August 2, 2021: About pain and grief

August 2, 2021: About pain and grief. The pandemic has perhaps allowed us to re-consider what we mean by pain. The disease itself, as I watched it sometimes ago in people I care about, has a component of pain. The discomfort can be from just simply a cold to gasping for breath. It has also reminded of the centrality of death in our lives. How death can come so suddenly or can be a prolonged expensive battle armed with ventilators and other apparatuses. Who finally makes the decision about when to stop? Or is the decision made easier by nature intervening. Many, perhaps a little bit of me also, saw the futilities of extending life by appendages and then still undergoing the pain and the grief, because eventually nature found a way. Now, we are told, there will be no more deaths from the disease. In some places, the delusion that we will no longer die from the disease, leads to conversations about the need for masks. We stand again at a point of inflexion as in some parts of the World the proverbial “summer holidays” are coming to an end. Thousands will, for instance, go back to academic institutions, some of which foolishly are ostriched into believing that all is well. I shudder to think the grief and pain that we are about to invite into our lives. Because not all deal with these emotions well. When people were told that they cannot see their loved ones and the bodies were taken away to an unknown place to be cremated, the emotions might become uncontrollable. These are tests we were not prepared for, and even when knowing of the surety of death we are never ready. I have seen many who have dealt with death. I have reflected on how I have dealt with, pre-pandemic, loved ones. Does this show who we are? Is the ability to remain calm outwardly while a storm goes on inside a sign of strength? In my estimation, it is. Is that calmness interpreted as a lack of care? It could well be. When I argue to my colleagues that we need not be calm in the face of an ongoing pandemic, am I being a troublemaker in throwing a wrench into plans. We will ponder these, I hope, to become people who choose to learn, and not deny. What is the quality that allows a child to make a decision about the future of a parent who is no longer able to decide? To bring home and palliate or to be in the hands of the professionals in the antisepsis of the hospital. I know people, including my wife, who boldly made these decisions. Grief followed but there was the sense of agency. There was no helplessness. Mistake or not, I hold the agency, is the argument. I see strength in those moments. Those who can calmly say “This is my decision” and be able to live with that – in the face of death - deserve admiration. They are the change agents. I see them around me, and I wish I had that strength. A bondhu tells “U hv” over the abbreviation of WhatsApp and I hope that is true. Such are the strong people I need around me if the decision has to be made for me. These tests will never end. Hope we are up to it as we delve into a new set of mistakes. And the words of Patty Loveless may have to be invoked over and over again, “How can I help you say Goodbye.”