Condolences


The subject of memories came up at the hospice group when last we met. A gentleman who lost his wife to cancer not long ago was expressing his frustration with his in-laws whom he asked to write down memories of his wife for their young boys. He wanted them to get to know her through the stories or bits of information that he was not privy to. So far he has met little success and wanted to know if any others in the group could give him some insight into this phenomena of silence that sometimes springs up in families when loved ones die. 

Most of the others in the group had similar tales to tell of relatives and friends who seem to be of the mind that their pain is so much greater than ours that they can’t possibly fulfill simply requests such as writing down memories to share with our children or even keeping in touch with us. I remember being told by friends of my late husband that his illness and then his death were “just too hard” for them to deal with and they needed to distance themselves from first him and then later from my daughter and myself. I can shrug now and wonder at the weakness of people but at the time I was outraged. 

Another thing that gets to me still is the unfairness of who gets supported when their loved one is felled by serious illness or dies and who does not. It doesn’t seem to me to have anything to do with how nice a person the lost one was or whether or not the survivors reached out. It’s more like a luck thing. That point was brought home again to me by an essay in Newsweek by Katie Couric on the tenth anniversary of her husband’s death.

Ms. Couric was widowed after just nine years of marriage and left with two daughters then two and six. At her husband’s funeral, she asked those gathered to please write something down about her husband for her to share with their girls when they were older. This way giving them a chance to know the man they would really never know firsthand. She was overwhelmed with the responses. Cards and letters filled with memories which after ten years she felt her daughters were now old enough to read.

I have a sack of condolence cards. I have read probably one or two of them. Mostly the cards contain nothing but some sickening platitude that really bears no reality to the reality and then a signature or two. I ravaged them for the cash and checks so I could pay for Will’s burial because there was no money otherwise and then I put the cards in a gift bag  and put them in a closet in the spare bedroom. When we moved, I put them in a box. I think I have seen the sack one time since then. So in going on three years now, I have done little but move those cards from one place to another. I don’t know why I keep them at all. There is nothing in them that my daughter can read to learn about her father but I supposed that knowing people cared enough to send a card might make her feel a bit better. The only problem with that theory is that if any of those people had truly cared, they wouldn’t have chosen the trite cards that they did and might have written more than just their names.

Picking a sympathy card is one of the hardest things to do. I try to keep it very simple. I stay away from anything that hints at God’s will or my knowing how the person feels. I don’t believe God wills things on us and I only know how I feel. If I don’t know the person very well, I merely sign it. If I knew the deceased or the person, I try to write something, athought or memory that lets the recipient know that I do remember. That’s really all I wanted. To know that Will’s friends remembered him, who he was and what he meant.

Katie Couric falls in the lucky widow group. Someone who got support and true sympathy.

Running Errands with My Husband


Rob took the afternoon off today, so we could run over to Northgate Centre and visit the Service Canada Centre there. It’s amazing to me the number of  things one can find in malls here that have nothing whatsoever to do with shopping. At Northgate not only can a person apply for unemployment, Social Insurance Numbers (as I did today) and passports at a Service Canada outlet, so to speak, but there is an outreach high school, a fitness center for moms and kids, a doctor’s office, a dental office and an insurance agent. Quite a different take on such a faciality then I am used to being from the Midwest of the United States. Perhaps it is a big city thing, but I have noticed that Canadians make the most of their strip malls and malls. It’s not just a shopping thing. For example the strip mall we visit to shop at the organic grocery, Planet Organic, also contains a police station and a person can find registeries – for birth, death, marriage, driver’s, auto, hunting/fishing licenses and certificates just about anywhere as the government outsources those tasks to private companies. One thing the Canadian don’t have though is 24 hour service. That is rare. They also don’t get the American idea that Saturday should be as convenient as Monday thru Friday in terms of access. Saturday has many stores closing at 5 or 6 and the mail just doesn’t move. Sunday? Well, Canadians aren’t religious really but the day is still the Lord’s where work is concerned. Noon to five are the hours on anything that happens to be open for the most part.

So now that I have that digression off my chest, let’s return to my errand running with Rob. We got my SIN (social insurance number) to obtain for filing my taxes up here. No I haven’t earned a dime since coming here but every adult has to file and surprisingly we all file as individuals. Canada doesn’t recognize the concept of filing as a married couple. The SIN is just a temporary one. Once I have my residency, I exchange it for a permanent number. It works just like the SS#’s in the U.S. except they have numbers for permanent residents and citizens that start with a different prefix than those they assign to temporary residents and workers. Neat, huh? America could learn a thing or two from the Canadians.

I love spending time with Rob in the middle of the day – just the two of us. Even if it is as simple as a run to the mall, home improvement store and then the grocery for foodstuff to make pizza, it’s just nice to be together. Our conversation wasn’t extraordinary. We weren’t more affectionate than normal (because our PDA standards are above the norm for people our age anyway). It was just the spending of time, holding hands and talking about all the regular things couples talk about as they go from place to task to another place again. The normalcy and who would think that such a thing would be worth commentary? But it is.

 

IVF and Savior Babies


There is a couple in B.C. who want to use a procedure called pre-implantation genetic diagnosis as part of an IVF attempt to produce a sibling match for their eight year old son in need of a bone marrow transplant. The procedure itself is more commonly used by couples who carry genetic markers for a variety of genetic illnesses. Many of which are fatal. The hospital in B.C. turned the couple down for IVF citing ethical concerns, but they also added that the mother, at 47, was far too old to produce viable eggs for the procedure anyway.

Having been through two cycles of IVF myself at age 37, I know that once a woman hits her mid-forties most reputable IVF clinics will not do IVF unless the couple consents to using donor eggs. All those mid – 40’s and older movie stars who turn up PG without copping to IVF via donor egg are not doing the general public a favor by perpetuating the myth that women at mid-life can easily achieve pregnancy. The women who do get pregnant – “naturally” or through IVF with their own eggs – are freaks of nature, so to speak, because we really weren’t meant to do this. We are designed to wind down and stop producing viable eggs and therefore ceasing to be able to have babies. Not fair? Sure. Men can still impregnate after all, but don’t think that they are still sending their best guys into action. The older the father is the more likely there are to be genetic problems with any embryos created. Older men tend to father children with much younger women whose eggs are still primo. It’s not him. It’s her.

I can’t imagine the pain of this poor couple, but I wonder at the clinic that is essentially bilking them of $30,000.