Worst day of my life

Today is the first anniversary of the worst day of my life.

May 2017

It's not the day Roz died. That wouldn't arrive till the 2nd July. It was the day she sank into what was essentially a diabetic coma. 

The day I realised I could never talk to her again. My Rozzie had left me. Only her shell remained.

...and it had all happened much quicker than anyone predicted.

After fourteen months of slow tumour growth Roz's body had essentially given up in June and the tumours grew at a much more aggressive rate. After being confined to her liver, they were now in her lungs and lymph nodes. On the 24th June we were informed that she had about three weeks to live.

While the number of weeks was a bit of a shock, the fact that this was now officially terminal was not. Roz had rapidly deteriorated over the course of June and we were waiting for this shoe to finally drop. In a way it was a bit of a relief. We had held off informing others until we had an official diagnosis and timescale so I could now call people and inform them. I didn't have to keep this to myself.

Three weeks meant that I could give everyone plenty of time to say their goodbyes and still have time for myself and Roz to say our goodbyes...at least that was my plan.

June 2019

Roz was admitted to the local hospice on the 25th. On the 26th and 27th we had lots of people come visit her and, strange to say, but it was a lovely time. She was pain free, in a very pleasant location and surrounded by people who loved her. We all chatted and laughed. I felt like some of the burden of her care had been lifted from my shoulders.

And then I arrived at the hospice on the morning of the 28th to see her lying there, eyes rolled into the back of her head, almost completely unresponsive. At 7pm the previous evening she had told a wonderful story about how she had met one of her dear friends in her usual charming, witty way. Now she couldn't speak. Any attempts at communication were met with a very delayed barely intelligible response. A kiss would be met with a peck after a three to four second delay. That action alone would seem to exhaust her.

I asked the doctor if this was due to the pain medication. It wasn't. She was going downhill far faster than they expected. They warned me she probably wouldn't last the weekend. They informed me they were calling in the priest to read her the last rites.

And, at that point, I realised - we can't say goodbye to each other. I'd blown my chance. The one positive about being diagnosed with cancer - that you get to know when you're going to die and say goodbye to your loved ones - had not happened.

She lasted another four days, passing away at 6:30am on Tuesday 2nd July but the next few days were just the torture of watching her slowly become more and more unresponsive. 

On the 28th and 29th she could respond slightly to things around her. When informed that I would be sleeping in the chair next to her that night she replied with a very quiet "Yay!". When I told the other people in the room a story of how our cat, Dexter, was playing knock down ginger with me she chuckled quietly.

On the 30th the responses were merely slight facial expressions. Little frowns if she was uncomfortable or in pain, little smiles if something she heard made her happy.

On the 1st there was nothing. Her breathing just became more shallow. She lost the strength to suck up liquid or to swallow.

A dear friend, who is a surgeon, likened it to her being utterly exhausted in a very far away tunnel - she could hear everything we were saying but she didn't have the energy to respond - and the tunnel just gets further and further away.

Her actual death was a relief. Her physical body had finally given up. 

As far as I was concerned, Roz had already died on the 28th.