My sister Cheryle was diagnosed with breast cancer in her twenties, which was shocking. Perhaps it shouldn’t have been given that our mum died at forty two from the same thing. Cheryle had a long journey with cancer including bilateral mastectomies, reconstructive surgeries and metastases. Throughout her life she had chemotherapy and radiotherapy numerous times. In recent years it metastasised to her liver. Last year she made the decision to have no more treatments and just surrender to the process of living and dying. As she said, “I am living until I die”. And so she did.
When she suddenly deteriorated, her husband Steve called in what he later named the ‘A Team’, which consisted of Cheryle’s chosen group of family members to come and help care for her. We all arrived within hours to help, and then all outside life stopped for six weeks. We were in a love bubble. I can’t describe how precious it was. The palliative care team were fantastic, supporting us to provide Cheryle’s everyday care. We all had that privilege.
We quickly took on self-appointed roles. I was a nurse years ago, but I didn’t want to take on that role with my sister. I wanted to help with her everyday care and be her personal chef, which we both loved. She was taking steroids to help manage some of her symptoms and it gave her a fantastic appetite for a couple of weeks, so every meal turned into an act of choice and love and laughter. She ordered whatever took her fancy off my menu at each mealtime. If she wanted it she got it. Being able to cook for her was wonderful. It also opened up lots of opportunities for playful banter between us. I think she enjoyed bossing me around. As my younger sister, she got ‘pay back’ for things that I did to her when we were kids! We laughed a lot. It’s hard to imagine that while someone you love so much is leaving you it’s possible to have so much fun along with the tears.
One of the many beautiful things during those six weeks was witnessing Cheryle and her husband’s interactions. He was one hundred percent there for her. We were all teasing them and joking that they were having a last minute love affair. It was such a beautiful thing to watch them together and to see how open she was to that much love and care from him. To see how much love he had to give her was a real privilege and a joy. Sometimes it wasn’t just a privilege and a joy, but outrageously funny as they joked and laughed together. When he would hold her up to transfer her to the bed or the shower chair, they’d pretend to have a waltz or have a cuddle with each other.
Being part of a team that looked after her meant that when it got a bit much, you could take some time out, go upstairs and have a cry. It doesn’t mean we didn’t cry in front of her too, but it gave us the opportunity to share the grief. We pulled together and supported each other in a way that will always be powerful and precious to us all. We were able to love each other, hold each other, cry together, laugh together, plan together, and just give her an absolute Rolls Royce ending of her life.
She had been on medications that had perked her up for many days and as it wore off, she started to require more pain relief. We managed her pain meds so well, she was so comfortable and at peace. She had said all that she’d needed to say to us. We talked very openly, very candidly about her death and her choices. No topic was taboo or whispered away from her. She was fully in command. The day before she died, I whispered in her ear and asked if there was anything else she needed to do or say. She said ‘no sis’. She was at peace. She knew we were all with her.
On that last day she had slipped away into that other state we go into when we are close to death. We were just caring for her tenderly. After we had eaten dinner downstairs sitting around her, talking, most of us went to bed to get some rest. It was clear she was getting close to dying. It was only about an hour or so before my daughter called us downstairs, and we all stood around her as she took her last couple of breaths. It was very peaceful. After she passed, we bathed her and dressed her and laid her out in her bed. Her husband Steve joked about us all needing a stiff drink, so we made chamomile teas and sat around and drinking then went off to bed around midnight. The next morning it just seemed so right that she was still there when I went downstairs.
We had a team meeting about what we were planning to do that day and how we would safely transfer her body into the coffin. Before we did that, my daughter and her daughter lined her coffin with beautiful red and gold Indian fabric. It was all very practical, tender and ordinary in an extraordinary way. I never got to do this with my mum, dad or brother.
As a team, we transferred her into the coffin where she laid the whole day. There was music playing, there was some laughter, some tears. We came and went from the room throughout the day, we stood around her, holding hands and said what we needed to her. As she lay there, we surrounded her with beautiful flowers from her best friend’s garden and I took immense joy watching my daughter make the most beautiful wreath for the top of the coffin.
It was a day filled with practical things like tidying up the room and sorting out what had to go back to palliative care and what didn’t, washing everything, and stopping to talk to her many times. It was just a day of her laying there peacefully, until later in the afternoon when the local funeral home came to take her body away for cremation. It was a very practical, gentle, humorous, loving process and it felt so complete, unlike with my other family members. So Cheryle gave me a gift. An enormous gift. A lifetime of gifts as my little sis.
It’s interesting, while I’m emotional now talking about this loss, it’s mostly sadness about my parents and brother. I’m the last one standing now in my family. I just feel there was nothing more we could have done for Cheryle, to make her passing any better and it’s a really good feeling that we did that for her.
I think of her all the time, but I’m not sad. I was recently thinking that I should be feeling more than this and feeling a bit guilty that I don’t. But I don’t. I know grief has its own journey too and there will be more. I just feel happy that we gave her the best and considering that she had cancer in her twenties, and died at sixty-six, she was nothing short of remarkable in the way she dealt with those challenges. Of course, she wanted to live longer, but she also came to a place that she was ready to go. She said it was her faith that made it possible. She accepted how it was, which gives me a lot peace too. I’m more in a state of gratitude than bereavement. I think bereavement is different for everyone, so I will try not to judge my experience.
She surrendered to the process of dying and surrendered to us to loving and caring for her which gave us such a rich love filled time too. Is that even possible? For someone dying to be able to give you such a good time? But she did. Being able to let go of my life and the world around me and just be completely present for her was exquisite.
Rest easy dear little sis, you deserve it.
Thank you 🙏 for sharing such an inspiring message