Saying Goodby to Edna

(Note: This was written just over a year ago after visiting Edna, one of my congregation members.)

It’s hard watching a loved one die.

It’s particularly hard watching a loved one suffer as he or she goes through the process.

As a pastor, I cannot escape the reality of people dying. It’s part of my job to help a person prepare spiritually for that last breath. There is both great honor and great sadness in doing so.

There is honor as a man or woman realizes that death is immanent, asks for you to bring Holy Communion or to pray at the bedside, and then enters into a peace that passes all understanding. God has used you to bring that person to the point of accepting death and instilling the peaceful understanding of meeting God at the final breath. There is almost no greater place to be at that moment.

Yet, there is great sadness. You stand there beside a person you have come to know and love in the time you have served a church. You remember conversations, meals shared, and times of laughter. You know in a few short weeks, days, or hours, you will no longer have such things again. Sure, you know that you will see this person in heaven once again, but a relationship on earth is ending. It does damage your heart.

In every situation leading up to death, there is a holy moment that changes a person for eternity. That moment with Edna came unexpectedly.

Edna was a self-described "tough old bird." She went through life with that attitude, even though down deep, she was an ol’ softie. I don’t think she ever called me to tell me about her medical issues or the medical issues that her husband suffered before his death. Edna hated, detested, reviled, picking up the telephone and calling someone. It was a reaction to the many years she was forced to do so while working. But find out about such issues, I eventually did–including her diagnosis with cervical cancer.

Edna might have gotten her diagnosis early enough if she hadn’t been taking care of her dying husband Willie. But she felt a duty to care for him during his last days. Only afterward did she go to the doctor to find out what was causing her so many problems.

Chemotherapy ensued. The cancer was inoperable at the time because it was so massive. After several months, surgery was scheduled, and the vast majority of cancer was removed from her body.

But as is the case with such surgery. The human eye is incapable of seeing microscopic particles. More chemo followed as well as radiation. But it was to no avail. The cancer had taken a strong root, and it would not be defeated.

Several months went by, and Edna was taken to the hospital once more. Her bowel was obstructed. Surgery was required again. The report following the procedure was not good. The cancer was once again massive and had caused the blockage. She would have months to live.

Watching someone from this point forward is not exactly fun. I knew Edna was going to die, and even though she knew it, she didn’t want to acknowledge it. She moved into a nursing home and began that final process of heading toward death’s door.

Once a week, I would travel the 70+ miles to see her. We shared a few laughs, and she shed a few tears at times. Mostly she talked of her pain and how it hurt to eat and even drink. The cancer had entered her stomach and had made life miserable. She still didn’t want to talk about dying. She’d come close. She’d hint around it, but it was too emotional to take that final step.

Edna finally accepted that she was dying. After several weeks, she began to talk about the end of her life. Mostly it was in the form of questions. Why after so many hard years did a person have to suffer while dying? Why after trying to do the right things did someone have to be so miserable and full of pain? What was her purpose at this point and time?

Such questions are common place. I have long given up trying to give a good answer. I have none. I told Edna several times that I had no idea and that all I could do was trust that God had the big picture. Eventually, I’d find out as would she. It’s not an answer that satisfies, but it’s the best one I’ve got. It seemed to me that Edna clung to the hope it provided.

The Tuesday after Labor Day, I made my way down to see Edna once more. She had been moved to the second floor of the Vosswood Nursing Facility. It was the hospice ward. Her death was not far off.
I walked in the room, and she was not having a good day. I could see that she had lost quite a bit of weight from the last time that I had seen her. She was beginning to suffer confusion from lack of food and drink. She did, however, recognize me.

We went through the usual litany of questions: How’s life in Cat Spring? How is the church? How are your kids? What’s new?

I could tell that Edna was uncomfortable. She had commented that she was very nauseous and that the medicine they gave her for nausea actually made it worse. She paused after one of our verbal exchanges. The silence hung in the room for a full minute.

Afterward, she opened her eyes and said, "If nothing happens between now and next week, the next time you come and see me, would you bring me Communion?"

My mind rushed back to just a couple of years into my calling as an ordained pastor. An elderly woman had been admitted into the nursing home with chronic lung problems and congestive heart failure. I went to visit, and she asked me to bring her communion the next time I saw her. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a next time. She died before I could bring her the Sacrament. I learned a hard lesson from that experience. Never do I leave the church without my home communion kit.

I responded, "Edna, I have my communion kit out in my truck. I’ll be right back. We’re not going to wait."
I proceeded to head down to my truck to retrieve my kit. I had a temporary moment of panic as I thought through the weekend and my leading worship at a local nursing home. I had given Communion to my members there and then put the kit into my guitar case. That case was back at the office. Had I remembered to take it out? Thankfully, when I opened the door, the kit sat right there in the passenger seat. "Thank you, Lord," I breathed.

I grabbed it and headed right back into the nursing home.

I rode the elevator up in silence remembering the last person who asked for Communion in the hospital. Another elderly member who died of cancer in the hospital days after I gave him communion. I wondered if history was not repeating itself.

I arrived on the second floor and walked to Edna’s room. I heard what sounded like a man in the neighboring room coughing and retching. I prayed for him. But as I turned to Edna’s room, it wasn’t someone in the next room at all. It was Edna. Her nausea had overcome her. She was retching painfully. I set my Communion kit down and just stood there.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she managed to throw up some awful, green, chunky bile. It was reminiscent of the fluid taken through one of those stomach drains after a person has stomach or intestinal surgery. I fought down my own wave of nausea.

At this point, I headed to the bathroom. I pulled out several paper towels and moistened them in the sink. I brought them to Edna, and she began cleaning up some of the spittle. But then the retching started again. She wasn’t done. I returned to the bathroom for more.

I confess, I hated those moments. I hated listening to the sound of the retching. I hated seeing that green stuff in the bottom of that plastic throw up thing. I hated that Edna was having to suffer with pain and retching and weakness. I hated that I had to witness it. There are myriads of other things that I would have rather been doing at that moment.

But I couldn’t. I was there. It was and is my job to be there. Whenever others might have the luxury of running, I have to stay put. It’s my job to represent God’s presence at that moment in time. If I can offer an act of kindness and compassion–it’s even better. I stayed in that room with a retching child of God whose stomach had been invaded by cancer. I stood there and waited until she was finished so that she could put into her stomach something else. Something that instead of taking her life was capable of giving her life. I stood there because at that moment in time, God called me to make sure this woman understood that despite all the suffering He was still there for her.

When Edna finally endured the last of the vomiting and her nausea passed, she said, "I think I’m better now. I’m sorry. I think I’m ready to take communion."

As I readied the wafer and poured the wine, I told Edna that she had no need to apologize. She couldn’t control what was going on inside her. It was okay by me.

As I spoke the words, "In the night in which He was betrayed..." that room was filled with the presence of the holy. We knew the reasons for this moment. We knew what it was all about. We knew Edna was in her final preparations to leave this world and enter the eternal one.

A few moments after finishing our meal, Edna spoke, "I love you. I love everybody, and I want to go home."

This is not the first dying person to utter those words to me. I know Edna probably wanted to go to her physical home and die there, but I also know the double meaning. She was ready to go.

I replied, "I love you too, but I can’t help you with that last one."

She said, "But you helped me get ready, and I thank you."

I hugged Edna and said, "Goodby. I will keep you in my prayers."

In all likelihood, those are the last words that I will ever speak to her in this lifetime. I walked back to my truck not sure whether or not to laugh and smile at the holiness of the moment or to let loose a flood of tears. Holy moments will do that to you. When I said goodby to Edna, it did.