I generally recommend against suffering a massive cardiac arrest four days after turning 56, but especially during a global pandemic.
Because when this happens, your family will be told that under no uncertain terms will they be able to come visit you in the hospital. Even though studies have shown that coma patients tend to respond well to human touch and the sound of loved ones’ voices, the global pandemic, which at the time of your cardiac arrest has infected fewer than 1,300 people in your entire state (population 1.344 million), will prevent this from happening for you. Sorry about that.
A friend-of-a-friend of your son who works as a nurse at the hospital will make surreptitious visits to your ICU room to talk to you. She’ll text your son more updates than what the hospital is offering.
Your children will be told to call in on a speakerphone in an attempt to mimic in-person contact. Your son will inform you that he is looking after your new puppy, and your daughter will be terrified when she realizes the faint whooshing noise she hears is your ventilator.
Your family will then be told a week after you get sick that even though you have no chance of recovery and that all remaining care would be futile, they still cannot all come visit you in the hospital to say their goodbyes before your life support is removed. Not even in groups.
Instead, they will be told that only one person is allowed to come up and see you, even though you have two adult children who have been isolating for months and who have no symptoms related to the global pandemic. Your son will immediately cede the visit to your daughter. Your daughter will worry that she will be prevented from seeing you one last time as she flies in from out of state the day after you get sick and therefore has not been isolated for a two-week period, per the governor’s orders. She will tell half-truths to hospital staff when questioned, but the cardiac ICU doctors will largely seem unconcerned about where she lives.
Depending on the diocese you live in, you may or may not have access to last rites. The hospital may push back against family members who request that you receive the sacraments one last time. Your daughter will insist on it because it is important to her. She will be overcome with relief when she is told that it happened.
Your family will be told that, overnight, your condition deteriorated and that you are now a candidate to donate your organs. Your relatives will be consoled that their tragedy could be someone’s hope. Your organs will eventually be donated to three people.
On the day that you will be declared brain dead, the team handling your future organ donation will plead on behalf of your loved ones so that they can say goodbye in person. Your sister will be allowed to join your daughter, and the hospital will agree to look the other way and permit the double visit. Your daughter and sister will both weep through their masks. Your daughter will hold your hand, talk to you, and give you one last hug, making sure not to bump into any of your tubes.
Due to the pandemic, which 14 patients at your hospital will be battling on the day you die, most people will be too afraid to visit your loved ones and offer in-person comfort. They will drop things by the door and scurry away and then send a text or call. It’s nice, but your daughter will just want a real hug and to drink an entire bottle of Pink Whitney. She will understand their concerns, though, since a lot of her friends work in the medical field and/or have babies. She will not want them to get sick.
You won’t be able to have a real wake. Most of your friends will not be able to come. They live out of state, and interstate travel is discouraged. There will be a private viewing if your family wants one. Everyone will wear masks. Your cousins won’t be allowed in the funeral home, but damned if they’ll be kept away from the cemetery. Your daughter will fight for a priest to celebrate the graveside ceremony, and she will use her work connections to get the nice priest from Madawaska who is currently at St. Joseph’s to do the service.
Your loved ones will spread out at the cemetery and attempt to disguise that they number more than 10 but fewer than 20. Your children will each get one friend to accompany them to the burial. Your son’s friend will serve as one of the pallbearers. Your daughter’s friend will be given instructions about which gravesite to pretend to be mourning at if the police come to break up the service.
Your daughter will worry throughout your burial that someone visiting the cemetery will call the police and report the size of the gathering. The service, mercifully, will go off without a hitch, and the priest, unbeknownst to your daughter, will choose to read her favorite Gospel passage.
Due to the global pandemic, which at this time has resulted in the deaths of 89 people in your state, your eventual “real” memorial Mass will be scheduled for a to-be-determined date in the future. Everyone will probably have to wear masks. It’s unclear if your out-of-state friends will be allowed to come.
Less than a week after your burial, large protests will erupt around the country and throughout your state. Nobody will be charged for violating social distancing policies, and police in your state will allow hundreds of people to gather peacefully in a park without any issues or concerns about social distancing or the spread of disease. Your daughter will then be called a host of vile names for wondering on Twitter why her family wasn’t given the same opportunity to gather to mourn peacefully.
Rest in peace, Dad.
Christine Rousselle is a Washington correspondent for the Catholic News Agency.
