Dad, Ray Arland, and our Mom, Mary, his beloved wife of 68 years are pictured at their home before Ray’s death last month.
By Barb Arland-Fye
Faith on the Journey
Dad seemed preoccupied when we arrived at my parents’ home on a Saturday night in late September. Newly diagnosed with a fast-moving cancer, he had chosen to forego chemotherapy for in-home hospice care, but “what-if” questions filled his mind. My husband Steve and I cancelled previously made plans to fly to Oregon to spend that time instead with my parents, Ray and Mary Arland. We are grateful for that nudge from God.
The following night, Dad said he wasn’t feeling well. Minneapolis firefighters and EMTs arrived within minutes of Mom’s 911 call, examined Dad and whisked him off to the hospital because of his extremely low blood pressure. Steve and I followed the ambulance to the hospital. The emergency turned out to be the foreshadowing of Dad’s last week of life on earth.
The ER doctor informed us that Dad had pulmonary embolisms in both lungs and that the 4-inch cancerous mass in his abdomen had grown even larger in the two weeks since an oncologist diagnosed Dad’s Diffuse Large B-cell lymphoma. The cancer diagnosis had stunned my parents. Dad, 92 and physically fit his whole life, had just begun to experience health challenges in the last two years.
Now he was dying, as the ER doctor told me outside of dad’s treatment room. The next day, in his hospital room, Dad gave Mom a kiss and told her, “You’ll be OK.”
Hospice care is a gift, a team-centered effort of medical providers and loved ones who focus on providing comfort to a patient in the final stage of life. In-home hospice care requires a big commitment on the part of families and loved ones. If the care becomes too difficult for the family, they may need to consider other medical options, including hospitalization.
We were determined to help Mom (and my siblings) accompany Dad on his final journey to heaven’s gate and we did, in his favorite space, a four-season room the grandkids affectionately named “The Treehouse” for its view of the woods. This is the room where Dad engaged in his favorite pastimes — reading and bonding with his kids and grandkids while urging on his beloved Minnesota Vikings, Gophers and other teams.
Love guided us on the journey. The hospice nurses — on the phone and in person — sustained us as we navigated uncharted territory with plenty of trial and error. There were funny moments — when Mom told Dad the angels were waiting to open heaven’s gates for him and Dad responded in semi-consciousness, “The angels are bored!” — and poignant moments, when Dad asked Mom, “What do you suppose Christmas is like here?”
At times, Dad seemed restless and discouraged, drifting in that liminal space, where the veil between this life and the next is very thin. Mom leaned over Dad’s bed and told her husband of 68 years, “Ray, I promised that you would stay at home. We’re taking care of you right here. I’m here for you.”
Steve and I monitored Dad overnight, changing his wet clothing and sheets and assisting him when he tried to get out of bed even though he didn’t have the stamina to stand on his own. We slept very little but God kept us focused on the moment, on being present to Dad.
Our attempts to dress Dad after Steve gave him a shower left us laughing and crying. Mom had hold of one of Dad’s arms and I had the other as we struggled to place a short-sleeved shirt over his head. A hospice nurse later suggested cutting the back of a T-shirt down the middle as an easier dressing method and choosing roomy exercise shorts to complete Dad’s attire.
When Steve and I left the house to pick up supplies, Dad told my Mom worriedly, “They left,” and she responded, “Yes, but they’re coming back.” Dad said, “I need the big one, Steve. He’s the only one who knows what to do to help me.” Mom assured him, “Ray, they’re going to be back.”
We began using a gait belt for Dad to assure his safety. However, when I removed the belt as he prepared to get into bed, the buckle brushed against his calf, which began to bleed rapidly. We quickly bandaged the wound but dialed the hotline just to be sure he would be OK. The hospice nurse on call came to the house and said we had done a good job. She cleaned the wound and applied a specially designed bandage, which she showed us how to make.
During another exchange between Mom and Dad, when I wasn’t present, Mom said he told her, “Winter is just so pretty here.” She rubbed his cheeks and gave him a kiss. “He’d try to say, ‘I love you.’ Then I said, I love you,’” Mom recalled.
A loved one’s hearing is the last thing to go before death. The hospice nurses encouraged us to continue talking to Dad. My brother Tim and I played songs on YouTube — a couple of hymns and contemporary music that Dad and Mom loved, including their favorite, “The First Man You Remember,” from the musical “Aspects of Love.”
A hospice nurse named Sara talked by phone with Mom, Tim, Steve and me regarding the progression of Dad’s disease and medication for his final journey. Sara estimated that Dad was in the late transitional stage of dying, the stage prior to actively dying. It was four days after his trip to the emergency room.
His body’s operating system was shutting down. Dad began using his abdomen to breathe, which created a distressing sound, a “death rattle,” as a hospice nurse described it. The gurgling sound that accompanied it was the result of his inability to swallow.
The hospice nurses we called throughout this arduous, sacred journey were guardian angels, accompanying us as we accompanied Dad through this transition. It wasn’t the Hallmark moment we anticipated. The true Hallmark moments remain: my memories of the father who loved his family, lifted us up and lived his Catholic faith in word, thought and deed. In his final hours, Dad’s restlessness caused him to accidentally hit my cheek. It did not hurt but even in his semi-conscious state, Dad — always diplomatic and polite —said, “Pardon me.”
The final hospice nurse who visited us talked to Dad in a soothing voice as she administered his medications and checked his vital signs. She told us Dad had just minutes or hours before passing. I called my brother Tim to come quickly. Our other brothers, Pat and Brian, would be flying in from Arizona later that day.
The death rattle ceased and the quiet seemed deafening. Dad died at 6:40 a.m. Oct. 3, with my mom, Tim, and Steve and I at his side. We are grateful his suffering had ended but heartbroken to lose him.
Sixty-seven years ago, Dad welcomed me into the world after an hours-long wait for Mom to give birth to their first child. I had the privilege of accompanying him on his journey out.
(Barb Arland-Fye is the retired editor of The Catholic Messenger and is a member of Our Lady of the River Parish in LeClaire.)
