When Silence Speaks

I wake up with a start in the middle of the night. I could have sworn I heard his voice, his call from the living room where his sickbed stood.

My husband suffered a stroke in 2022, and since then, he had to sleep in the living room because he could no longer walk, and stairs had become an insurmountable barrier.

I sit up, confused, and turn on the light. I jump out of bed and hurry down the stairs to reach him.

But of course, he’s not there, and the realization strikes me like lightning. My husband died on Monday evening. My subconscious must be playing tricks on me—maybe it was wishful thinking?

Since Monday, I’ve only focused on informing family and friends about his death and planning his funeral.

The undertaker has been here. A long conversation about wishes and arrangements.

The pastor has been here, too. Another long conversation about my husband and who he was, his qualities, of which he had many. In the last two years, though, he hadn’t been able to make much use of all that he was.

Now I sit down, light a cigarette, and stare at the empty bed. It never truly fit in the living room, even though we tried to make it as homey as possible around it. But with a lift system hanging overhead, it’s hard to hide the institutional feel of the whole setup.

I go to the bathroom, then call the dog and quietly turn off the light in the living room. I go upstairs again, but I whisper goodnight to... oh right, he can’t hear it, but perhaps his spirit?

I catch myself repeatedly doing things we used to do—our rituals that made the days bearable. Sometimes they worked; other times, they ended in his desperate outbursts of frustration. I could understand him.

I could also understand that, in his helplessness, he sometimes voiced that he hoped life would soon end.

I don’t think, however, that he imagined it would be so close on Monday when we got up. He’d had a restless night, and I’d had to help him several times. Fatigue was etched on our faces, and the decision to call the doctor was easy.

It turned into a hospital admission for a check-up on his overall condition. Blood tests, however, revealed something more serious. He had to go for a CT scan under suspicion of a pulmonary embolism.

While the doctors reviewed the results, he asked the nurse to call me and ask me to bring his wheelchair the following day because he couldn’t bear lying in bed all the time. There was hope, at least in his mind, that he’d be up again soon.

But his body had other plans. A few minutes later, he suddenly felt unwell and lost consciousness within moments. Shortly afterward, he went into cardiac arrest.

The doctor was just about to enter his room to inform him that the scan showed a large pulmonary embolism and that there was nothing to be done.

Looking back, I’m glad he never received this news. Knowing that life would likely end in moments would have made him panic.

There was, therefore, no attempt at resuscitation; it wouldn’t have helped him.

I was left there by his bedside. It all felt so surreal—one moment in good spirits, the next, dead. How swiftly the cold can creep in.

Now it’s almost three days since then. Tuesday, Wednesday, and now Thursday. On Saturday, he’ll be laid to rest. He’ll be carried out of the church to Gabriel’s Oboe, a piece of music he decided long ago would be his farewell music when he was carried out of the church. I’ll have to say a final goodbye to the person I’ve loved for 27 years and spent nearly as many living with. I don’t know how to do this the best way.

He didn’t like cut flowers; they served much better outside in the garden. He also didn’t particularly enjoy being the center of attention, especially not from many people at once. But he’ll have to accept that on Saturday, our focus will be on him alone.

On the other hand, who knows how much he’ll perceive of it? He’s become a spirit and can simply slip away if it doesn’t suit him. Perhaps he’s already crossed into the light and left this vale of tears behind.

There are still a few nights to go. If I hear him again, I’ll know he hasn’t crossed into the light yet and that he’s here as my private ghost. Perhaps a sort of Halloween greeting?

What wouldn’t I give for all of this to be a bad dream? But sadly, it’s not. On Saturday, we’ll commit him to God our Creator, and we will gather to remember him in joyful and nostalgic ways.

And someday in the future, I will receive his ashes and journey to the sea east of where we live. There, I will gently scatter his ashes into the sea. Some will stay here, some may drift to his homeland, and some may float eternally in the water, free and untethered—just as he always wanted to live life.

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If you would like to give a little contribution to the immense costs counting up on my husbands funeral, I would appriciate it from the bottom of my heart and you can send here: