Peanut - #BlogBattle

Welcome to this week's #BlogBattle entry, a weekly short fiction contest hosted by the delightful Rachael Ritchey.

It's keyword-based, and this week's keyword is...wait for it...legume.

Yes, you read that right. Since a peanut's a legume, here we go...

Peanut

Tanks don't have flat tires, but they do throw tracks, and sometimes you need to call AAA. Well, not the Auto Club, exactly, but there would be a maintenance APC coming our way shortly with the bits and pieces we needed. Our organic equipment wasn't up to the task.

Meanwhile, it was just another day at the office. Biff and The Dude were tossing a football back and forth, increasing the inconvenience of the Vietnamese whose road we were already blocking when occasionally the pigskin would nail one of the scooter-riding elite in the head.

Sonny was sitting on the edge of the loader's hatch, wearing the CVC helmet to keep radio watch. And I was just taking advantage of the downtime to look around.

It's amazing how sometimes you just pass through life without seeing what's in it.

There was a ville set back from the road, across a line of what would have been paddies in the wet season. Now the ground was baked dry. It was a prosperous little place; some of the hootches even had corrugated tin incorporated into their thatch-and-wood architecture. People were moving back and forth, swaying and shimmering in the langur of the heat-haze.

Women and old men and kids. No MAMs. They were all in the bush with Charlie, or in the bush with Marvin the ARVN, trying to avoid running into Charlie.

Watching them made me sleepy, and I was about to tell Sonny that I'd try to find a patch of shade to catch some z's when I heard the whine of an approaching jeep.

Trailing dust and scattering scooters it came, rather like Moses parting the red Sea on a lower budget.

There were two men in it, and as it pulled in behind us the passenger got out, took off his Ray-Bans, and called out, "Peanut?"

No one ever called me peanut except my Dad, and I felt a warm happy glow, because there he was, large as life.

It's not much advantage in the Corps having a Dad who's a general, but it doesn't hurt, and you might even get to meet him on a dirt road in a hot land during a weird war.

"Dad...uh, sir." I reached down a hand to help him up onto the deck.

"Peanut! They told me I might find you here, abusing government property...what'd you to to the poor thing?" He patted the turret.

And that was the last thing he ever did, because suddenly his head snapped back in the center of a moving halo of blood. I heard the shot almost at the same instant.

The ville.

The momentum carried Dad in a parody of a backwards walk off the side of the tank, and he fell into the dirt.

There was another shot, and the jeep driver fell sideways, arms reaching for the dirt, legs holding him in the vehicle, and a ribbon of blood running down to make a puddle.

Sonny yelled, "Sniper!" and I felt The Dude and Biff climb up and past me, heading for their fighting positions. I looked to where they had been. The road was empty of civilians, and the football rolled in a sad curve into the ditch, abandoned.

I wondered where all the civilians went.

"TC!" Sonny grabbed my arm."Get DOWN!"

Another bullet pinged off the armor, and Sonny dropped into his hatch like a prairie dog.. I edged around the side of the turret, and looked toward the ville. There ther ping, followed a split second later by the sound of the shot.

Well, ok, I thought. That's it. I stood up and pulled the sky-mount .50 around, and yelled into the cupola hatch, "Gunner, coax, on the hootches!

I racked the charging handle, hit the butterfly, and the fifty went two rounds and stopped.

The coax wasn't firing. "Gunner, COAX!"

"Coax is down." Biff's voice came back faintly; the .50's loud, and the two rounds it did fire took most of my hearing.

"What've you got in the tube?"

"HEAT." We'd been bunker-busting, and HEAT was the round of choice for can opening.

"Fire that, and gimme cannister."

Biff came back with something unintelligible.

"WHAT?" Say again, I can't HEAR you!"

Sonny popped back out, just as there was another ping, and a bullet ricocheted off the useless .50. He cringed and handed me a CVC, carefully passing along the comm wires.

Biff was talking. "Where does he want me to put the round? What am I shooting at?"

"The ville, the ville!" I was still yelling, and probably hurt the guys' ears.

The Dude asked, "Did anyone see where the shot came from?" He spoke slowly, trying to defuse the moment. Tension makes for mistakes, and mistakes get people killed. "TC, maybe you better get back in the tank?"

He was right, but my father was lying dead in the dirt, and I didn't want steel between us. "I'm fine. I'll call the fire."

"Did you see it, TC?" Biff was slowly traversing the turret, occasionally stopping, the gun tube wavering like to nose of a hound dog.

"No." It would be hard to spot a sniper, if he was any good. There was another shot, well-aimed, and is popped its little sonic boom near my head.

"Unload that heat wherever, guinner. Then load cannister and waste the ville. Left to right, put a round in every hootch."

That would teach the little folk a lesson about harboring snipers. Wouldn't be a very practical lesson, because cannister pretty well shreds everything in its way, especially people.

The IC static hissed in the headset. "Get started," I said. "No, wait one...loader, check the map. Are we good?"

Sonny's voice came back after a longer pause than I expected. "Yeah, we's good...this-all's a free-fahr zone."

I nodded, and looked at my father's corpse. "Do it," I said.

The Dude came up quickly. "Biff, wait."

The Dude pulled himself out of the driving compartment hatch, in front of the turret, and just stood there, looking at the ville. He'd had to take off the CVC, so he wasn't on IC.

He looked over at me. "I'm still alive, TC. Sniper's gone." He had been standing in full view of where I figured the shooter might be.

"How do you know?"

"I'm bait. TC, he's gone. We can't waste the whole place. Look!" he waved his arm toward a particularly elegant structure, with only a few holes in the roof. Two heads peeped around a corner, then ducked back. "TC, there's people there. Don't do this."

"He's still there. He's one of them!"

The Dude shook his head. "No, he's not. He's gone. TC, look at me. I'm bait. And he didn't take it."

Fine. The sniper was crafty. "Well, yeah, and stay alive...get back in! Gunner, get that HEAT on the way. Then cannister."

The Dude knelt by his hatch, and shouted something. Then he stood up again, with a .45 in his hand, and he pointed it at me. "TC, no. We can't do this. You can't do this, TC."

I felt my mouth drop open and stay that way. There was dust, and the smell of blood on the air, and I could taste it as the seconds lumbered slowly past. The muzzle of the .45 was very large, and very black. I wanted to say, "Dude, put it away. Now."

But the commanding tone was not at my disposal, and neither were the words, and I head myself say, in a voice dry as death, "They killed my father."

The Dude's hands were shaking, and for some reason that was scary. "Not them, TC. The sniper. Him alone, and he's not there now."

Sonny raised his head from his hatch, looked at me, then turned to look at The Dude. He swore, and then pulled up one of the tanks hand weapons, a grease gun.

I wondered if I'd have two of my crew looking like they were going to shoot me, but Sonny pointed the thing a The Dude. "Dude, y'all cain't do this, man. We's autherahzed to waste any place what we-all takes fahr from. TC's raht, boy. Let's us do this." He flipped up the ejection-port cover, making the grease gun live. "Ah'll shoot y'all if ah haves tuh."

The Dude said, "That's OK." His hand was shaking more violently, and the pistol's muzzle was tracing little arcs across my retina. "Do what you have to, Sonny. I'm doing the same." He thumbed down the safety. "Please, TC."

The Dude's eyes were wide, and as I met them he bit his lip.

"Okay," I said.

The Dude almost collapsed, and I heard the snick of the hammer being lowered. He was hunched over, shaking. Sonny raised the muzzle of the grease gun high, and snapped the cover back. Wise precaution; sometimes they would fire when you put the safety on.

"Keep and eye out," I said, and them jumped down to attend to the bodythat had carried my father's soul. He looked like a squirrel that had been run over. Shrunken, limp, and it looked like this thing could never had lived or loved or laughed.

"I'm sorry, TC." The Dude was standing behind me. I would have preferred that he not be there, for the moment, but there he was.

"About what?" I wanted to sound combative. But he was more than my driver. He was my friend, and he had just been pointing a gun at my face.

"Everything."

"Yeah." I thought he meant my dad and the mutiny. But I was wrong, at least in some of the details.

"I'm sorry the world's the way it is. I'm sorry we can't find it in our hearts to live with each other. I'm sorry for the sadness and the anger and the the way we make God carry our flags, so we can feel justified. I'm just so sorry for it all."

"Yeah," I said again. Not much else I could say. "Would you have shot me, Dude?"

"Yes, TC. I would have shot you."

"Why?" Suddenly I was very tired. I wanted to lie next to my Dad, in the arms of death.

"Better to lose your life than to lose your soul."

"They deserved it, Dude. You know they let that sniper stay there. You know they could have kept him out. One guy, most two guys. If they won't stand up for themselves, then what's the point in any of this?" I laid my hand on my dad's arm. He was cooling off. Maybe temperature is the wall between life and death.

"Yeah, we had the right. You had the right, TC. They were guilty as charged, for that. But I couldn't let you be their executioner."

I sighed. "Why not?"

"Because  I couldn't let you destroy the man we follow, and trust, and love."

"

Your Dying Spouse 51 - Replaceable Me

We're linked with the Wedded Wednesday, on the totally awesome Messy Marriage site.

This post is from the soon-to-be-dead-dude's perspective...a gift one can give one's caregiving spouse. Can give, and in most cases should.

I'm going to die before my wife does (barring anything really weird happening). I do not want her making the rest of her life a mausoleum through which she wanders down the years, her footsteps echoing in the stillness.

She deserves better.

I'm not replaceable as an individual; no one is. God made us unique, and after we were 'done' He broke the mold.

Especially, some might add, in my case. Some things you don't want to try twice.

But I am replaceable in the context of a marriage relationship.

bd I have to be, do leave the best possible legacy for my wife. I have to leave her with the feeling that marriage was worthwhile, that she will miss the kind of companionship I provided.

And I want her to hope that she may find it again, because she'll have decades yet to live, if all goes according to the statistical norms.

But how does one accomplish this? How do you leave a legacy of love that is severed in a clean break, and not a festering wound?

I don't know, but I think it might be done this way...

Love but don't cling. In other words, don't get sentimental and spend evening poring over scrapbooks and photo albums, going down memory lane. Spend time together, but make it time spent in the moment, or looking forward, even to a future one might never see.

Don't mention the elephant in the room. It's fine to say, "I think that when I'm dead you should remarry", but one should not dwell on it. Returning to the subject can create a feeling that the dying person's really insecure, and will put just a touch of poison into any love potion that may be quaffed...after. Don't do it.

Encourage independence. The caregiving spouse should be encouraged to have a life outside the battlefield that terminal illness creates. Whether that is involvement with church ministry groups, or membership in a gym, or just going for a walk in the evening and communing with the great outdoors...there should be a link to the life that is pleasant, and free from the spectre (to some degree, at least) of impending death.

This is not a suggested carte blanche to start dating before the body's in the ground, though I know of an instance when that's exactly what happened. The brother of a friend of mine was dying of a particularly unpleasant  cancer; he had two kids, and a wife who had a degenerative disease, and could not work.

So he encouraged his wife and younger brother to date, while he was still alive, because they did like each other...and he put his family''s welfare ahead of his own feelings of possessiveness.

It worked. The transition for the widow and the kids was as smooth as it could be, and the world rolled on - I was lucky to be a confidante, They were happy, and still are.

But this is the exception; in most cases, there's to much human nature that gets in the way, and too much emotion. A relationship that starts and becomes even mildly romantic, even in a restrained and completely appropriate manner, before the spouse's death is unlikely to survive the upheaval that will follow.

That said, I hope that my wife already knows someone she might choose to spend the rest of her days with (even if that thought has not crossed her mind). I hope that he understands the ordeal she's going through now, and respects her for it. I wish them both all the happiness in the world, with a full heart.

I know her well; she's not made to be alone. Her happiness transcends everything, including my ego.

(In case you're wondering what I'd do if the shoe was on the other foot...I'd never remarry. But I'm a completely different sort of animal; for me, solitude is natural, and I've lost so very many people that I know that somehow, they're close...if Barbara were to die before me, I'd still be living with her, in a manner of speaking, and no one would be allowed to take her seat.)

Help me out, here, please...again, this one was kind of a nightmare to write, because I'm still making the transition from resenting that someone might be walking through my 'life' to simply wanting the best...and letting go of the hooks that might lock my wife to a memory.

What did I miss? What might you disagree with...or at least have said differently?

Your Dying Spouse 50 - Listening To Doubt

When the curtain looks like it's about to fall, it's almost universal that a dying person is going to go through a period of reflection.

What did my life add up to? What did it mean?

When the horizon's clear, and we feel that our days are still many, we tend to look at each day as an opportunity to catch up - to correct at least some of the mistakes we've made, to catch up with those dreams that shimmer tantalizingly out of reach.

And when the test results come in, and you know that the days are, truly, numbered, you end up doing the math.

This is what it adds up to, this life I've lived.

Some people can look back on a life well-lived, but others - perhaps most, especially those life feels like it's being cut short, feel like they're leaving behind too much unfinished business.

And that their lives are like Shakespeare's tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

If your terminally ill spouse falls into this category, it can be heartbreaking.

Heartbreaking because the life you shared, the love you shared, will be dissected and found wanting.

What can you do?

First, remember that this is not about you. It's about loss, and grief, and anger. It's rage against disease, and the prison of time in which your mate is suddenly placed. And it's anger against God for not fulfilling the promises we assume He makes (which He doesn't; he promises much richer rewards, but they're hard to see when you're hurting.)

It's hard to step back, but this is the time to put on something of a professional face, and this is why it's so important to have your own life, apart from the role of the caregiving mate. When you've placed your whole identity into the role you're playing, you're terribly vulnerable to hurts that are certainly not intended...but that nonetheless may never heal.

IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU.

Second, listen without trying to fix it. Your husband or wife may have to travel to this road to come to some sort of closure. Many people need it, some don't, and you generally won't know until it happens to your spouse...or to you.

It's a process, really. And as painful as it may be over some days or weeks or months, it can, in the end, bring a measure of peace...well, I did my best.

Arguing - trying to point out even obvious failures of logic that paint a negative picture - just puts you in an adversarial role, and may cause your spouse to fight his or her corner, to fight for that negativity.

Sort of like the quarterback getting confused, and running to the wrong goal line.

But there are times when you do have to point out evidence to the contrary, evidence that shows the true worth of a life.

But when?

Simple. When it's in the form of a question, and not a statement. "My life sucked" asks for a response along the lines of a wordless hug.

"Do you think my life sucked?" is a plea for alight, to illuminate the past and to create coherence from what feels like chaos.

Third, go for diversion. Reflection's never a terribly useful thing, even when good eventually comes of it; there are just too many dangers. It's an emotional minefield.

Encourage hope, and a connection to the future. I still work on the aeroplane I'm building, even though I know I am not likely to finish it, let alone fly it. But just the act of fashioning a small part - even if it takes me ten times as long as it should - is still a heart-leap into tomorrow.

Yes, I have to talk myself up, sometimes, not to feel it's futile. Actually, sometimes means every morning.

Another way to give a connection to the future, if circumstances allow it, is to get a puppy or kitten. There's something about developing that relationship, and seeing the growth of character, intelligence, and the bonds of love over a fairly short time that nothing else can match.

And it can be lifesaving; there have been documented instances of life being prolonged through the positive attitudes engendered from the love of a dog or cat.

What do you think? What else would you suggest, both as a way to keep yourself sane as a caregiver, and to help your husband or wife?

We're linked with Testimony Tuesday. and with the Wedded Wednesday,

Your Dying Spouse 49 - Alone In The Fight {FMF}

We're here for Five Minute Friday, hosted by the gracious Kate Motaung; it's a five-minute timed writing challenge based on a keyword, which this week is...alone

We're also with Weekend Whispers, and Inspire Me Monday.

Execute.

Dying can be a pretty lonely business.

It prys you away from the life that rushes past you, and throws you into a gyre in which everything is redolent of raw meat and steel and gunpowder.

Every day is literally life and death.

You don't get to escape; there are no days off. There's no respite time.

The enemy isn't at the gates; he's in your living room, and you're fighting hand-to-hand while your family's watching TV.

Alone.

And that's as it should be.

I don't want my wife to experience the change in worldview I have gone through; she has had her own changes, inevitably, but to her there's still something to be gained from cheering on her favourite on America's Got Talent.

She can still experience the thrill of victory, and the agony of defeat as it applies to sports; it can still matter to her, because she can step back. I want her to have that respite.

I can't. My life's narrowed down to a single point; get through the next minute, and keep writing, keep trying to make this all mean something.

That's life and death for me.

I don't want her to be in this sometimes humourless and always ruthless vale of wrath.

I want her to have the sunlight.

Endex.

As an extra note, the support she has given me, and that of my online family, has been something I could not do without; 'alone' in this context doesn't discount those. It merely means that I have to refrain from making my situation the most important thing that's happening in my wife's life (it is, but I don't need to emphasize it), and refrain from making it all revolve around me.

Life goes on; it should, and I want it to.

The last few days have been among the worst I have faced; I am glad to still be living. Being afraid to sleep, in case you don't wake up...saying to your wife, "Well, just in case...if this is it, it's been fun, and I'd do it again" followed by a fist-bump...all that's kind of a bummer.

And this post was terribly hard to write. I don't want to face these things; I don't want to have to do this analysis, this dissection of a fell process.

But it's my job.

We're linked with the Wedded Wednesday,

Problems with Paratroops - #BlogBattle

Taking a short break from the "Dying Spouse" series...it's another Tuesday, another #BlogBattle, hosted by the wonderful and talented Rachael Ritchey! (We're also connecting with Thought-Provoking Thursday.)

Today's keyword is troop.

Problems With Paratroops

Charlie had planned ahead. He'd placed a bunker complex right where we would be working with a platoon from the 101st Airborne.

This was going to be interesting.

The Dude was keeping watch with the binos. "OK, enemy in sight," he said suddenly.

"Who?"

"It's a butter-bar..."

I waited, dreading what the next words might be.

"And he's got a map."

There is nothing more dangerous than a second lieutenant with a map...unless it's an Airborne second looey with a map.

The Dude lowered the glasses and shook his head. "Just when I was getting accustomed to the thought of staying alive."

The Airborne officer strode up to where we'd laagered the tanks. He rapped sharply on the fender of the New Guy Tank with the butt of his .45, and was then directed over to us.

"Hello, men. I've got a job for you." He sounded like he'd just watched a few too many John Wayne movies.

"Yes?" I said.

He looked up at men and put his hands on his hips, crumpling the map. "Yes, SIR, sergeant." I guess messing up his map had irritated him.

"Sorry, sir. What can we do for you?" I remained seated in the turret. No need to expend energy until I was told to.

He spread the map out on the fender. "We've scouted a bunker complex...would you please come down from there, sergeant?"

I sighed, loud enough for him to hear, and swung myself down. The Dude followed. Biff and Sonny had been relaxing on the back deck. they sat up to listen.

"We've scouted a bunker complex here." He pointed at the map, and then turned to point ata treeline in the distance. "Right there. It's a big one. At least a half-dozen classroom-size, and the camo on top is fresh."

The Dude picked up the binos to scan the treeline. "Ah, sir?" he said in his most respectful voice. "Sir?"

"Yes, what?" The butter bar was impatient.

"It's more over there, don't you think?" He pointed thirty degrees off from where the lieutenant had indicated.

"Hmmm. Yes. That's where I was pointing!" He waved his arm more generally now. "Over there."

"Of course, sir." The Dude was carefully glassing the treeline, and the ground in front of it.

The officer turned to me. "You're going to assault that complex, sergeant. My men will follow once you've taken out the main structures, and we'll mop up. You will use HE, and individually destroy each bunker. Is that clear?"

It was clear, all right. The Dude stepped in before I could destroy my own career by replying.

"Tanks don't work that way, sir."

The lieutenant looked at The Dude as if a case of c rats had just opened on its own accord, and spoken to him. "I beg you pardon?" he said.

He really said that. I guess the Army really took this officer-and-gentleman thing seriously.

The Dude went on. "Sir, we operate with infantry support. We need your guys around us. Alone, we're sitting ducks for anyone with a satchel charge or an RPG."

"That's absurd. You have armor, you have weapons..."

"And we can't see out, except through the viewing blocks. Besides, an RPG will go through more than a foot of armor."

The lieutenant looked at me. I nodded at The Dude. "He's got more experience here than I do, sir."

"Some commander you are...well, son," he said to The Dude, "how do you know that?" He was at least five years The Dude's junior.

The Dude said mildly, "Because an RPG went through the glacis of my first tank. Thirteen inches. I wasn't driving them, otherwise I wouldn't be talking to you now."

"Well, now isn't that why you have hatches? So you can see the threat and kill it?"

I couldn't resist. "Well, sure, but we make awfully good targets for snipers. They sort of know where to look, sir."

"Well, now if you're scared, you should have said so."

The Dude stepped close to the lieutenant. "Sir, my TC isn't scared of anything in this country, or this war."

"He's afraid to do his job!"

The New Guy crew had drifted over to hear if we were really going to go out and commit suicide at the orders of this idiot.

The Dude remained calm and mild and venomous. "Well, sir, I'll tell you what. With TC's permission..." He looked toward me, and I nodded. "He'll drive, and I'll ride the commander's cupola."

"Well, at least somebody here's got guts."

The Dude smiled. "No, sir. It's just that I'm expendable."

The lieutenant nodded, and said, "Well, be that as it may. H-hour is zero-five-hundred zulu."

Sonny spoke up. "Pardon me, sir, buh, what's that tahm, heah?" Zulu was GMT, which didn't mean much on the other side of the world.

"Figure it out, soldier!"

"Marine," said a deep voice behind me.

"Wha...uh..." the lieutenant was looking over my shoulder as if he'd just seen God Himself. "Uh, sir!" He threw a salute that would have knocked him cold if it had been any sharper. Perhaps that would have been a mercy for him, given what followed.

I turned, and behind me stood a full-bird, with leathery skin and crinkles around his eyes that made him look kindly. "Hello, sir," I said. I didn't salute. You don't salute in the field, because that identifies officers for a sniper.

The colonel smiled, crinkling his eyes more. He said to the lieutenant, "Son, we don't call these boys soldiers. They're Marines. We want their help, so we don't insult them."

The lieutenant looked like he'd swallowed a yardstick from the wrong end. "Yes, sir!" This time he didn't salute, but his hand flinched. He sure wanted to polish that apple.

"Now why don't you boys tell me what my subordinate wants y'all to do." He looked at The Dude, and I realized that he'd been close by all along, listening.

The Dude explained the lieutenant's plan, and outlined our objections.

The lines on the colonel's face seemed to deepen as he listened, and when The Dude had finished, he nodded. "Excellent presentation, son. If you ever want to transfer to the Eagles, I'll sign a personnel request. We could sure use you...though I guess it would be a step down for you, eh?"

The Dude said, with a neutral expression, "Sir, I'd be honored."

"I'll bet!" laughed the colonel. "Now, I want y'all to run this assault they way y'all think it should be run. Just tell the lieutenant here what you need, and you'll do it."

The butter-bar had turned white, which wasn't surprising, seeing as how he'd been freshly castrated in front of a group of Marine enlisted tankers. "Yes, sir," he said, in the voice of a dormouse with a head cold.

The colonel ambled off, leaving the lieutenant standing there, alone among allies, blinking rapidly.

The Dude climbed back onto the tank, and disappeared into the turret. He emerged, and said to the lieutenant, "Here, catch!"

And he threw the boy a can of our highly-prized Millers.

Your Dying Spouse 48 - Listening to Fear

We're linked with Wedded Wednesday this week; please click on the link to visit, and find some really great marriage resources!

As a caregiver, sometimes the most important thing you can do is listen...and sometimes you will be listening to things you prefer not to hear.

I should be quick to say that they're not likely to be directed against you...while impending death does loosen the tongue, it's still pretty stupid to piss off your caregiver. (I'm sorry for the slightly rough language, but that's the best way to describe some acrimonious exchanges to which I have been a party.)

The hard stuff you'll have to listen to will generally fall into two categories - I'm scared, and my life has meant nothing.

Today we'll talk about listening to fear.

When your fatally ill. there's a lot to fear, and I'm not just talking about the classical fear of death. That's the least of it (and for me, it's not an issue - I've had Near-Death Experiences, but those are for a future post).

The most immediate fear is 'how much more is this going to hurt'. There are levels of pain that are simply indescribable, and that can't be touched through conventional means. (Morphine no longer works for me, unless I take enough to kill me.)

And pain is rightly to be feared, because it can kill you quick, through shock...an extremely unpleasant way to go.

Other fears are of growing dependency, of losing one's mental and physical faculties, and of impoverishing one's family with the expense of terminal illness.

They're all reasonable fears, and not to be dismissed. I was once told, on admitting I was scared, "Well, if your faith was stronger you wouldn't be afraid." That was, I hardly need say, singularly useless advice.

What's needed from you is just a friendly, listening ear. The fears are real; there really are monsters out there. Your husband or wife needs a safe place to be scared, a place to have a shoulder into which to lean.

Yes, for Christians, there are many places where the Bible says, "Fear not!"

But the whole point of the Agony in the Garden was that Jesus was flat-out etrrified of that which awaited Him. I mean, of all people, Jesus asking to be let off a task?

It's OK to be scared. Live that for your mate - with love.

Your Dying Spouse 46 - Asking For Help

Sometimes, as a caregiver, you can't go it alone. And you shouldn't.

Dealing with serious or terminal illness in a spouse is probably the most challenging thing you'll face. It tears at the emotions, it can undermine faith, and it can be physically draining.

And, for good measure, it can be a financial disaster.

Let's look at each of these in order -

Emotional exhaustion, sometimes called compassion fatigue, is almost impossible to avoid when you're watching the person you love the most in all the world fade painfully from this life.

With the best will in the world to meet the challenge of each day with fortitude, the demands pile up quickly - your obligation to be the support (sometimes the only support) for someone in extremis, the demands of having to work (sometimes in a distracted state), the requirement to be there for your kids if they are still living with you (and sometimes if they're not), and not lastly the need to be emotionally attentive to friends and family, to keep those vital connections up.

Just writing it is tiring.

Emotional exhaustion sets in when you simply start getting numb; the pathos of the situation fails to move you, and you become more a master of expediency - how to accomplish the required tasks - than a steady source of uplifting support. (And that engenders guilt, just to make it a bit worse.)

The only way to really fight this is to preserve parts of a life that is yours. Whether it's being able to take a few hours on a weekend to play tennis or golf, or it's limited to getting a latte at Starbucks on your way home from work...do it.

It's not selfish. This is the preservation of life - yours. Emotional exhaustion arises when your identity starts to become lost, subsumed in the ongoing tragedy that's become central to your life.

But you are not dying. Not yet, anyway, and you have to reinforce the feeling that life does, indeed, go on. It's not heartless; it's necessary. If you're religious, remember that you were created with just as much value as the person in your care...so you have to be within your own circle of care.

And don't do it alone; keep up those trusted friendships in the safety of which you can find help by simply being able to rage against the injustice of it all, without being judged or condescended to.

Faith can really take a beating, in this situation. You see an illness, pray for healing...and it doesn't happen. There are those who say that you didn't pray hard enough, or you didn't use the right words or 'form' for your prayers.

This is sheer nonsense. Everyone dies; Jesus, in His life on Earth, died more horribly than most...and His prayers for deliverance were refused.

In the 21st century, many branches of the church have taken a hard turn into the 'prosperity gospel', and 'signs and wonders'. God wants you to be rich; God wants you to be healthy; God wants to heal your infirmities.

Yes, He does, but He also wants you to have the free will to choose Him, not as a genie who grants wishes, but as a source for hope that's eternal, and not temporal. Are there healing miracles? Sure, I think there are; but I believe they follow the pattern of those described in the Gospels, in which the healing was performed as part of a larger function. An example, if you will, and not an end in itself.

As someone who'd definitely like a healing miracle (and as I write this I am on the backside of the worst day I have had), I can accept that God may have other plans; and that healing as athe result of 'penny-in-the-slot' petitioning would actually work counter to His requirements, in creating free will.

Of course I'm going to worship a God who answers this prayer, but the point is to believe when He seems to be absent.

I think the best counter to this kind of disappointment-undermining-faith is to consider the history of Christianity. Horrible things happened in Jesus' time, to perfectly nice people. Eleven of twelve Apostles met nasty ends. And we revere martyrs.

It isn't about God blessing us with book contracts (so important to a writer!), or placing us in an advantageous position for promotion. It's about trusting God to be there, giving us the comfort we need to survive when we're looking into a fearsome abyss.

To maintain our faith, asking for help can be vital; no religion, least of all Christianity, says we're supposed to go it alone. Almost every church has support groups, and most have specific support groups for caregivers. Get involved; it's a place where you can be free to cry, and to doubt...and to have your tears dried, and your doubts gently healed.

And, when you participate...you're helping others, as well.

Physically, caring for someone can be trying; ask my wife! Sometimes she has to be my 'other leg', when walking is difficult; and she's had to drag me inside, when I collapsed in the yard from a spasm of pain.

Add to that the time-consuming stuff of having to bathe someone, and maybe feed him...and keep a tally of medication...along with life's normal demands.

The best way to face this is...wait for it...self care. Thi is the time to watch your nutrition, and exercise as you are able, and catch sleep when you can (if sleep deprivation is a problem.

Here, you can ask for help by having an accountability partner...someone who knows your situation, and who will keep tabs on you...and will exercise with you.

And finally, finances. Dying isn't cheap. I have no insurance, and part of the reason I don't take pain meds is that I can't afford them, and especially can't afford the blood tests every three months that are mandated by recent legislation (the tests were over $600, last time I checked).

You may need modifications to your house, to allow wheelchair access...or you may need a hospital bed.

It's very hard to ask for help with money; in this culture we are taught to be self sufficient, and to 'neither a borrower nor a lender be'.

But there are times when you can't go it alone. We have received help; we have had to ask for it, when multiple disasters hit at once.

And I am so grateful that it was offered, and given. Some we have been able to pay back; some of it...probably never.

There is a large serving of humble pie that goes along with dying.

And I guess that is part of the lesson...because when we were in that position, I asked myself...if I were able to help a friend or family member, would I hesitate? How would I feel if someone forebore to ask me, when I could have given that aid, and instead suffered in silence?

I'm no saint, no philanthropist...but I'd like to think that at the times I could help out, I did.

It isn't a matter of paying it forward, or what goes around comes around...it's just that life can beat you into the ground, and sometimes we can't get up alone.

As you might imagine, this was both awkward and difficult to write...especially the last bit. What do you think? What can you add?

And if I got some of this wrong...where's the error?

We're linked with Inspire Me Monday, and TestimonyTuesday.