Dying Well: Our Journey of Love and Loss

by Susan Ducharme Hoben

Overview

Dying Well is an inspiring love story telling of how a man celebrated life while facing his death with grace and dignity. His widow guides you through decisions made and actions taken on their nine-month journey from diagnosis through celebrations and goodbyes, to a peaceful death free of fear and regret. She shares lessons learned as their family came to terms with her husband’s impending death and found ways to make this last stage of his life as loving and joyous as possible. This uplifting end-of-life story offers a thought-provoking perspective on dying, one that may help you and those you love achieve what’s most important at the end of your lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780999749807
Publisher:	Wilder Adventures
Publication date:	03/19/2018
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Susan Ducharme Hoben is a former executive consultant with IBM's Strategy and Change Consulting practice. She put her mathematics degree from Cornell University and graduate studies at Georgia Institute of Technology to good use in a thirty-five-year career in information technology that began with systems engineering with IBM and ended with consulting. Upon retirement, Sue founded a travel journal about luxury barging in Europe.

After a lifetime of watching people die, and just as importantly, watching people live, Sue feels passionately that we Americans do not die well, taking a terrible toll on us, emotionally and financially. She hopes that her experience with an uplifting end-of-life journey can contribute a valuable perspective to the growing interest in exploring how we die.

Table of Contents

PREFACE…………………………………………………………….1

1. A BROKEN HEART ...................................................................... 3

2. THERE IS A TUMOR .................................................................. 17

3. RESUME USUAL ACTIVITIES ................................................. 23

4. WE HAVE SOME BAD NEWS .................................................. 29

5. WE WERE NEVER CLOSE ANYWAY ..................................... 37

6. EARLY RETIREMENT ............................................................... 43

7. NO MORE TEARS ....................................................................... 47

8. TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN ................................................ 51

9. THE PROGNOSIS IS NOT GOOD ............................................. 59

10. THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM.......................................... 67

11. DECISIONS, DECISIONS .......................................................... 71

12. LET THE POISON BEGIN ......................................................... 77

13. WE ARE FAMILY ...................................................................... 87

14. LET US GIVE THANKS ............................................................ 97

15. A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE ...................................................... 107

16. THE AUDACITY OF HOPE..................................................... 117

17. ARE WE THERE YET? ............................................................ 123

18. AS ONE DOOR OPENS . . . ..................................................... 131

19. ANOTHER DOOR CLOSES .................................................... 135

20. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH ............................................................ 143

21. LIFE IS SHORT......................................................................... 145

22. A BITE OF THE BIG APPLE ................................................... 149

23. A WALK DOWN MEMORY LANE ........................................ 159

24. AN IRISH WAKE ..................................................................... 165

25. LIFE’S A BEACH ..................................................................... 171

26. ON THE ROAD AGAIN ........................................................... 187

27. SELLING THE CAR ................................................................. 197

28. YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND ........................................................ 201

29. THE BOY SCOUT MOTTO ...................................................... 209

30. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE ..................................................... 213

31. THE ROAST .............................................................................. 221

32. HOSPICE ................................................................................... 227

33. THE FINAL DAYS .................................................................... 235

34. THE FINAL HOURS ................................................................. 247

35. SAYING GOODBYE ................................................................ 255

36. PREPARING A LIFE’S STORY ............................................... 261

37. CELEBRATING A LIFE WELL LIVED .................................. 269

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS………………………………………….277

ABOUT THE AUTHOR…………………………………………...279

Editorial Reviews

“Dying Well’s account is a mix of love, sorrow, and practicality that is at the heart of what we, as a society, need to do to more normalize a process that modern medicine has tried so hard to shield us from.”

Adam R. Silverman MD, FACP, Vice President, Population Health, Saint Francis Health Care Partners; Co-Chair, Care Decisions Connecticut

“Dying Well is not about illness, but about embracing reality at the end of life and making the necessary decisions that honor a life well lived. Sue Hoben takes us along with her and her husband, Bruce, on this last journey together as a couple after he has a terminal diagnosis. They approach this transition the same way they approached all of life’s challenges—with heart and humor shaped by their deep love and respect.”

Judy L. Mandel, New York Times best-selling author of Replacement Child: A Memoir

“In Sue Hoben’s clear-eyed, incisive memoir, the reader will find much more than an emotional experience. This is a love story, but it is also an account of successful navigation of a complex medical system. Take a box of tissues and prepare to be touched and to learn many lessons that will serve you well when you or a member of your family is seriously ill, or fatally ill and dying. Our society pushes death under the rug. The courage of Sue and Bruce Hoben includes a refusal to do so, an open approach to this tough situation that eventuated in the greatest of gifts to those who loved Bruce, and a major fulfillment of the arc and nature of Bruce’s remarkable embrace of the last part of his life, that harvested what he had planted for all the decades before.”

Henry Schneiderman MD, MACP, Section Chief, Geriatrics and Palliative Care, Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center/Trinity Health of New England; Professor of Medicine, UConn Health Center; Professor of Medicine, Quinnipiac University School of Medicine; Clinical Professor, Nursing, Yale University

From the Publisher