While working in a hospital as a resuscitator, Alexei Samokhin wrote down what people said before they died. These phrases, as chaotic as life itself, and the author's comments on them, are an invaluable and unprecedented document of human existence.
Lesha Samokhin was a talented person - a journalist, musician and doctor. Saving the lives of many, he himself left young, in the best traditions of poets - at the age of 37. His most striking legacy is the text "Last Words". In memory of Alexei, we publish this amazing text.
The boomerang, whatever its flight, must return back. If you put your hand on the pulse, you will feel the countdown that starts at the moment of your birth. Someday, you will surely die. All your life, if you're not dumb, you talk. You speak words, words about words... Someday what you say will be your last word. What follows are the last words I heard during my five years in the hospital. At first I began to write them down in a notebook so as not to forget. Then I realized that I remember forever and stopped writing. Here, not all of me are so chosen ...
At first, when I stopped working in the hospital, I regretted that such things I now hear very rarely. Only later did I realize that the last words can be heard from living people. It is enough just to listen more closely and understand that most of them will not say anything more.
"Wash the currant, son, it's just from the garden..."
A. 79 years old
It was the first entry in my notebook, the first thing I heard when I was still a nurse. I went to wash the currants, and when I returned, my grandmother had already died of a heart attack with the same expression on her face with which I left her.
"But he's still smarter than you..."
V. 47 years old
An elderly, very rich Azerbaijani woman who threw a tantrum that she wants to see her son. They were given ten minutes to talk, and when I came to escort him out of the department, I heard how this was the last thing she said to him. After he left, she looked quite angrily at everyone, did not talk to anyone, and an hour later she died as a result of cardiac arrest.
"Remove your hands, armed gang! You swore to me in eternal friendship!"
G. 44 years old
It was some old Jew in complete insanity. On the first day after the operation, apparently after anesthesia, he confessed his love to everyone, and on the second he decided that we were "an evil gang that dressed up as people of a sacred profession." He cursed all day and by evening, without ceasing to curse, he died.
I sprayed myself with this x @ ney already five hundred times!
D. 66 years old
Some locksmith, died of an attack of bronchial asthma in front of my eyes. This is the only thing he managed to say to me, showing me an inhaler bottle that expands the airways. Then he collapsed to the floor.
"Potassium..."
Y. 34 years old
Potassium was the cause of his death. The nurse did not set the speed of the dropper and the lightning-fast administration of potassium caused cardiac arrest. Apparently, he felt it, because when I ran into the hall at the signal of the instruments, he raised his index finger and pointed to an empty jar and informed me about what was in it. This, by the way, was the only case of a potassium overdose out of several dozen in my practice, as a result of which death occurred.
"How aware are you of what you are doing. Write me a piece of paper how much you are aware of what you are doing now ..."
F. 53 years old
J. was a hydraulic engineer. He suffered from hypochondriacal delirium, asking everyone and everything about the mechanism of action of each pill and "why it itches here, but it pricks here." He asked the doctors to sign in his notebook for each injection. To be honest, he died because of the nurse’s ***, either she mixed up the cardiotonic, or his dose ... I don’t remember. I only remember what he said at the end.
"It hurts a lot here!"
Z. 24 years old
This young man had one of the "youngest" heart attacks in Moscow. He constantly asked only “wee-and-be ...” and spoke, putting his hand on the area of \u200b\u200bthe heart, that he was very hurt. His mother said that he was very stressed. Three days later, the "youngest" death from myocardial infarction was recorded. He died repeating these words...
"I want to go home"
I. 8 years
A girl who two weeks after liver surgery said only these two words. Died on my watch.
"It used to be better..."
K. 46 years old
A patient who, after two months of unconsciousness, asked to have his tracheostomy cuff deflated, convincing everyone that he definitely needed to say something. Having croaked these two words, he again lost consciousness and did not come to his senses.
"I am a relative of Igor Langno."
L. 28 years old
He was a blond Baltic guy with a severe heart defect named Igor Langno.
"Larisa, Lara, Larissa..."
M. 45 years old
M. had a repeated extensive myocardial infarction. He died and agonized for three days, all the while holding on to the wedding ring with the fingers of his other hand and repeating the name of his wife. When he died, I took off this ring to give it to her.
"Don't stand at my cold feet."
N. 74 years old
This grandmother told everyone that they were "strangers" to her. She said her last phrase proudly and a little angrily. She told me during the night round, refusing treatment. After that, she defiantly turned her back to the wall and fell asleep. In the morning, she was found by her roommates, who died in this position. I really didn't have to stand at her cold feet.
"Girls, buy me two Wheels Wagons, please. Your wife will give you the money. Have some tea. Thank you."
O. 57 years old
A precocious-looking diabetic who, terrified that he was accidentally put on a glucose drip, injected himself with an “overdose” of insulin. At this time, the nurses went to the store outside and he asked them to buy him a chocolate bar to raise his sugar level. After that, he lost consciousness from hypoglycemia. I never came to my senses. Chocolates were brought when he was already dead. My wife never gave me the money.
"You are a doctor ... Therefore, it will be so, as you tell me."
P. 44 years old
An intelligent gray-haired Georgian who constantly shook hands in a friendly way with everyone who approached him, repeating that he trusts everyone and believes in everyone. He said these words after an injection of morphine, before he was put on an oxygen mask. In his sleep, he began fibrillation of the ventricles. He was electrocuted thirty times. Then the heart stopped. They didn't.
"Of course, I'm getting old..."
R. 62 years old
An asthenic grandfather with a gray bald spot, who successfully recovered after a banal coronary artery bypass grafting. He lay alone in a single room and constantly tossed and turned in bed so that the sheet “crumpled” and had to be pulled up regularly. Grunting, he complained about his age just at that moment, waddling from side to side. He had no complications. I gave him an injection of rellanium to put him to sleep. He died in his sleep, apparently "of old age."
“If I get well and my heart grows, I can bring you real high fur boots from the North. You can go hunting in high fur boots, so you won’t know grief in Moscow. If there is no rejection, like a submariner, then you can come to me in We have a time there when the sun doesn't set below the horizon. in the north, that you don’t want to go south. Okay, I’ll sleep, I’ll sleep ... When I sleep, it seems not so anxious ... Be careful with the electrodes, otherwise I woke up in the morning, nothing runs ... Well, I think that’s all ... Yes, it’s me, what I’m going to tell you, you yourself know everything ... "
S. 43 years old
During this story, a nurse administered sleeping pills, on which he fell asleep. This patient was a mustachioed inhabitant of the Far North. He came to Moscow with a diagnosis of "dilated cardiomyopathy", which has only one treatment option - a heart transplant, after which we were on duty with him. “Submariner” I am his friend in the department, who served all his life on a submarine, who died during the rejection crisis, a month after the operation. He had the same indications for a transplant, which he brought himself to, having made a vow to "fuck 100 women", breaking down on the 76th. S. did not even reach the crisis. He died seven or eight hours later from some kind of fulminant infection. I remember that there was a big scandal with surgeons who reproached us for non-observance of sterility. In my opinion, even the SES called ...
"All?.. Yes?.. All?.. All?.. Yes?.. All?.. Yes?.."
T. 56 years old
This patient died approximately like the above E. He got up without permission to urinate himself in the "duck". At that moment, ventricular fibrillation began and he fell to the floor. We, as a whole shift, put him on the bed. Cardiac arrest began, someone began to “pump” ... For each chest compression, on exhalation, he asked one of these questions. Nobody answered him. This went on for ten seconds.
"When I flew I saw white lights, however, drink this one yourself when your daughter comes"
U. 57 years old
In fact, it was a military pilot Belousov. Charming, handsome and very strong-willed uncle. With complications, he lay on a ventilator for four months until he died of sepsis. These are not words because of the tracheostomy he couldn't speak, this is his last note, which he wrote in huge letters, reminiscent of the scribbles of a preschooler. About the white lights, he tried to explain to me three times, unfortunately, he did not understand anything. Drink it yourself about the miraculous “mumiyo medicine”, with which he was conscientiously soldered at the insistence of his brother, who, by the way, was also a military pilot. I was on duty with Belousov for a month and a half, fifteen shifts in a row. I really liked him, I really wanted him to recover. He died at night and I was incredibly upset. In the morning, leaving work, I ran into his daughter at the door of the department. She knew me and asked with a smile: “How is he there? I, here, brought him baby puree, mineral water, honey ... I frowned, deliberately rudely muttered something about being tired after a sleepless night, and quickly ran into the elevator. They say she sat at the entrance for two hours, no one dared to tell her ...
"Remove the carriage, ** it burns the magnifying glass."
B. 52 years old
A huge miner from the Donbass who did not know how to pronounce half of the most common words in the Russian language. He spoke in a staccato bass. Until he died, the catheter was never removed.
"Come to me! I'll share the high with you!"
F. 19 years old
I didn't hear it. This was heard by a friend of mine whom I met when he worked as a salesman in a music store. These words belong to his girlfriend, who died a few minutes later from a heroin overdose. At his house, in his bed. Later, I asked him if he remembered her last words. “Of course I will never forget them!” he replied and shared with me.
Composer Edvard Grieg: "Well, if it's inevitable..."
Queen Marie Antoinette was completely calm before her execution. Climbing the scaffold, she stumbled and stepped on the executioner's foot: "Forgive me, please, monsieur, I did it by accident ...".
The Roman emperor and tyrant Nero, before his death, exclaimed: "What a great artist is dying!"
Vaslav Nijinsky, Anatole France, Garibaldi, Byron whispered the same word before their death: "Mother!".
When the Prussian king Frederick I died, the priest at his bedside read prayers. At the words "I came into this world naked and I will leave naked," Friedrich pushed him away with his hand and exclaimed: "Don't you dare bury me naked, not in full dress!"
Dying, Balzac recalled one of the characters in his stories, an experienced doctor Bianchon: "He would have saved me ...".
At the last moment before his death, the great Leonardo da Vinci exclaimed: "I insulted God and people! My works have not reached the height to which I aspired!"
Mikhail Romanov before the execution gave the executioners his boots - "Use, guys, after all, royal."
Spy dancer Mata Hari blew a kiss to soldiers aiming at her: "I'm ready, boys."
The philosopher Immanuel Kant said: "Das ist gut".
Sick Anna Akhmatova after an injection of camphor: "Still, I feel very bad!".
One of the cinematographer brothers, 92-year-old O. Lumiere: "My film is running out."
Ibsen, after lying paralyzed for several years, stood up and said: "On the contrary!" - and died.
Nadezhda Mandelstam to her nurse: "Don't be afraid."
Einstein's last words remained unknown because the nurse did not understand German
Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev died on August 22, 1883 at the age of 65 in the town of Bougival near Paris. His last words were strange: "Farewell, my dear, my whitish ...".
Heartbroken relatives did not stand around the bed of the dying man: despite several novels experienced, the writer never married, having spent his life in the ambiguous role of a true friend of the Pauline Viardot family. The death of Turgenev, all his life, by his own admission, "huddled on the edge of someone else's nest", was somewhat like the death of his famous hero - Yevgeny Bazarov. Both were escorted to the other world by a dearly beloved and never fully owned woman.
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky woke up at dawn on January 28, 1881 with the clear realization that today is the last day of his life. He silently waited for his wife to wake up. Anna Grigorievna did not believe the words of her husband, because the day before he was better. But Dostoevsky insisted that a priest be brought in, took communion, confessed, and soon died.
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov died on the night of July 2, 1904 in a hotel room in the German resort town of Badenweiler. The German doctor decided that death was already behind him. According to an ancient German medical tradition, a doctor who made a fatal diagnosis to his colleague treats the dying man to champagne... Anton Pavlovich said in German: "I'm dying" - and drank a glass of champagne to the bottom.
The writer's wife, Olga Leonardovna, would later write that the "terrible silence" of that night when Chekhov died was broken only by "a huge black moth that painfully beat against the burning night lamps and dangled around the room."
Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy spent the last days of his life at the provincial Astapovo railway station. At the age of 83, the count decided to break with an orderly, prosperous existence in Yasnaya Polyana. Accompanied by his daughter and family doctor, he left incognito in a third-class carriage. On the way, he caught a cold, pneumonia began.
The last words of Tolstoy, spoken by him on the morning of November 7, 1910, already in oblivion, were: "I love the truth" (according to another version, he said - "I do not understand").
None of us like death. None of us likes to talk about it (teenagers are not taken into account, because these creatures are not yet ripe for such conversations at all). Some claim that they are not at all afraid of death, while others, on the contrary, are horrified at the mere thought that their life will someday end.
"Tomorrow I will die, and you with me"
“When my beloved grandmother was dying, someone had to be in the room with her all the time. The guard was changed three times a day. One night my dear cousin volunteered to babysit her. They got along pretty well while she was still well, and when he volunteered to babysit her, everyone immediately knew that they would chat all night, or he would start rereading her favorite book to her. The house Granny lived in was a little creepy. The light in the hallway was constantly flickering, and in the guest bedroom it could even turn off for several hours. I loved my grandma, but I didn't really want to stay overnight in that creepy house.
According to the cousin, the night he stayed at her house, the grandmother abruptly got out of bed at about one in the morning. When he returned from the kitchen, he saw that she was standing on the second floor in one nightgown and, in the truest sense of the word, making faces at someone. When my cousin asked her what was really going on, she replied: “I just want the man who is standing on the stairs to pay attention to me!” The next day, my cousin stayed with Grandma again, and when the clock was about six in the evening, Grandma called him over and said, “Nothing really matters. Tomorrow I will die, and you will be with me." He called us urgently and said he couldn't babysit granny anymore, and I totally understand him." - peppermint_toad.
"Why are they here?"
“When my grandmother died, my mother was always next to her bed. Once I heard their conversation, in which my grandmother constantly asked the same question to my mother: “Why are they here?”. It really scared me, but as my mother later explained to me, it was a kind of transition from the world of the living to the world of the dead ”- feegleshmaken.
“I see the line. Tell your mom that I'll be back"
“I am a paramedic by profession and have seen a lot of things over the years. The first incident I want to tell you about happened not so long ago. One elderly lady, grabbing my hand, began to talk about the fact that next to her was a headless man and some girl. They want to take her away, but she won't go to heaven. By the way, that night she died from internal bleeding. The second time I will never forget. Even when I first started working, we were called because there was a major car accident. When we arrived at the scene, we saw that the woman who was driving survived with virtually no injuries, but her nine-year-old son was bleeding. When we rushed him to the hospital, he looked at me and said, “I see the line. Tell your mom that I'll be back." His eyes closed smoothly and we began resuscitation, but he never survived” – medic1947.
"Help, they're torturing me"
“I work in a hospital as a resuscitator, and when your patient dies, it's always hard. Once, a girl came to me in a very serious condition. She had numerous injuries to her head, pelvis, arms, and so on. I won't bore you with talking about injuries. So, when I was around, she half-deliriously pulled me by the sleeve and opened her eyes so wide, as if she saw something terrible. All I could hear before her heart stopped was, "Help, they're torturing me." I still feel uncomfortable about this incident” – Ephy_Chan.
"The devil was in my room all night, but don't worry, God is with you"
““The devil was in my room all night, but don’t worry, God is with you” - this is the phrase repeated by one patient of our hospital who was dying. Toward morning he had a terrible attack, and he died with wide eyes and a terrible grimace on his face. He also screamed about the "Devil" all night long and said over and over, "Get out of here! Get out of here!" This building is going to explode!” – Coyena.
“I have faced death many times before”
“This guy was going to have breakfast and he refused to check his blood glucose. Since we were already familiar with his medical history, we suspected that he might need insulin. I expressed my concern, but he answered me: "I have faced death many times." By the way, the guy did not lie, he was really seriously ill and for the past six months he has practically gone blind. I came back 30 minutes later to check it out. He was unconscious and turned almost blue. We immediately took him to intensive care, although it was clear to the naked eye that he was in a deep coma, and his brain was most likely already dead. He was on life support for another week, and then his relatives finally decided to turn him off.” – Damnmorrisdancer.
The last words of the dying have always been treated with special trepidation. What does a person who is on the verge between two worlds feel and what does he see?... The last words of the great people were simple, mysterious, strange. Someone expressed their greatest regret, and someone found the strength to joke. What did Genghis Khan, Byron and Chekhov say before they died?
The last phrase of Emperor Caesar went down in history slightly distorted. We all know that Caesar allegedly said: "And you, Brutus?". In fact, judging by the surviving texts of historians, this phrase could sound a little different - it did not show indignation, but rather regret. They say that the emperor said to Mark Brutus, who rushed at him: "And you, my child? ..."
The last words of Alexander the Great were prophetic, the ruler was not without reason known as an excellent strategist. Dying of malaria, Macedonsky said: "I see there will be big competitions on my grave." And so it happened: the great empire he built was literally torn to pieces in internecine wars.
"Batu will continue my victories, and the Mongol hand will stretch over the universe," Genghis Khan said on his deathbed. The last words of Martin Luther King were: "God, how painful and scary it is to go to another world." "Well, I went to bed," said George Gordon Byorn, after which he fell asleep forever. According to another version, before his death, the poet exclaimed: "My sister! My child ... Poor Greece! ... I gave her time, fortune, health ... And now I give her my life." As you know, the rebellious poet spent the last year of his life helping the Greeks in the liberation struggle against the Ottoman Empire. Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was dying of consumption in a hotel in the German resort town of Badenweiler. His attending physician felt that Chekhov's death was near. According to an old German tradition, a doctor who has given his colleague a fatal diagnosis treats the dying man to champagne. "Ich sterbe!" ("I'm dying!") - said Chekhov and drank the glass of champagne served to him to the bottom.
"Hope! ... Hope! Hope! ... Damned!" - Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky shouted before his death. Perhaps the composer was delirious, or perhaps desperately clinging to life. "So what's the answer?" asked the American writer Gertrude Stein philosophically as she was wheeled into the operating room. Stein was dying of cancer, from which her mother had previously died. Receiving no answer, she asked again:
"What then is the question?" She never woke up from the anesthesia. Peter the Great was dying unconscious. Once, having come to his senses, the sovereign took the lead and began to scratch with an effort: "Give everything back ...". But to whom and what - the sovereign did not have time to explain. The monarch ordered to call his beloved daughter Anna, but was unable to say anything to her. The next day, at the beginning of the sixth hour of the morning, the emperor opened his eyes and whispered a prayer. Those were his last words. It is also known about the dying suffering of King Henry VIII of England. "The crown is gone, the glory is gone, the soul is gone!" exclaimed the dying monarch. Vaslav Nijinsky,
Anatole France and Garibaldi before their death whispered the same word: "Mother!". Marie Antoinette behaved like a real queen before her execution. Climbing the guillotine on the stairs, she accidentally stepped on the executioner's foot. Her last words were: "Excuse me, monsieur, I didn't do it on purpose." Empress Elizaveta Petrovna extremely surprised the doctors when, half a minute before her death, she rose on pillows and threateningly asked: "Am I still alive ?!" But before the doctors had time to be frightened, the situation "corrected" - the ruler breathed her last.
They say that Grand Duke Mikhail Romanov, the brother of the last emperor, before his execution gave his boots to the executioners with the words: "Use, guys, after all, they are royal." The famous spy, dancer and courtesan Mata Hari blew a kiss to the soldiers aiming at her with playful words: "I'm ready, boys!" Dying, Balzac remembered one of the characters in his stories, the experienced doctor Bianchon. "He would have saved me," the great writer sighed. The English historian Thomas Carlyle calmly said: "So this is what this death is like!" The composer Edvard Grieg turned out to be just as cold-blooded.
"Well, what if it's unavoidable," he said. It is believed that the last words of Ludwig van Beethoven were: "Applause, friends, the comedy is over." True, some biographers cite other words of the great composer: "I feel as if up to this point I have written only a few notes." If the latter fact is true, then Beethoven was not the only great man who, before his death, lamented how little he had managed to do. They say that, dying, Leonardo da Vinci exclaimed in despair: "I have offended God and people! My works have not reached the height to which I aspired!"
One of the famous cinematographer brothers, 92-year-old Auguste Lumiere said: "My film is running out." "Dying is boring," Somerset Maugham quipped at last. "Don't ever do it!" Dying in the town of Bougival near Paris, Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev said something strange: "Farewell, my darlings, my whitish ones ...".
The French artist Antoine Watteau was horrified: "Take this cross away from me! How could Christ be portrayed so badly!" - and with these words he died. The poet Felix Arver, hearing a nurse say to someone: "This is at the end of the corridor," moaned with his last strength: "Not a corridor, but a corridor!" - and died. Oscar Wilde, who was dying in a hotel room, looked longingly at the tasteless wallpaper and ironically remarked: "These wallpapers are terrible. One of us must go." Einstein's last words, unfortunately, remained a mystery to posterity: the nurse who was near his bed did not know German.
http://www.yoki.ru/social/society/13-07-2012/400573-Memento_mori1-0/
