I’ve contemplated death many times. Having an interest in palliative care, I find trying to give the patient the death I would want for myself helps me give them ‘a good death’. However, it’s not a negative or intrusive thought pattern for me.
The best deaths I’ve seen, are people dying at home from old age or a progressive terminal illness, where their family are around them joking and having fun. When the family are positive, the dying patient rarely needs any medications to ease them through death. All of these patients had a serene facial expression, and often a kind of smile at the moment of death. So that always appealed to me.
I went to verify the death of one of these patients a couple of years back during Easter weekend. The family were joking about him being resurrected like Jesus as it was Easter and I was laughing as I performed the examination to verify the death. His wife asked if I could close his eyes, which I explained is almost impossible if they remain open after death. They didn’t close, to which his wife said “well he was a stubborn bugger in life so no change in death”. Then his son put his sun glasses on the patient and crossed his arms to make him look “like a cool dude”. Then we all pissed ourselves laughing. To me, this guy had a very good death, and didn’t need any medications.
@RD81 it sounds like your thoughts are more an OCD pattern of intrusive thoughts. Did you experience a death in the family as a younger person? Maybe your thoughts are happy and calm, but if they bother you consider getting the book Overcoming Obsessive Compulsive Disorder second edition by David Veale and Rob Wilson.
