Inspirational Stories

Beyond Tuesdays with Morrie

The other day I heard a hospice worker say that they were dealing with living people in their work - admittedly living people with limited time - but they were still living people. To me that says it all. Too many people assume that dying means just making a person comfortable until they die. I don't think that's the case. I think people with a terminal illness want to live every day as fully as they can - including the last one.

Medical journals are full of people who keep surprising their doctors at how long they hang on. I think a lot of that has to do with how productive they feel they are. Morrie said, 'If I'm giving I want to stay alive because people need me.' When I visited Morrie on Tuesdays he'd rally because I was coming. He had a reason, as opposed to the days when it was just another day being sick.

When I was visiting Morrie, I observed the hospice workers in action. They were there every step of the way when he lost something. First they would teach him how to deal with a wheelchair, how to deal with pain, and how to wash himself with limited capacity. As he slowly lost the ability to do other things, they would help him get dressed, help him tie his shoes and they would help him eat. He became extremely close to them.

Morrie shared things with the hospice nurses that he never shared with any members of his family. Private, personal, physical things. I think that's true in a lot of cases, because the hospice workers are catching people at that point in life where they have nothing to hide any more.

Morrie said, 'Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.' I think the reason Morrie was able to be content and happy when he was dying was because he'd lived the life that he'd wanted to live. Even though he obviously didn't want to go - none of us do - he didn't have any regrets. And he'd lived a good life. Everyday people were coming and sitting with him, holding his hand, telling him how great he was, telling him how much they loved him. It was proof that he'd done a good job, because if you live a good life it will come back to you at the end.

By watching people die you can draw your own conclusions. And if you want a death with loving people around you like Morrie, it will make a difference to the way you live. You won't want things left unsaid. You won't want any fights or forgiveness issues out there. You won't get in squabbles. You won't let people slip away. If you realise that at your death the things you own aren't going to make a big difference, that money isn't going to make a big difference, then you may question why you spend so much of your life chasing these things.

A big contribution Tuesdays with Morrie makes is that people aren't as afraid to talk about death after they've read the book. Morrie talked about how in our culture death is something we don't want to know about. We shove people away. If we could we'd push them down a shute into the basement of the hospital so we'd never have to look at them. And this is foolish - because, as he said, when it's your turn, you're not going to want to be treated like that.

The day Morrie was told he had ALS, also known as Motor Neurone Disease, he was walking on his own and he could do anything he needed to do at that point. He knew what was coming, he'd been told he had a terminal illness - but if terminal illness means it ends in death - then we all have it. So I think we need to 'fess' up to this and we need to look death in the face and not be so ashamed of it. We need to visit dying people more and we need to keep them in our homes more. We shouldn't act like we could catch something by being around dying people, like death is contagious or something - it isn't.

Treat terminally ill loved ones as you've always treated them. Love them. Care for them and don't pity them. Be there and be patient with them. Observe how and what they need. Don't impose your way of thinking. Like the mother with the chicken soup insisting you 'drink this'. Maybe chicken soup isn't the answer. Talk to them.

My brother and Morrie had very different approaches to their illnesses. Morrie said, 'Come on, get in, visit me, ask me questions'. The more I wanted to know the more valued he felt. But my brother only rang when he was ready to see me. I had to respect that.

The most valuable lesson from Tuesdays with Morrie? Death does not end a relationship. If you make the relationship the focus of your efforts, then death won't be such a big deal. I miss Morrie, but I don't regret anything. We had a rich period of time and I'm so glad that we had it. I felt more at ease with his death than I would have if I didn't know about his death until after he'd died. But I made the time and he made the time to enrich our relationship before he left. So although death ended his life, it didn't end our relationship. His wisdom is still inside me. His lessons are still inside me - I'm talking to you about them, so he still goes on.