The Chair

I saw ‘the chair’ last night and to be honest, I didn’t even recognize it until someone mentioned that it used to be my dads chair.

About five or six years ago, at about the age of ninety, my dad requested a new lift chair that he had seen in a magazine. Dad was living in an assisted living facility and wasn’t sleeping well in his current lift chair as it didn’t recline far enough for a good nights sleep. He couldn’t sleep in his own bed either. This was a lift chair that fully reclined into something similar to a twin-size bed…a little narrower…but when he woke up, all he had to do was push a button to help him get up for the day.

Dad was painfully thin and his bones were ‘seizing-up’ for lack of a better description. He couldn’t stand upright anymore and he was really slowing down. In less than a year after getting ‘the chair’, dad became 100% bed-bound and he didn’t need ‘the chair’ anymore.

However, there was someone who could use ‘the chair’…my mother-in-law. She was in her nineties and the chair she had was uncomfortable. She also was in an assisted living facility. Soon ‘the chair’ was hers and she loved it. It was comfortable and served her needs just fine.

She passed away 2 years ago and I had totally forgotten about ‘the chair’. Until last night.

You see, my brother-in-law is dying from cancer. A couple of weeks ago he moved in with one of his sisters…one that he is quite close to. She wanted to take care of him in his final days. Recently the doctors said he only has weeks to live and I wanted to see him.

I went there last night and as of yesterday morning, he had been moved to a hospital bed. ‘The chair’ was sitting in the next room and I was told that he had been using it since he moved in with his sister.

Next to ‘the chair’ was a sofa and I sat there for a short time looking at the chair. I remembered my dad sitting in it before he passed, my mother-in-law sitting in it before she passed, and now another family member used it until he no longer could.

This chair should not be thought of as anything less than comforting someone when they need it most…and it doesn’t have to be a chair for end of life. It should be thought of as something as comforting as a warm blanket when you’re cold, soup when you’re sick, or the softness of holding a new baby.