Janet’s Final Breath: Wrestling With Meaning at the Edge of Life
When I first wrote this, it was early—just after 6 a.m. The hospice room held a stillness that was anything but peaceful. Janet’s breath, fast and shallow, ticked away like a second hand on an old clock, marking time in a rhythm that defied comprehension. At 8:33 a.m., she took her last breath.
I never posted this draft, then. The immediacy of her passing eclipsed everything. But now, in the echo of those moments, the words carry a weight they didn’t then—a kind of prescience born of sitting so close to the edge of life. Looking back, I see that the writing itself was part of the vigil, a tether for me to hold onto as Janet’s life slipped through her own fingers.
As I sat beside her, giving this piece its final touches, something shifted. It was subtle at first—a ripple in the air, a tightening in my chest. Caitlin, Janet’s daughter, felt it, too. We exchanged a look, a silent exchange of dread and hope tangled together. The weight of waiting lifted just enough to make room for an overwhelming truth: Janet was preparing to leave.
Her breathing slowed, the space between each breath stretching into infinity. For days, her eyes had been closed, but now they opened, staring past us into somewhere we could not go. We called the boys, Janet’s sons, and held her hands, speaking prayers and words of release. Her breaths lengthened further. Her hands turned pale, then grey. And then, in a moment both monumental and unbearably quiet, Janet was gone.
Resistance and Surrender
Janet’s dying carried the weight of that great tension between resistance and surrender—a lesson etched into the air of the hospice room she occupied in those final days. She held tightly to life with a ferocity that was, in its own way, a kind of love. Her body had been whispering its truths from the beginning, truths that grew louder as time passed. The prognosis, the treatments, the quiet calls to prepare for the inevitable—she turned away from all of it, as though turning away might rewrite the script. She hoped, as we all do when faced with the unbearable, for a reprieve.
In my eagerness to help her navigate what lay ahead, I once shared with her a film on Tibetan Buddhism. Narrated in Leonard Cohen’s gravelly, hypnotic tone, it explored the bardos—those liminal spaces between life and death—and the sacred work of readying oneself for the crossing. It frightened her. It disturbed her sleep that night. At the time, I thought I was offering her a gift, a map through the unfamiliar terrain of her dying. But now, I see it differently. My well-intentioned insistence masked a truth I was not ready to face: this was her journey, not mine to map or direct. My guidance had a weight to it that she did not ask for and could not carry.
She turned away, retreating into the sanctuary of her fear, as though it might shield her from what she was not yet ready to see. To call this denial would be to oversimplify, to rob her of the fullness of her experience. Denial is a term we use to dismiss what we do not want to comprehend. What Janet showed me was something much deeper, much more elemental—a refusal to relinquish the only world she had ever known. It was not failure; it was devotion. It was a testament to the life she loved and the humanity she shared with all of us who cling to what is familiar when the unfamiliar looms so large.
Her resistance mirrored our own, though we cloaked ours in different terms. As her family, we resisted seeing her as she truly was: a woman who was not fighting but dying. We, too, longed for more time, more connection, even as we silently wished for an end to her suffering and, if we were honest, to our own. Resistance is not failure—it is the language of love in a world that forces us to let go, even when every fibre of our being begs us to hold on.
Janet’s resistance was not the enemy of her surrender. It was part of it, a necessary tension that drew her ever closer to that final act of grace. And in the end, she taught us that love is big enough to hold both resistance and surrender, that it is in the paradox of clinging and release where we meet the deepest truths of what it means to live and to die.
The Sacred Vigil
In her final hours, Janet’s room transformed into something sacred. The soft multi-coloured lights from her Christmas tree we set up when she arrived at hospice, the pitter-patter of rain with the occasional thunder playing on a speaker, the presence of her family—all of it created a space where life and death met and mingled. We whispered to her: You are loved. You are remembered. You made a difference. These were not empty words; they were offerings, a way to help her loosen her grip on this world.
When her soul left her body, there was a palpable shift. The air lightened, the heaviness lifted, and in its place came a stillness that was almost unbearable in its beauty. We stood guard as I had promised her, like great dragons protecting her sacred crossing.
When the nurse returned, I asked for time before her body was touched. Time for her spirit to fully untether itself from the vessel that had carried her. The nurse hesitated, citing protocol, but there are moments when reverence must take precedence over routine. I held firm, and she conceded. And then, as we waited, another shift occurred—a lightness that felt like Janet’s final ascent, her soul finally free.
The Ritual of Farewell
The hospice had its own way of honouring the dead. When the funeral home arrived, the staff lined the foyer, heads bowed, hands clasped. Janet’s body, dressed in her chosen kilt and white blouse, was draped with a handmade quilt and her McGregor sash, adorned with a lion pendant. We played The Skye Boat Song, its haunting melody carrying her spirit forward, drawing tears from even the hardest among us.
Bagpipes have a way of breaking through the armour we build around our grief. Their sound is ancient, primal, and unrelenting. They demand that we feel, that we confront the ache of loss and the fragile beauty of love that remains.
The Work of Grieving
Grief is not a moment. It is a process, a labour, a reckoning. It is the price of love and the weight of what remains when someone we cherish is gone. Janet’s dying has taught me that grief is not about closure or moving on. It is about staying open to the ache, letting it shape us, and finding meaning not in answers but in presence.
One day, each of us will sit where Janet sat, or beside someone who does. Her journey offers us lessons for that time: to let go of our need to control, to see beyond the failing body, and to honour the sacred labour of dying as the final chapter of living.
A Scottish Farewell
In the quiet after Janet’s passing, as the bagpipes faded and the room emptied, a verse came to mind. It felt fitting, a final benediction for her journey:
“Be still my soul, the hour is hastening on
When we shall be forever with the Lord;
When disappointment, grief, and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.
Be still my soul, when change and tears are past,
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.”
—Traditional Scottish Hymn
Janet’s journey has ended, but her love and her lessons remain. May we carry them forward, not as a burden but as a guide, as we navigate our own crossings in this life.
With reverence,
Laurie Anne
