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I’ve noticed something about the way people talk about death. It forces us to become metaphysical and philosophical. Some become crazed or paranoid while others show a cool indifference, but I’m not worried about the various facades. Actually, I’m not worried at all. So why not speak frankly?

Last week, while I attended to my patient through a harmless sleep study, Scott, from Respiratory stopped in to chat. (For those not in the health profession, in between saving lives, filling out charts and cleaning up some odd bodily fluid, there is a lot of hanging out). A fellow technician asked where he’d just been.

He’d just finished up a code blue on an infant. I’ll save a dramatic story.

The infant died.

The technician asked if Scott was okay, and he was very indifferent at the time. “It happens,” he replied.

A few weeks ago, my great Aunt died. I barely knew her. You’re welcome to read up on her death on my dad’s blog. He mostly reported a relief of stress from watching over her so much, though he was sad to see her go. Her main request was that she didn’t want to die with a breathing tube in place. Once the hospital was sure she was going to pass, dad approved the removal of the tube they’d forced in without her conscious approval, and she died.

The first time I knew someone who died, it was my grandma on my mom’s side. She had cancer. I’d watched her on and off drugs. I was seven or eight years old when she was sick and I remember the permanent I.V. they’d put in so she could have pain medication directly injected at any time.

She decided to go off treatment for her cancer at some point in time and she became alive again, if only for a short time. It was short lived. Her three daughters sang songs with her around the organ she had in a small Ozark home. The daughters were in harmony and grandma smiled. Pain, as it turns out, is merciless.

It wasn’t long before I remember her barely eating and using crutches to move about the home. The family acted with holiday cheer and grandpa was tender, something he isn’t really known for. Christmas, afterall, is a time for caring. Why do we wait for such days?

In February, mom returned home late at night and I woke and came down from my attic room. She was wilted. I think I asked because children confirm their intuition at a certain age. Every tear behind my eyes already knew what the answer was. Grandma died. In my eyes, at that moment, I remember thinking that my mom had lost her mom. Grandma seemed to come in second at that point in time.

I knew someone who died. Remember the first person you knew who died?

When I was 16, I volunteered at the emergency room my mom worked at. I saw a large black man in severe pain as a nurse or respiratory therapist drained blood and fluid from his lung through the same bullet hole that leaked the fluids in. I saw a child receive facial stitches for injuries from a car wreck and I even had a trial of the cocaine based anesthetic used for facial based injuries.

Later that night, as my eyes could barely stay open, a lady in what I would guess was her 50′s came in from an ambulence. They were performing CPR on her as she came in.

It’s not like the movies. The chest compressrions are more dramatic and the staff aren’t anything I’ve ever witnessed in a movie. People are just doing a job. It’s done with pride and purpose, but it is done as a job no less.

I stood to her left side. Her eyes looked around unfocused for awhile and then fixated. Liquidy fecal material drained from beneath her and you’d better believe there was a smell with it.

The crew continued on, waiting for due process before calling her death time. I left the room to grab a can of aerosal that would relieve the pungent smell in the room. I left knowing she was dead.

I had witnessed my first death. When it isn’t someone you care about, it isn’t that bad unless it’s a child. I only really felt the impact of her death as I listened in to the phone call to the mother’s family. When I realized she was a mom, that’s when I could relate.

Her death was nearly scientific, natural and garunteed. I had no qualms with that. It wasn’t upsetting or difficult or traumatic.

When you see a birth, it’s almost like that child has always been alive and when I saw someone die, it was like they had always been inanimate.

Back at the lab: After Scott had mentioned the dead infant, I asked my colleagues what experiences they had with codes. They are also respiratory therapists, so I knew it was a safe bet they had coded (worked on) several dead bodies. Some of which you bring back, and some of which die.

From my brief interview, they had two distinct types of death. The first type is probably the type that comes to mind in most peoples’ imaginations. Panic and terror and an immense fear of the outcome. These were people who seemed to have a third sense about their future and just knew they were going to die despite what test results said. They were horrified and intense and then dead. If it’s any comfort, this seems to be the rarer of the two.

The other one is more common. It’s what my mom came home with every morning from the night shift. It really goes something like this. The person came in, they were responsive, they died. Unaware or aware, they simply passed out and that was the end.

The only difference between them and the survivor in the next room over is a regaining of consciousness. Otherwise, if you’ve been under local anesthetic and you noted how it was a dreamless sleep, the beginning of death isn’t much different, apparently.

I know I’m supposed to summarize some great prolific ideal from all this, or come to a reason why I’m glad I have God or Allah or some other important after-life power in my life, but that’s just not where this goes.