Speaking of disturbing passages of reminders of attitudes now gone there is this:
Quote:
Suddenly, just as she had done once before, she began to answer someone or something that the others could not hear. “Yes, Jean, it won’t be long now!” And right afterward, “Yes, my dear Clara, I’m coming.”
And then the struggle began anew. Was it a struggle with death? No, she was wrestling now with life to gain death. “I want to,” she gasped, “but I can’t. Something to help me sleep. Have mercy, gentlemen, give me something so I can sleep.”
At the words “have mercy,” Frau Permaneder sobbed loudly and Thomas groaned softly, clutching his head with one hand for a moment. But the doctors knew their duty. For the sake of the family, they were required under all circumstances to preserve this life as long as possible, and a narcotic would have meant the immediate loss of all resistance, the surrender of life. Doctors were not placed on this earth to bring death, but to preserve life at any price. And there were certain religious and moral reasons as well—they had heard all about them at the university, although they might not be able to recall them precisely at the moment. And so, instead, they stimulated her heart with various drugs and induced vomiting several times, which brought some momentary relief.
Five o’clock—the struggle could not get any worse than this. Sitting upright, her eyes wide open for battle, Madame Buddenbrook flailed her arms, as if grasping for support or hands that were reaching out to her, and constantly answered calls that came from all directions, which only she could hear, but which seemed to be growing ever more numerous and urgent. It was as if not only her dead husband and daughter were present now, but also her parents, her parents-in-law, and other relatives who had gone before. She called out names, and no one in the room could say precisely just which of her dead relatives she meant. “Yes,” she cried, turning first in one direction and then another. “I’m coming—soon—just a moment—but—I can’t—Gentlemen, something to help me sleep—”
At five-thirty, there was a moment of peace. And then, quite suddenly, a shudder passed over her aged, pain-racked face—the features twitched in a rush of horrified joy, trembled with deep, fearful tenderness. In the next second, she flung her arms wide, and then—so abruptly, so instantaneously that both what she had heard and her answer seemed almost simultaneous—she cried out in the most absolute obedience, with boundless, fearful, loving submission and surrender, “Here I am!” And passed on.
They had all pulled back in shock. What had happened? Whose call was it that had caused her to follow instantly?
Someone pulled the window curtains back and blew out the candles. Meanwhile, with a gentle look on his face, Dr. Grabow closed the dead woman’s eyes.
They stood there chilled by the pale light of the autumn dawn that now filled the room. Sister Leandra covered the mirror above the dresser with a cloth.
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Unfortunately attitudes in the medical profession, at least in the US, have still not changed as much as such attitudes should. Still not accepting that it is better to ease the suffering of a terminally ill patient into a quicker death with less suffering than to employ extraordinary methods to prolong life and suffering.