my attention on it. I recognise that my pain is coming from me and is a part of me and it’s essentially no different to any other sensation of the nerves other than how I choose to feel it. When I choose to feel the pain with my full attention it feels like I move into a state of mind that is in tune with the pain. It’s like all along the pain has been trying to get my attention, trying to get me to listen to it, and I’ve been fighting it, telling it to go away…and once I dedicate all my attention to it I find a place of relative peace…it feels like I’m fixing the problem just by the act of observing and understanding it…I guess it’s kind of like meditation really. Meditate on the pain. Feel the way it flows through you, follow it and move with it. Fighting it is fighting yourself.”
Her face briefly lit up with life as she had one of those far-away moments. I felt a prang of happiness at the realisation that I had given her a good answer, or at least one that I felt was true to my belief.
“Did you read that in a book?” She asked.
I hesitated and thought about it. I wasn’t sure. I’d certainly never read those words before. As my thoughts ended I spoke.
“No. I’ve read a lot of books that have influenced me to think the way I do, but that came from my experience. I used to get migraines that propelled me into a world of pain, and I used to fight it; grit my teeth and get angry and frustrated; I would actually punch myself in the head to try and stop it; until it started one day while I was too tired to try and fight it and I relaxed and let all the pain through, let it take me over, and it vibrated through my body until it wasn’t pain any more. It changed, or my understanding of it did. It was like some kind of electric field in the darkness, with no direction and no centre. Everything else had gone; sound, light, no hot or cold or anything else, even time seemed to have vanished. All that was left was the silent, still, vibrating field of the pain, and my attention; my perception; which was engulfed by it. I observed it but I was not separate from it. I was the pain, and I was observing myself. After devoting my attention to it, it faded back into me and I fell into a deep sleep.”
Amber listened intently, with a sad look on her face.
“I don’t want to feel the pain,” she said, looking at our hands with the twinkle of tears in her eyes. I squeezed her hand affectionately.
“No-one wants to feel pain, but it is a part of us all and something we all have to face. Face it head on. You cannot run from it any more than you can run from yourself, because it is a part of you. Turn and face it, follow it and try to understand it. It cannot escape you and you cannot escape it. It’s like a switch has been flipped inside you, turning on an electric current. You cannot escape it. Follow the current until you find its’ source, and who knows, maybe there will be an off switch.”

I left a short while later to continue my rounds, and from the look in her eyes when I left I knew that she cried after I went. Her body was very sick, and was screaming at her in the language of pain. She did not want to listen, but that was what I had told her to do. The thought of meeting the pain she had already experienced straight on was a shattering prospect. She was a strong girl, fighting the cancer like she was not ready to leave, but it was taking its’ toll, physically and emotionally.

The next day Terry told me that she had refused her pain medication that morning. I was a little worried. I went to see her and found her curled up in her bed. Her eyes were closed and she did not register my arrival, but she was not asleep. Her deep concentrated breath told me that she was taking my advice. I dared not disturb her from her concentration, but I wanted to try and comfort her somehow, so I sat down by her side and gently put my hand on the side of her head, stroking her temple with my thumb. As I made contact she took a deep breath in and slowly exhaled, and her breathing rate slowed, but each breath still filled her lungs to capacity. I did not try to speak to her. I closed my eyes and sat with her for some time, trying to empathise with her pain, trying in futile desperation to find some way to take it all away. I was disturbed by Terry whispering across the room.
“Anthony, the boss has asked where you are. I told her you were talking with one of the ‘terminals’ and she eased off, but you need to get back on shift or she’s gonna come looking for you.”
I looked at Amber’s concentrated yet peaceful face, and replied quietly to Terry, “I’m on my way.”
“Don’t go. Please.” Amber’s eyes remained closed and she did not move except to speak. I looked up at Terry.
“Can you cover for me for a while mate? I’ll be back soon.”
Terry had heard Amber’s plea and gave me a kind smile.
“Of course mate. Don’t worry about it.”
Amber’s quiet voice expressed her gratitude, “Thank you Terry.”
Terry heard her, and looked both happy and sad as he left. Amber did not speak again for a while. As I sat with her, her face alternated between that of pain and concentration, like she was travelling through a strange dream interspersed with bad things. I closed my eyes and tried to empathise. Before I knew it I was in a dream myself. I held a child in my arms. I knew in my heart that I had to protect the young girl with my life. She was injured and I had to watch over her until she had healed from her injuries, then she would be ready to face the world alone, able to defend herself. I flittered between strange unknown places, some calm and peaceful, some dark and threatening, and I felt thoughts gathering and beginning to form fears but I let them pass on through me. I walked through the darkness without worry, past threatening apparitions that were nothing but empty fear. They withered upon my passing as I explored the world of the dream. The child I held grew heavier as I walked, and I knew that this was a sign of her healing. I had to put her down eventually, but I held her hand tightly and kept her close to me. We walked together, noticing that the darkness had lifted, and suddenly she stood beside me as a woman.
“You’re squeezing my hand too hard.”
I opened my eyes and saw Amber looking at me.
“You were in my dreams,” she said.
“You were in mine too,” I replied. I held her hand, tight but gentle. She smiled.
“I should get back to work. How are you feeling?”
The skin on her face was too loose over her bones, and her neck looked thinner than healthy, but her colour had changed. She looked warmer, more alive.
“I feel the pain, but I’m not suffering from it. It’s like you said. I feel like I’m listening to the pain now, and it’s not hurting me anymore. I’m very tired though. I need to sleep.”
I smiled at her, hesitated, and then leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead.
“Get some rest. I’ll pop in tomorrow and see how you are.”
“Thank you Anthony.”
“It’s okay. I’m glad that you’re feeling a bit better.”
I smiled at her for a moment or two, then fluffed her pillows and tucked her bedding around her. She reached out her hand and put it on mine. There were tears in her eyes, but she smiled from one of those far-away moments.
“Thank you. I feel better than I have in a long time.”

She died that night. I did my rounds and looked in on her before I went home. She was asleep, with a peaceful look on her face. I really thought she might pull through, but I guess her body had nothing left to do in this world. A part of me was horrified at the possibility that my advice might have shortened her life, which my conscience dismissed. I had spoken my mind and she had made a decision to act on what I said. I had spoken honestly, and that was the only honourable thing that I could have done in the situation.

I still dream of her from time to time.