Robert has everything – money, prestige (he’s CEO of a $400m business), standing in the Jewish community and glioblastoma multiforme, level 4 – the most aggressive brain tumor you can have the misfortune to have.
I wouldn’t consider myself a close mate, but we’ve worked on a couple of projects together, our kids went to the same private school and we have some common friends.
As you’d expect, Robert is running down the latest experimental drugs and procedures including cyberknife (a robotic radiosurgery system used to treat tumours with extreme accuracy and minimal invasiveness), gene therapy and a host of other evolving treatment regimes.
But he’s a realist – the condition comes with a poor prognosis, and there is currently no cure. He knows he’ll likely be dead within 12 months, but his wealth might buy a few more months.
Robert has already had brain surgery to resect a large part of the tumour. His recovery has been good and he feels like he has a new lease on life. The problem is glioblastoma is known for its high recurrence rate; cut a piece out, and what’s left in your brain grows back with a vengeance.
Robert’s wife, Lucy, has reached out to me during a charity gala event. We go every year and we pay inflated prices for experiences we don’t want, each of us trying to outbid the other in a tokenistic display of philanthropy. But we rationalise to ourselves ‘it’s all for a good cause’, and it’s tax deductible!
Lucy said that their house is overflowing with flowers and gourmet baskets from clients and work colleagues, who send their well-wishes. But she feels what Robert is really craving is someone he can talk with about his deepest fears and concerns. They don’t have kids, and Robert is estranged from his siblings over an inheritance issue that ended up in litigation, over 30 years ago. Their local rabi visits but neither Lucy nor Robert is overly religious, and Robert has remarked on several occasions that the Rabi is posturing for a sizable donation to be bequeathed to their local synagogue.
Lucy described Robert’s work colleagues as greedy sycophants that are more concerned about their careers than about Robert’s health. His poor prognosis has lead to a sharp drop off in calls from work. Lucy hopes it’s because of the awkwardness of conversation given his impending death, but she rather fears it’s more about their perception of diminishing returns!
”Their marriage is strong, but Lucy feels Robert is too stoic to admit vulnerability...
…so she’s asked if I could call in on him from time to time.
My first thought was how do I manoeuvre myself out of this situation. I felt totally underqualified to provide counselling support; after all – I hardly know the guy!
But a voice inside me said there is no way I could back out of this and that visiting Robert is the right thing to do.
I visited Robert several times over a 6-month period.
At first, our conversations were quite shallow – mostly work-related. It almost felt like Robert had to impress and live up to his reputation – tough, stoic, fearless. As his condition deteriorated, I found the narrative was starting to change.
Robert started dropping his guard. He became more open and was no longer afraid to show vulnerability. Our topics of conversation morphed from reviewing the latest treatment breakthroughs, to more mundane stuff. I think I was slowly becoming a close friend, not simply an acquaintance. As our relationship strengthened, it dawned on me that what Robert really wanted most from me was for me to just sit with him in his predicament; experience it with him.
Initially, I tip-toed around the subject of his impending death. More recently, we both felt confident to talk openly about it. We discussed things like religion, Trump and current geopolitical tensions, Robert’s proudest life memories to his greatest regrets and the legacy he leaves behind.
On occasion, Robert asked my opinion and invited challenge on some of his views and stances on things. Where I felt it was safe, I offered my perspective, but I was careful never to cross the line into coercion.
We skipped over the bucket list conversation and went straight to his ‘impending death to-do list’. We drew up a list of things, of ranging importance, that Robert wanted to tick-off before he ‘checked out’. And I set about to address as many of these as possible. Robert was dying, and I couldn’t fix that; but I could knock-off a number of these irritants, including getting one of the run-flat tyres on his wife’s Porshe changed and giving away his golf set to specific people. I took charge of all the ‘fixable’ things on the list that I felt I could fix.
The list also included some heavier items like helping him reconcile with his two younger brothers. Robert also wanted to leave a recording for his wife and closest friends, spoken in sincerity.
I introduced Robert to the Life Minus Work platform. The site had two features that were particularly relevant to Robert’s situation.
The site’s ‘Fixing-what’s-broken’ page offers users a guided platform for unpacking broken or problematic relationships and provides a step-by-step process for reconciliation and / or coming to a more constructive ‘landing’. Through the site, I helped Robert reconnect with one of his siblings, which had an almost immediate and dramatic uplift in Robert’s demeanour. The other brother was a harder nut to crack, but I helped Robert develop his ‘Plan-B’ strategy in case ‘timing’ became an issue.
Through Life Minus Work’s AI-supported ‘My story’ facility, I helped Robert craft his final message to the world. We followed the prompts and made use of the site’s style / tone moderator facility to record a three-minute, emotionally charged video that served as a tribute to those that cared for and supported Robert throughout his life, referencing the various forks in the road that finally led him to the present. Robert used the ‘My biggest regrets’ section of the video to record a tribute to his youngest, and still disaffected brother, acknowledging his sadness in not being able to affect a reconciliation, and how much he loved him. In a lighter moment in one of the video outtakes, Robert smiled and observed “if my comments don’t guilt the little prick into deeply regretting not having responded to my invitation for reconciliation, making him feel disgusted in himself, then I’ll be turning in my grave’.
Robert died a week after posting the video on the Life Minus Work site. His privacy settings gave Lucy the option of using the video at his wake and sharing excerpts on other social media platforms. His youngest brother attended the funeral, and just as Robert predicted, he felt ‘like shit’ after he heard Robert’s message about the failed reconciliation. That’s one to Robert!
Even though I was deeply saddened by Robert’s death, it felt incredibly liberating to be able to help someone in such a profound way. Directly helping Robert these past few months far and away eclipsed the feelings of ‘do-gooding’ that donating to charities or sponsoring other worthy causes create. I think Psychologists refer to the joy that comes from this type ‘do-gooding’ as ‘eudemonic joy’.
I really like experiencing this kind of joy!
