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Manslaughter - Guilty by Definition

by Advancedserendipity

After over 13 years working a nurse I had witnessed some weird
and wonderful things. Occasionally, one of them stands out as
significant. Back in '97-'98 I went to Australia with a one year
working visa. During this time I worked for nurse agencies in
Melbourne, Perth and Sydney. The experience was a good one as I
was able to see how another health care system worked.

During this period a stack of interesting experiences occurred
for me, though the most significant happened in Sydney. What
happened here would alter my perception of life and what nursing
was all about.

Working as an Agency nurse in a city usually means working at
several different hospitals, in several different wards. This had
been my experience after 11 months in Australia.

For some reason I'd been allocated several consecutive night
shifts on a rehabilitation ward, in a private hospital. Since
this ward was generally quiet for most of the night I usually
brought a book along with me to pass the time.

To find my next book I went into a second-hand bookshop, went
to the New Age section, stood back and waited for a book to grab
my attention. One soon did - The Tibetan Book of Living and
Dying. I picked it up and started to read it that night.

The opening chapters explain, amongst other things, that the
main difference towards death in the East and the West is that in
the East people are generally prepared for death from a very
young age. The West has a general theme that we don't usually
face up to death until it's staring us in the face.

This resonated with me. How true. I had seen it on numerous
occasions - scared patients and hysterical families attempting to
make sense of the impending demise of a loved one after being
given a death sentence by a doctor.

I thought about this a lot during the next couple of nights.

During my time on this rehabilitation ward I got to know the
patients quite well. Each night I would stop in and have a chat
with each of them, handing out the assorted pharmaceutical
delights, which they had become accustomed to.

One of my patients was a lady called Dorothy. She had fallen
over at home several months ago. She had no medical history, just
a case of bad luck. She had a lovely smile and a most pleasant
demeanour.

After about eight shifts on this ward I went in one night to
be informed that Dorothy would be going home the next day. I
entered her room last that night so that I could have a longer
chat with her, beyond the cursory 5 minutes that we usually spent
together.

'Congratulations. You must be delighted,' I told Dorothy, as I
walked into the room.
 'Huh! Delighted? What possible reason would I have to be
delighted?' Dorothy was unusually curt in her response.
 'I don't understand. Are you not happy to be going home?' I
asked.
 'What have I got to be happy about. I live on my own and I can
barely make it from the bed to the toilet. I'm dependant on
someone else to do my washing, cleaning, shopping and cooking. I
can't ask my daughter to look after me - she has enough on her
plate. She has two young children and a very demanding job. I
have absolutely nothing to look forward to.'

Upon hearing this from this sweet, usually smiling, old lady I
found myself momentarily speechless. I had not expected that from
her. My mind went blank.

After a prolonged pause I asked her, 'Do you believe in life
after death?'
  Then it was Dorothy who paused, before looking me in the eye
and saying, 'Well, I'd like to but I just don't know.'

This prompted a discussion about life after death and some
various perspectives that I'd come across at that stage. We
talked for well over an hour and a half. I mentioned the Dalai
Lama being reincarnated several times and that this was fact
according to millions of Buddhists across the world. I'd also
heard about a Native American Indian ritual whereby people knew
they were about to die and sat around a fire and gave all of
their worldly belongings away. This was their way of cutting the
ties with this world and moving on to the next.

I had not thought about death too much before - but given the
choice between life after death and no life after death - I knew
which one I preferred the sound of. Despite this, I wasn't sure
either way.

At the end of our chat Dorothy grabbed my arm and her face lit
up. 'Thank you Adam, this has been the most useful conversation
that I've ever had.'

Her words touched me, though I thought little of it at the
time. She had been experiencing anxiety and I had said something
to alleviate it. I'd done this numerous times before. I wasn't
really sure about what I'd told her but she seemed happy enough,
so my job was done.

I looked in her room before leaving the next morning but
Dorothy was sound asleep, so I left the ward and went home.

That night I went back into the same ward. As I arrived, there
were doctors running down the ward and into the room that Dorothy
had been in. I wondered what was going on, as she should have
been discharged. I slowly made my way to the room and Dorothy was
flat on the floor and the crash team were attempting to
resuscitate her.

I went numb at the door as I witnessed the futile attempts of
the crash team to resuscitate her and the subsequent disbelief of
the entire ward staff. Dorothy had no medical history - this was
out of the blue. I'd been responsible for the death of Dorothy
and I was the only one that knew it.

After I had watched the resuscitation team in action and gone
numb, I felt a resounding peacefulness permeate my body. Had
Dorothy waited for my return to die?

I'll never know this for sure. What I do know is that any
doubts about whether there is life after death were eradicated
for me that day. For all of the books that I had ever read on or
around the subject, nothing had ever, or indeed has ever, come
close to what happened on that ward during those two nights.

I dedicate this article to Dorothy and thank her for the gift
of hope beyond doubt that she has given me.

Adam Shaw is a traveller, writer and Health Consultant. He has
spent most of his life developing skills in working with energy,
people and dynamic, personal insight techniques. He now runs <a
href="http://www.walkinnovation.com">insight workshops</a> to
teach this knowledge to others.
http://www.advancedserendipity.com

Syndicated by Top Gazebos - www.topgazebos.net

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