PAUSE MORE. RUSH LESS. is a monthly newsletter that encourages you to live a more reflective life by slowing the pace you live it—so you don’t miss life’s most meaningful moments. Like this one ...

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SPECIAL NOTE: The blog below was just written and is very personal to me. I consider this article a work-in-progress, but I want YOUR help. After you read this blog, please answer the two questions at the end in red. My email is below. This will help me with my research. Thank you. 
 

 
The "No Goodbye"
 

“Faith draws the poison from every grief, takes the sting
from every loss and quenches the fire of every pain.”
 
                                                                        Josiah Gilbert Holland

 
I believe there comes a moment in your life when you know you’re going to die. It’s not something we ever talk about—but we know. The question is: What do you do in that moment? How in the world do you accept it?

Maybe you only have a few months. Weeks. Or days. And even if the doctors haven’t told you it’s imminent—you know. My mother knew. “I think I have cancer,” she once said to my fourteen-year-old sister, “but the doctors aren’t telling me.” It was 1965. The world had a lot to learn about cancer. At the time, a physician told my father, “I think we’ll have cancer beat in a few years.”

“Little good that will do us now,” my father must have thought.

Her name was Rose. My mom was forty-five—four years removed from the birth of her last child, a baby girl—Joanie; the youngest of her six children. She had three boys and three girls. We ranged in age from four to fourteen. I was eleven. Third born.

I’ve often wondered what you think about during those last days when your life ebbs away and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. And what on earth do you tell your young children—if anything? It’s a question that has plagued me for sixty years, since the day Mom passed. You see, over the years, I’ve thought about whether she should have said goodbye. And if she had, would it have made life easier for my siblings and me—or more painful?

I’ve replayed it in my mind countless times: once she knew there was no chance to survive lymphoma, could she—should she—have attempted to say goodbye to each of her children? Would the mere admission forfeit the possibility of a miracle? Stifle her faith? Quench hope? Or admit defeat—without a fight? And do you unleash the worst outcome once you speak your greatest fears aloud? And, of course, my parents more likely believed saying goodbye would have been more traumatic than allowing the inevitable to unfold.

I cannot fathom the emotional toll my mother felt confronting her mortality at forty-five while raising six young children. What was it like to know she had seen our last birthdays, her final Christmas, and hugged us for the last time? How did she cope knowing she would never tousle her boys’ hair again, tease us, and not be there to explain the changes her girls would experience as teens?

How could she possibly accept the fact that she would never see us graduate from elementary and middle school, much less high school or college. She could only imagine our role in a school play, our academic or athletic accomplishments, future career interests, the men and women each of us would fall in love with, eventual weddings, and the prospect of grandchildren. Most of all, she could only imagine the men and women her children would become--without her influence.

 But what she didn’t have to imagine was my father’s faithfulness to her memory, his love for her that spanned forty-three years after her death. His commitment to raise us precisely the way they would have together—had she lived. She could envision him instilling in us their family values, attending church, and all six of us emulating the integrity we observed in our father.

Today, families who find themselves in this situation, with no way out, make videotapes of goodbye messages or write letters to their children to be read at a future date so they remember their loved one. No videos in 1965. No cell phones with cameras. No technology to preserve memories—to blunt the anguish.

Yet, a handwritten note and a two-minute conversation were possible. I’ve often imagined my mother talking with me alone—telling me why she loved me—how I was special to her. Something—anything—to cement a memory of her; and the place reserved for only me in her heart. I can picture each of my siblings still cherishing this now time-worn scrap of paper, inscribed by her hand, telling them how deeply she loves and believes in them.

I know what you’re thinking. A mother telling her child that she was going to die—or “go to heaven” or whatever a mother says to her children about such a heartbreaking reality—would be terrifying for them. On the other hand, wouldn’t it be just as horrifying to just slip away—with no goodbye? Would a verbal goodbye or a note have brought me a small measure of comfort after the shock faded and my heart healed? And wouldn’t the memory of looking into my mother’s eyes, perhaps for the last time, and recalling her telling me what she loved about me be etched in my mind forever?

I admit these thoughts and feelings originate from the heart of my eleven-year-old self, and I cannot grasp the full weight of what they faced. I don't recall how quickly the cancer spread nor comprehend the devastating pain she experienced.

Recently, my older brother, Chris, shared with me a letter she wrote to my uncle in 1965. An excerpt.

Dear Joe,

This is going to be a real depressing note as I cannot conceal my feelings anymore. I, for one, do not feel at the present time my operation has done me one bit of good … I lay down 80% of my day and am in constant pain with my legs and lower back. We’ve decided to go to Mayo’s and I’ll be going alone and I’m plenty afraid but there is no other way. Mac* has been wonderful to me and so patient. I feel like a heel most of the time because I cry a lot. My boys, Jim and Chris, are my big helpers ... Pray for me.

*Mac is my father.

Looking back, I realize it’s easy for me to view this situation now through the simplistic lens of childhood. But this letter to my uncle, written in her hand, is a gut-check. And I must never forget that in real time my parents were absolutely overwhelmed; the pain was relentless, and then there was the fear. The icy, paralyzing fear of dying, leaving your children behind, and desperate for the words to make sense of it to yourself—and your children.

Today, with my six-decade perspective, would I change anything?

Honestly, I still feel the void I grew up with, that hollow, barren feeling that something sacred was missing from my life. The hole. The crater. Yet, I also feel the blessing of having a father, a role model, who had the strength to raise six children alone and never cease honoring her memory for the 43-year balance of his life. And then there is the pleasure of seeing my three sisters embody her traits: her joy, spontaneity, grit, and laughter--all bringing me joy while keeping her memory alive.

And yes, while part of me still craves holding her now brittle, yellowed farewell note, I’ve learned by placing my faith in God’s grace—and trusting my parent’s agonizing decision, you can recover and find purpose from the most profound loss as a child. Even when there’s no goodbye.
 

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WHAT WOULD YOU DO?  Please help me out and answer these two questions. If a parent is dying, should they say "goodbye" to their children? How should they do it if their children are young? Email me at: jamescmagruder@gmail.com.

Photo courtesy of Suzy Hazelwood, Pexels.com
 

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