My Apa and the Stranger

I read this book “Postcards From a Stranger” by Imogen Clark around the time my Apa breathed his last in hospital and I must admit the following part hit me the most. It is always ineffably heart-breaking to every child to see their parents writhing in anguish every night and day, and eventually slipping into someone barely recognizable.

 

Imogen's Debut Novel

“Dad is lying with his eyes closed but I can’t tell if he’s asleep or not. His breathing is laboured and every third breath or so just doesn’t come at all. He seems to have shrunk in the four days I’ve been away. He looks no bigger than a child under the crisp, white sheet and his skin, translucent in the half-light, is milky pale. He coughs but it’s a weary sound, as if even this is too much for him.

I look at Dad. He is so diminished that it’s hard to see the man I know in this aged, broken shell.

The old man lying in this bed is someone else entirely.”

I felt good when she took all the pain to reply to my comment I left on her IG post:

A screengrab from IG