When I closed this site last year, I very much doubted I would ever create another site of any description. However, life does indeed go on and I have had many emails from the visitors to this site and from those of you seeking help with WordPress related issues. So, to those who have come here looking or me, I have actually created several sites since closing down ErraticSouls, but perhaps the best way to get in touch with me now, is to visit me at JamesICT.

I will also stop using my current Twitter site and anything else related to this site in anyway.

Thanks to those people who have shared their thoughts.

Table of contents for Cancer

1. This only happens to other people…
2. DEATH: The Final Frontier
3. Slice and dice
4. Friends in time of crisis
5. Life changes so quickly
6. Laughing
7. And then there is despair
8. Anja passed away today

The world has lost a truly beautiful person this evening as Anja took her final breath and finally passed away, peacefully as she slept. Her short but difficult fight with cancer is now over and she can rest in peace forever.

I am too broken to write all the words that are in my heart, but for those of us who knew Anja, we know she can never be replaced. She was a very unique individual who touched the hearts of all she met.

Her loving spirit will live on in all of us and her memory will never be forgotten.

I am now a broken and shattered soul who will never find true happiness again, but I feel honoured and privileged to have known Anja, to have been her husband and to have shared so many happy times together as one soul.  Above all else, Anja was my best friend and the love of my life.

Goodbye my angel. I will love you till my dying day. I can never let you go…

The sun is always shining even when it is dark!

Table of contents for Cancer

1. This only happens to other people…
2. DEATH: The Final Frontier
3. Slice and dice
4. Friends in time of crisis
5. Life changes so quickly
6. Laughing
7. And then there is despair
8. Anja passed away today

This may not be the most well-presented piece of text I have ever written, but it is from my heart. And anyway, I really do not care. To write it now, this minute – helps me stay sane. In the past 72 hours, Anja’s condition has very rapidly declined. 3 days ago she could still hold a half-coherent conversation with me. She was extremely tired but still chose to sit out of bed for much of the time. Her appetite significantly dropped but she could still chew a few mouthfuls of food at some points throughout the day. She still chose to suffer in pain and make the effort to leave her bed and use the bathroom. Her dignity remained intact.

We could hug. We could smile at each other. We could communicate.

2 days ago, Anja was simply too tired to sit up, she could not stay awake for more than a few minutes at a time and she stopped eating almost completely. A few crisps and a spoon of icecream was all she could take in. Sleep took over. She tried to smile but her energy levels were too low. She held my hand in hers and looked contented as she slept. Unable to control her bodily functions, she had to let go and I cleaned her as she still lay sleeping.

During the same period of time, the doctors and the nurses who visit decided it was time she stopped even trying to take her medications orally, and she was given a device called a syringe driver instead. This means she is now attached to a small machine that intravenously administers her medicine through a small tube inserted in her arm. It is automatically monitored and the nurses are able to add more/less medicines as required, without Anja even being aware of the process.

She sleeps deeply and at least looks contented.  I have been awake for well over 40 hours and I am utterly shattered. I know Anja is going to stop breathing very soon. It could be minutes, hours, maybe even days – but is certainly not far away now. I sat on the bed next to her all night and between the tears, the sheer sobbing and the pain of knowing I am losing her, I held her close to me and savoured every moment she blew a breath across my face.

The nurses came this morning and helped me wash her body and administer a new dose of medicine in the device. Tears slowly dripped from her eyes as she was subjected to the indignity of having to allow complete strangers to bathe her and change her bedding and clothes. I just held her face against mine and cried openly, knowing that every moment this was happening, she was crying inside too. We are extremely private people and severely struggle with such invasions on our intimacy. It cannot be avoided of course, but knowing this does not make it hurt any less.

I checked on her computer today too, to answer any emails or messages from her friends and family, but instead, I found the following message waiting for me, accompanied with a photo of us hugging each other on a recent trip to the Dales;

James I love you so much,, when I look at you I just burst in tears..
I wish that everything could be as it was .. Just living our lives together…
Just being you and me as one soul, as one love together….

I wish I was not sick
I wish everything was like it was
I wish I could me more…but the cancer took everything human away
The cancer messes you up as a person and you just change in a weird way
The cancer plays in your body as if it is not yours
You have all kinds of weird things going on in your body and believe me it is so scary… Have parts in your body you did not know you had before..
And other parts seem to have disappeared ..You have feelings you never had
You have thoughts you never would have thought thinking of..
You just change in many ways your life is changing and ending of course
I fight my way to be with you all the time
I fight all the pains aches to be with you
I fight against the grim reaper with my sword of happiness
I never want to lose you

I know this has taken her a lot of effort. Too much effort. English is Anja’s second language and yet she has always tried so very hard to always get it right. Even with so much stress upon herself, she finds time to make me smile.

And I can do nothing more now but sit with Anja, talk to her and tell how much I love her, and just hope she can hear me and feel me with her all the time. I cannot eat. I feel sick inside and I panic that she will be gone on my return, when for those fleeting moments, I need to leave the room.

Nothing has any purpose for me now. I write this and I wonder why. I hear Anja’s irregular breathing right behind me as I sit in front of this screen and type, and my body tightens each time it takes too long for her to exhale. All of our worldy possessions could be stolen in front of my eyes and I would not care.

And still the tears flow from my eyes. More than anything else in this world, I wish I could take her disease upon myself and let her flowing spirit free again.  She is a truly beautiful person, even now, with death knocking so loudly at our door.

Table of contents for Cancer

1. This only happens to other people…
2. DEATH: The Final Frontier
3. Slice and dice
4. Friends in time of crisis
5. Life changes so quickly
6. Laughing
7. And then there is despair
8. Anja passed away today

Many of the recent posts on this site have focused on the struggle and difficulties we have faced in light of Anja’s diagnosis of cancer. And as much as we certainly do have enormous difficulty coping with all of this every single day, we also make sure we have time to smile, laugh and even joke around about it all. The only crazy thing with all of this though, is that even though WE can laugh, when we mention this attitude to other people they look at us as if we have truly lost the plot.

The thing is, even before all this came upon us, we both knew exactly how we felt about death and all it entails. The whole ‘funeral thing’ has been an issue with which we see absolutely no point. Consequently, there has been a very strong element of truth in our jokes when we say to each other ‘When I die, just throw me in the wheelie bin – and remember to close the lid.’ I mean, isn’t the way in which we all choose to be ‘disposed’, totally up to each individual? Sure, we need a clean, sanitary method and we are not against other people doing whatever they want in terms of burials and cremations. So yes, we do respect other people’s ideas and beliefs. But for us, the cheapest and quickest method, with the least pain for the person left behind, has always been our perspective.

So we have already arranged for the manner in which Anja’s body will be ‘disposed’, once she leaves this world in mind and soul and nothing but her body remains. A simple ‘cheap’ cremation for those you who really want to know, with no trimmings, no extras and no fuss. This may sound callous of me, but believe me when I tell you, this is what we have both agreed on long ago and is not the result of either of us being cheapskates.

So what do we laugh at? Well, death itself in many different ways, but more than that, the unknown elements that death brings to us all. As already mentioned, we are not spiritual or religious people and we have no idea what lies before us. Perhaps your beliefs allow for a sense of security or comfort in what death brings, but that is not the case for us. So, we make jokes about the funeral ‘farce’, the expectations of society at such a ’serious and revered’ time, and we even joke about what happens to your body as it decomposes and rots away. Sounds morbid I guess, but when you are at this point in your life, you see life differently.

For instance, recently we had a discussion about what Anja would like to be wearing when she was cremated and being the person she is, I knew the answer would not be the norm. In fact, I was already thinking along the same lines when she said she started to tell me that she would like to be cremated in the costume she bought a little while back. You see, Anja went to this fancy dress party dressed up as The Corpse Bride, complete with the black and white roses, the white face, and looking pretty much like the female persona of death itself. However, what makes this even more bizarre [and really makes Anja laugh openly about it] is the fact that even though you know me as James [as does everyone in real life too], my birth name is Tim – surname Burton. Yep that’s right -  Anja wants to do it all properly and be cremated as Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride. Considering we have only been married for approximately 18 months, she says this is the obvious choice. And who am I to argue? Our humour has always been somewhat ‘black’, so why change it now.

And Anja makes jokes about her ashes. Her favourite hobby of late has been to ask everybody to have a barbeque in her honour when she is gone. That’s right – a proper barbeque with meat and salads and so on – and she whispers out aloud to everyone within earshot, ‘just make sure you all throw a few of my ashes around the place too, so you can feel me with you…’

Putting all of this into written words gives the whole laughter thing we experience, a different taint, but you know, with death actually staring us in the face and with both of us absolutely out of our minds with the stress, anxiety and uncertainty that awaits us in the very near future, well then, laughter, humour [even if bizarre and surreal tothe extreme] is really not as strange it may at first appear.

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And that my friend, will do for now…