The real fear
My friend, who now has cancer, sits in front of me smiling. We have been talking about things deep inside her. I ask her, “Are you afraid?” She hesitates a moment and then says, “Yes.”
“What are you afraid of?” I ask. She is silent.
“Is it the cancer? Is it the treatment? Or suffering? Or death?” She continues to smile. And then she says, “I am not afraid of cancer. But I am afraid of the suffering that may come with treatment. I am not afraid of death. But I am afraid of being dependent.”
Indeed, when we go deep into it, none of us wants to be a burden to others. Nevertheless, that is one thing that 85-90% of us – the ones that are not blessed with a sudden death – will have eventually to deal with.
Read this article in the Guardian – truly verbalising the fear.
Maybe, accepting the fact of being dependent some day, of being able to say, “Okay, so I am a burden. Yes. I accept that,” may be one step in the right direction.
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