This week has been nothing I had written in my calendar to be. It all changed when I answered the phone to hear the frantic voice of my friend’s son. “Dad went for a walk and got lost. We can’t find him.” The local weather dictates staying indoors and somehow my friend has chosen to go for a walk and is nowhere to be found. This is brain cancer.

His son did find him, and we began to work as a team, spending a whole day in emergency, pleading with doctors, and then working with home care, social workers, lodge staff, trying to put parameters in place to ensure my friend is safe. It has not been easy, and it has been all consuming.

One afternoon, it was just him and I. We talked about doctor appointments and what results we hope for. Memory recall lasts only minutes, so the conversation is repeated. He is so very positive about life, about finding a cure. “One step in front of the other,” he says. I ask him, “have you given any thought to if the doctor says there are no more treatments they can do?” I ask this because we know this is the case. He looks into my eyes, and I gently touch his arm. “Just for a minute, go there and tell me what you think.” He ponders this. I am not sure how much understanding he has about this notion. He looks up and says to me, “well, what will be will be”. I lifted my coffee cup, and we clinked as if to toast the moment.

 The doctors have said that the end-of-life stage has begun. But we know better. End-of-life does not exist. It should be defined as end-of-earth. We knew 16 months ago when he was diagnosed that this day would come. Somehow, all that knowledge does not make it any easier for us. And the person who we love we now watch, slowly, losing his brain power, not knowing what is happening in his own life. It doubles the grief.

The days are spent in hyper mode calling the experts, driving to appointments, the worry about support…it makes the time go by fast and at the end of each day, we are more like caregivers than friends and family. My friend senses this.  It confuses him as to why we have all these new people coming to visit. Why he must spend time in hospital waiting rooms. Why he must spend the cold weekend at his daughter’s house. He doesn’t understand it is because he can no longer rationalize what is best for his own safety and comfort. This is pre-grief, the early stages where we know the inevitable is near, but we are too busy in the present to be present.

I suggested to his son that we need to focus on the moments of clarity.  These moments are few and far between and will continue to become fewer and farther but right now we have these moments. We must stop thinking in these moments of the grief, of the future. We must open our hearts to feeling the moment. Really feeling the blessing of the moment.  These moments will become the memories, kept in our heart, for the days after grief arrives to stay.