Microsoft Word Elisabeth Kubler-Ross On Death And Dying doc

DOCTOR: What have you changed in your day-to-day life since you have been aware of your 
cancer? Has anything changed in your life? 
 
PATIENT: Meaning in activity? I will be out of the hospital in just a couple of weeks and I don't 
know what will take place. I have just been living, more or less, from day to day in the hospital. 
Because you know hospital routine, you know what goes on. 
 
CHAPLAIN: If I hear you correctly in what you said earlier, it struck me as familiar. What you are 
saying is what Jesus said before he faced the cross, "Not my will but thine be done." 
 
PATIENT: I hadn't thought about that. 
 
CHAPLAIN: It is the meaning of what you said. You have wished for hope if possible that it not be 
your time, but you override that wish with a deeper wish that thy will be done. 
 
PATIENT: I know that I have a very short period to live, maybe a few years with the treatment I'm 
taking now and it may be a few months. Of course, none of us have any guarantee that we are going 
to get back to our homes tonight. 
 
DOCTOR: Do you have any concrete picture of how it is going to be? 
 
PATIENT: No. I know that it has been provided, the Scriptures tell us so and on this I lay my hope. 
 
CHAPLAIN: I don't think we should continue. Dr. G. hasn't been able to be up until just recently, 
maybe a couple of more minutes. 
 
PATIENT: Well, I feel very well. 
 
CHAPLAIN: Do you? I told the doctor you wouldn't be kept very long. 
 
DOCTOR: We'll leave it up to you to say if you get just slightly tired. This talking together very 
frankly about such dreaded topic, how does this make you feel, Dr. G.? 
 
PATIENT: Well, I don't find that a dreaded topic at all. After Rev. I. and Rev. N. left the room this 
morning, I had some time to think and it didn't affect me in any way particularly other than I hope 
that I might be of value to somebody else who is facing this if he doesn't have the faith that I have. 
 
(P112) 
 
DOCTOR: What do you think we can learn from our interviewing dying patients and very sick 
patients that would help us to be more effective in helping them face it, especially those who are 
not in a way as lucky as you are? Because you have this faith and it's apparent that it really helps 
you. 
 
PATIENT: This is something I have explored quite a bit since I have been sick. I am of the 
temperment that I want to know the complete prognosis, whereas there are some people who when 

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they find out they have a terminal illness they almost all go completely to pieces. Now this is 
something that I feel only experience can tell, what you can do as you approach a patient. 
 
DOCTOR: This is one of the reasons why we interview patients here with nursing staff and other 
hospital personnel able to see this. To see patient after patient, to elicit which ones really want to 
talk about it and which ones prefer not to mention it. 
 
PATIENT: Your first visits, I think, should be of a neutral nature, until you find out how deeply the 
patient felt about himself and his experience and his religion and faith. 
 
CHAPLAIN: I think that Dr. R. referred to Dr. G. as being lucky, but I think here you are saying 
meaningful things come out of this experience such as your relationship with your son which is at a 
different level and your appreciation of his growth came out of this. 
 
PATIENT: Yes, I thought we were lucky too. I was going to comment on this because I don't feel 
that this particular area is a thing of luck. This thing of knowing the Lord your Saviour is 
something that is not luck; it is a very deep and wonderful experience and I think it prepares one for 
the vicissitudes of life as it were, the trials -that we face. We all have to face trials, or face illnesses. 
But this does prepare you to accept them, because you know that as I said a little bit ago being shot 
from twenty feet away and the person misses you, you know that there is some other power than 
the fact that you are a good dodger or whatever. But we have heard it said that there are no atheists 
in the foxholes, which is true. You hear men become very close to the Lord in a foxhole, or when 
their life is in danger, not a foxhole but even coming 
 
into a serious accident and realizing suddenly that they are in it and they automatically call on the 
name of the Lord. It is not a case of luck. It is a case of seeking and finding that which the Lord has 
for us. 
 
DOCTOR: I didn't mean lucky in a casual way, just as a chance happening, more like a happy, 
fortunate thing' 
 
PATIENT: I understand, yes. Yes, it is a happy experience. It is amazing how you can feel this 
experience during a period of illnesses like this when you have others praying for you, and realize 
that others are praying for you. It is a tremendous help to me. It has been. 
 
CHAPLAIN: It's interesting I did mention to Dr. R. just as we came to the seminar-not only have 
you experienced people remembering you but your wife was also able to give some strength to 
people who had relatives dying here and offer a prayer to them. 
 
PATIENT: This is another thing that I was going to mention. My wife has changed quite a bit in 
this period. She has become much stronger. She was quite dependent on me. I am, you probably 
already imagine, a very independent individual and I believe in taking my responsibilities as they 
come. Therefore she hasn't had the opportunity, as it were, to do many of the things that some 
women do such as taking care of the business of the family and so on, and it has made her quite 
dependent. But she has changed quite a bit. She is now much deeper and much stronger. 
 

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