Pushing Death away

I have been working with death and trauma for a very long time.

It all started when I was around fifteen. In those days I was fit and used to go about on a bicycle that carried me far from home as I explored the rural countryside of leafy Buckinghamshire.

On one particular day I was free wheeling down a hill feeling the wind in my hair – when my front wheel skidded in gravel, hit the kerb, and I was sent flying over the handlebars only to greet the concrete path with my head. I remember the banging even now.

Almost fifty years ago medicine was not so advanced as it is now. I was whisked to the local hospital where they did what I think was normal then – they waited and watched to see what happened to me. I got worse – so much so I could not walk – and eventually I was transferred to the old Radcliffe Infirmary, where fairly quickly I had a brain operation for the brain haemorrhage that had been growing inside my head from that moment of concrete impact.

It was a close call – and what happened at that time has transformed my life and attitude to death.

I had what is commonly called a near death experience. I have read much on this since about how the brain causes this and how there are scientific reasons and so on – but what happened to me still, all these years later, affects me emotionally, such was the reality of it.

I was progressing down a dark tunnel – which was warm and strangely comforting, and like many others I saw a light towards which I was travelling. The light seemed to be coming from some kind of opening on the left hand side and when I got there I saw a human shaped being, a male figure. I received no introductions so had no idea who it might be – all I know is that this person said to me ” It is not your time, you need to go back”.

I have been annoyed ever since, such was the feeling of warmth, peace and acceptance I experienced there. I woke up reluctantly to discover myself in Intensive Care and alive. Three months of my young life spent in hospital.

It was this that gave me a deep interest in death and trauma. It gave me a kind of nodding acquaintance with death that has allowed me to move peacefully among those who are distraught from grief or distraught because they are about to die. Calm and peaceful, I have studied much on the subject and spent many years working in this area – the last great taboo as others describe it. I do not push death away.

However many do.

We have this strange attitude to death. During life we want to push the idea of death away – as far away as possible. It usually is not the subject most people enjoy at dinner parties.  Our grief is not handled well and we try even not to look at the experience at all, even though this still remains the only real certainty in life – that we do not live for ever.

On the other hand if death has taken place and we are left behind there is this strange ritual of paying homage to the deceased in burial and other memorials. Rather like an animal marking out a territory we leave goods for those who have gone – flowers on a regular basis perhaps – just to let them know that we have not forgotten, although whether the deceased is aware of the flowers remains to be seen. Similarly other goods are left – a bottle of beer perhaps or as I have seen a spliff for someone who enjoyed that as part of his life. It still lies there as a kind of taunt perhaps – so near yet so far.

This dilemma affects how we handle life – in therapeutic terms those who have worked on this struggle can find a sense of peace without the head injury or consequent visions. Perhaps those who push this away have a harder time, continually finding things to do to block out the inevitable.

Instead of pushing it away it would be interesting to discover a path to welcoming death as a friend we can welcome eventually, with all our hang ups looked at and our goodbyes spoken – with fear reduced and a sense of calm.

No wonder I have spent all these years working with death – a strange occupation as far as others see me and my work – but an occupation that perhaps was inevitable given that early brush with death.