Faced with death, what would be the last words to come out of your mind?
End-of-care doctors have revealed that these dying words fall into two categories: heartwarming and heartbreaking.
Patients have died peacefully and said they had no regrets, while others expressed sadness at taking their lives for granted.
Hospice nurse Julie McFadden told DailyMail.com that people have been calling out for their long-dead parents or a former loved one they had not seen for years.
But she has also heard patients say peacefully to those around them, “I love you.”
”Usually it’s not their last breath. Many people think it’s like the movies: a dramatic, final proclamation of something they’ve always regretted or something they always wanted everyone to know about. It’s not really like that,” McFadden explained.
She also noted that “Thank you,” “I forgive you,” “Please forgive me,” and “Goodbye” are also often said.
Younger patients will often say they are not ready to die, palliative care physician Dr. Simran Malhotra told Grunge
McFadden, a registered nurse from Los Angeles, California, has worked in hospice care for more than seven years and has been a nurse for more than fifteen years.
She started sharing her knowledge and experience on TikTok and has gained over 1.2 million followers and 12.4 million likes.
Hospice care is a form of health care that focuses on helping terminally ill patients reduce their pain and suffering and meeting their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life.
“When you talk to people every day who are dying, the biggest thing is that you don’t value their health,” McFadden said.
‘We take many things for granted: we can see that we can eat, swallow, walk and live completely pain-free. A lot of people say they didn’t appreciate that and that they would like that.’
People also say they ‘wish they didn’t work away all their lives’ and women especially ‘talk about diets, (and regret) worrying about how their body looks, or not eating this or not eating that because of dieting and trying to do that. look a certain way’.
But San Francisco Bay Area palliative care physician Dr. Mina Chang told DailyMail.com that the most common thing she hears from patients is, “I don’t regret it.”
Another common topic people talk about toward the end of their lives is “not expressing themselves to their family or loved ones.”
“If someone had an argument, (they say) ‘why didn’t I say I’m sorry sooner?’ Why didn’t we revive things sooner,” McFadden said.
Palliative care physician Dr Mina Chang (left) told DailyMail.com that older patients will often say they are ready to die. Hospice nurse Julie McFadden told DailyMail.com that people often call out to deceased parents during their final days
‘Now that they are confronted with their own mortality while dying, they think about the death of their parents. And they’ll say, “I never asked them, what was their favorite childhood memory?”
She added: ‘It makes them think about people they’ve lost and what they want to do differently now that they’re dying, and how they want to tell their children or their family. And then when they’re estranged, they’ll regret waiting so long to reconnect, if that ever happens.”
But not everyone can find the right words.
“A lot of times people won’t even talk about that at the end of life because people are so in denial that they don’t even want to talk about things like regret… They don’t always think about that. because they try not to think about it. It depends on the person,” McFadden said.
“Most people don’t say their last breath, but when they do, or are close to it, it’s usually ‘I love you.’ Usually it’s ‘It’s okay’, as if they’re comforting someone else, or things like ‘I’m ready.’
Sometimes people return to a childish manner.
McFadden said, “A lot of people will say their parents’ names. Or they say ‘mom’ or ‘dad’, or the name of an ex-husband who is already dead.
“When they say something close to death, it’s usually short and quiet. It’s hard to really talk.’
She also explained that calling out to deceased relatives could have to do with parents being “a source of comfort.”
“I always talk about how death is like birth,” she said. ‘People look a bit like babies.’
The languages that people speak can also change at the last minute.
McFadden said: ‘Their first language is Italian, but they have lived somewhere where they speak English for fifty years, but as they approach death they will start speaking Italian again.
“And their family hasn’t heard them speak Italian for years and years and years and now they’ll only speak Italian, or just speak some random Yiddish language from their hometown where they haven’t been in 80 years or something. crazy.
‘Sometimes they say things that just don’t make sense. But sometimes they don’t make sense to us, but they might make sense to them. People will say, ‘I just have to go home.’
‘They could be talking about our other home, if there is an afterlife. People are constantly talking about going home or somewhere else, or that they have to go away, they’re going on a trip.’
Some of Ms. McFadden’s conversations with patients were particularly memorable.
She told DailyMail.com: ‘One lady, we really connected. She said to me, “I’ve been a Christian all my life and I still don’t know what it will be like to die. Should I just close and open my eyes and see God?’
‘Of course I don’t know. I panicked and thought: You have to have the answer. And then I thought, no, Julie, just be honest with her. I just said, “I don’t know.”
“And she just laughed and laughed, and then I laughed too. And she says, “Well, I guess I’ll find out.”
“And I thought, ‘I guess you will.’
‘Another time a man grabbed my arm and almost scared me. He lay in bed and looked like he was actively dying, meaning he was very close to death.
“And he jumped into bed, grabbed my arm and said, ‘I’m dying, baby!’ and then sat back and died.
‘He was doing well, he was peaceful. It wasn’t like he was scared, he was just making it known.’
Palliative care physician Dr. Simran Malhotra Grunge said that what a patient says during their last breath often changes depending on how old he or she is.
She said: ‘My older patients will often say things like ‘I’m at peace’ or ‘I’ve lived a good life’, while for my younger patients… it really boils down to ‘I’m not ready.’ to die, I have so much more to do.’
She added that very simple things like saying “I’m sorry” and expressing love and forgiveness can be especially important in the last days.
Dr. Malhotra said, “These are some of the most meaningful words, when spoken with intention, that we can share with someone we love.”