Pope Benedict XVI's visit to UK

WELCOME TO BRITAIN

HOLY FATHER!

I wish I could come to see you but I will be with you through TV, on the Internet and in spirit – especially when you visit St. Peter’s Residence for Older People at Vauxhall! God bless you all.

Your sister in Christ,
love,
Virginia

Proof

People are always saying they want proof of God’s existence. And I say – to myself or anyone listening – here it is: I am proof…

How else could a cripple (primary progressive multiple sclerosis [PPMS]) alone, make it through a day or night without God?

When you have faith, which is believing without “proof”, and you pray, continually. When there’s nobody else there but you know you are talking to someone and that someone is always responding. When you see yourself doing things that could never be done without supernatural strength… Then you are living proof. And you thank God and wish everyone could share your witness.

Last night was a perfect example of what I mean… Picture it: adult son comes in after day at work, makes evening meal for Mum, feeds the dog, then goes off to friend’s house where he lives.

Mum (your’s truly, the ‘cripple’) moans a bit about being left alone – first to the son, then to the dog (toy poodle – good listeners!) and finally, if not simultaneously, to Jesus – then puts on brave face - and the television - and tries to get on with it…

All seems to be going well (but bear in mind that, although there could be “carers” popping in all day, there haven’t been because, along with many others, this MSer prefers to be alone…ergo, the legs are in a lot of pain at this point) but we need for there not to be a crisis. [Note: this is a house where there have been three power-cuts already this year and, every year sees myriad spiders!] …

Then at 1.30 a.m. there it is… I was watching a late showing of Marcus Grodi’s “Journey Home” on EWTN when: blam! Splot! “I’ve arrived!” It was the biggest, blackest, nastiest (all right, it wasn’t a brown recluse or even a widow but it was bad) arachnid, right there, to the right of the curtains, just behind the television and impossible, for a cripple, to get to. Ah!

Now, to add to my woes – and I don’t know why I forgot to mention this – my profiling bed is in this sitting-room (won’t go into why but it makes sense).

I wasn’t going to sleep with this thing (by the way, Lucy – poodle – has her own room!), so - as I did in the past when legs weren’t so bad – somehow, I had to get the cordless vacuum and aim for it. Hah! Without help?

Well, there-you-go. Helpless. Prayer is all you have.

“Jesus! Jesus!” (before, I’ve tried to cross myself but I think last night I was shaking too much.) I had to turn my back on intruder and reach for the charging, very heavy, Dyson…

I wobbled all over the place. Got my foot caught a couple of times in Lucy’s day-time pen. The damned thing let its web out, dropped and hid behind the curtain. I tried to hold on to a plasma (thin and light) TV-top… And then with another “Please, Jesus…” Just pointed, hoping for the best, and saw it – perhaps, not sure, only just – get sucked down the black-hole tube!

Then I sprayed – a little (allergies!) - high strength pyrethrin, went to brush my teeth (and breathe!), checked Lucy, came back and threw Holy Water all over the place. At last I felt better and could try to settle for the night.

And here I am. The next lunch-time. Daren’t look around but, hey, Mass is on. And there you have it…

They wanted proof of God’s existence?!

Amen

So, how do you die alone?

[The following two posts were drafted, both in different seasons, earlier this year. I’m sorry it’s taken so long to publish them but hope they’ll still fit in. We start with winter, the second is from mid-summer.]


So, how do you die alone? I mean, if you’re not a suicide who has meticulously planned it for weeks; you haven’t had an accident or heart attack and can see it coming but only just before you’re gone; you haven’t been lying in a hospice/hospital bed, long enough to know the staff and have regular visits, maybe even from loving family; you haven’t got a loving family…

I mean, how do you die alone when you’ve been suffering with a degenerative disease for years but people have always ignored it because: a) its many symptoms are – at least to begin with – invisible; b) in multiple sclerosis (MS) the ‘multiple’ lesions which cause the sclerosis are in the brain (“brain damage”) and spine, leaving the MSer moody and prone to emotional outbursts, as well as physically disabled; c) the pain from spasicity, nerves under attack, weak muscles, etc. makes you irritable; d) you often lash out at those who do try to help and don’t know why; e) people resent the reminder that this could happen to anyone; f) people want to believe life here can be perfect and last forever, so MS (and diseases like it) should have an end-date, be terminal – sympathy and compassion run out; g) [God forbid, anyone should say this but I think they might] you “won’t stop being selfish and get yourself euthanased.”

It doesn’t help, either, if someone like me (and I know I’m not alone among MSers) refuses to see doctors or use the medical establishment at all*. Some: don’t believe your self-diagnoses – even when you were right about other things and MS itself; don’t see the value in alternative therapies (i.e. maintaining some level of control over your own body); refuse to admit that even pharmaceutical companies use herbs.

As secular society relies on the Welfare State and social services to provide for its sick loved ones, it’s carers or nothing now for many senior and/or disabled citizens… So, if you don’t want carers (because you’re allergic to their perfumes**, for example), well, that’s another reason for relatives to turn their backs on you - for fear they’ll be called upon to help.

But probably the main reason people ignore you (or in the case of my dear son, get angry with you) is because they wouldn’t be like you. They wouldn’t want to stay at home if they were crippled or, as I am now, suffering something like COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) after said son brought “cold” germ for Christmas. They certainly wouldn’t choose to be alone at home (actually, there is also Lucy, a toy poodle who I feel really rotten for but seems happy [it’s not easy to find her a better home and, besides, I love her and keep trying for her sake: she keeps me moving!]).

They wouldn’t be like me – most of them – in that, they think you should do anything rather than die: you are certainly not supposed to look forward to dying (and definitely not talk about it with a smile on your face). And you shouldn’t have a faith that you say saves you from being lonely because you’ve always got the company of the Holy Family and Saints, when they have a faith but don’t feel like that (only because they haven’t been forced into contemplative prayer through pain and alone-ness). Even worse if they’re atheist (which most are): “You can’t just keep talking to an imaginary character…” (most don’t even seem aware of the historical evidence for the life of Jesus) “…and just wait for Him to come and get you…”

Ultimately, they have to believe you can’t be so ill that you think you’re dying and won’t call someone (i.e. doctor, ambulance, social services); you can’t say the only person you would see is a priest, that’s not the way they’d be.

Ah, but you can. And I do. And no one understands it, so it seems cruel sometimes. But I have to accept it.

And I offer it up in prayer to Jesus, because that’s the only thing I can do that may be useful.

While, in the meantime: struggling to stand up; furniture-walking to shuffle around; pooing in pants; coughing so much, heart feels weak; gulping swollen throat; swallowing voice; gasping for breath and needing air-purifier on full-blast, oxygen bottles nearby; preparing and taking dozens of herbs and the odd Anadin for head pain; sleeping only for minutes between coughing attacks; rubbing eucalyptus on chest, tea-tree (both in olive oil) on tooth ache (forgot to mention teeth falling out!); commode-sitting at regular intervals through night; talking to God all night (i.e. confession and just the name “Jesus”); saying Hail Mary’s in head – not usually finishing; surprising myself when – and if – I’m still here in the morning.

Without the prayer – oh, and, by the way, saying what Catholics say at Mass before receiving the Eucharist is amazing when you’re in pain/can’t sleep: “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you but only say the Word and I shall be healed.” Maybe I should say, Jesus’ response is amazing! Without prayer, it might be impossible. I might want to give up.

So, that’s my answer to ‘How do you die alone?’. I’ve written it here because, if there’s one thing good that’s come out of this, it’s the realization that I must keep writing non-fiction – my story – if I’m to help anyone else. And I must get on with it. Time (which only exists in this world) runs out.

Yet I think I wanted to say more. Especially on those last few nights lying there wondering about all this: feeling sure death was just one missing breath away. I mean, it was all right really, knowing you might die the very next moment and no one else being there, but why did it have to seem so matter-of-fact, so ordinary? You were hopefully going to see Jesus soon and, hey, that’s special isn’t it? Beautiful Jesus, followed by (well, maybe some time in Purgatory!), the oh-so-fantastic, Beatific Vision of God the Father, Himself. Why on earth did the very act of dying seem so…earthly?

I think I wanted to say more here to Jesus. At least say a prayer asking Him to take special care of: the homeless during this cruelest winter; anyone else alone and in any kind of pain; all those dying wherever they may be; my son; anyone suffering from, or having to contemplate, loss of a loved one.; everyone who needs Him.

Well, something like that. Something to end it all with, in writing.

And I suppose it is slightly obvious, now I think of it: anything here – death included – is bound to seem ordinary compared to the super-natural wonder of Heaven. Until you actually pass on (go over to the other side/leave this “mortal coil”, etc.) it has to be, by definition, ‘of this world’: earthly! It’s the “reality” we know here. Okay, I can live, and die, with that…

So be it. Amen.


* It must be remembered that there is no known cause of MS [at this time] and many blame the medical establishment with its over-use of anti-biotics, steroids and other pharmaceutical drugs. Many MSers (including myself) have suffered too greatly in the past from these treatments and their side-effects.
** I also have Multi Chemical Sensitivity (MCS).