Humour in the Face of Death, Part 13

The palliative care nurse said: 'I find that people die the way they have lived'. I have thought much about that comment since, although in my father's case there was a slight but significant variation: he died the way they both lived.

The constant struggle for control – who was going to make the decisions regarding food, the hospital bed at home, the amount of morphine and actually when to die – carried on until the end.

My father stubbornly resisted morphine until he decided it was time to go, w