Aren't We All Terminal?

Jeanette (not her real name) had reached her late 50's and knew that she was facing death. This strong cheerful Hispanic lady had a chronic blood disorder which was rapidly worsening. One afternoon, she told me that she had agreed to a local television interview because she thought it important to tell people about her life, her leukemia. and her experiences as a patient. She told me it was important that I watch, too.

A week or two later, back in my office, we talked about the television interview and she wanted to know what I thought of it. I told her that it was excellent, but at one point I thought she had been very angry. She agreed saying that the interviewer had repeatedly described her as "terminal". "Aren't we all terminal one way or another?" she asked.

A week later Jeanette was in the hospital, dying. We were talking about death and she showed that flash of anger that I had seen in the television interview. "What's going on?" I asked. "Why are you still here?" She told me that she was ready to go, and her family was ready for her to die. And then she said: "It's my priest who comes to see me every day. He's given me the last rites, but he's afraid of death and won't let me go."

When I returned to my office, I called another priest at a local Catholic Church, and reached agreement with him. I visited Jeanette at noon, the priest visited her at 2 p.m. and by late that afternoon she had peacefully died.