Mandy was glum. Knowing how well she was doing on chemo, I realized there had to be something else distressing going on. It was her mother. Ever since Mandy’s father died nine months ago, her mother had not been able to overcome her loss.

Until the day of her father’s sudden death, Mandy’s mother had been successfully managing her household. After the funeral was over and the guests had left, her mother stopped cooking and cleaning. She would only sit by the window and kiss her husband’s picture. Even with 24/7 companion care for household duties and medication for depression, she remained sad.

Mandy’s mother agreed she needed to move into an assisted living facility for more help. Though it was frenetic in the hallway where Mandy’s mother sat during the day in her new home, her mother cried, “I’m afraid to be alone.” Motioning at the constant hubbub, Mandy responded incredulously, “Mom, look around you. You’re not alone.” Her mother stared at Mandy and replied, “I am ’cause dad’s gone. I want to be in Heaven with him. Nothing else.”

Mandy tried everything to restore her mother’s will to live. She visited her frequently and took her shopping. She brought her kids over, and they played the piano for their grandmother. Mandy pleaded, “We’re your family, your flesh and blood. We love you. You should live for us.” Her mother shook her head.

Mandy had been part of her mother’s life only one year less than the forty-five years her mother and father had been married. What was different about the bond between her mother and father that superseded the flesh and blood relationship of Mandy and her children?

To help her better understand the relationship of her mother and father, Mandy reread the biblical account of creation. In the Garden of Eden, Adam, the first man, was alone and could not find a suitable companion among the animals. For the first time in the Bible there is something described as not good: “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18). So God created Eve and established marriage: “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and will cleave to his wife, and they will become one flesh” (Genesis 2: 25). The Hebrew word for “cleave” is dabaq, meaning to be joined fast together or bound as tightly as solder. Originally in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve were completely at ease and open with one another:

“The man and woman were both naked, and they felt no shame” (Genesis 2:25).

When sin entered the world through mankind’s choice to disobey God (the fall), Adam and Eve became self-centered and selfish. After Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, neither would accept responsible for his own actions: Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent (Genesis 3: 12). Since the fall, good marriages still maintain a measure of the original characteristics of God’s plan. The Bible illustrates many examples of good marriages, but also demonstrates the devastating consequences that occur when God’s intention for mankind of binding fast together in marriage is not followed.

What was Mandy’s mother’s and father’s relationship like? Between her parents there was physical and emotional intimacy and mutual dependence that grew over the years. “It was different than with us kids. They got closer when we kids grew up as we got further apart from them. They did everything together, especially after me and my brothers went to college,” Mandy recounted.

The marriage bond is so intimate that once broken can impair the physical and mental health of the surviving spouse, even causing early death. Mandy related that when she took her mother to her mother’s doctor after her father died, the doctor remarked her father would have likely survived only a few months if her mother had died because her father’s sole purpose in life during retirement was caring for her mother. The doctor added that everyone should want the same close relationship her mother and father had for five decades.

Mandy lamented to me, “Is it worth going through such pain and loss now after having almost fifty years of marriage?” When I asked Mandy how she would feel if her own husband died, she looked away for a few moments, then turned back and whispered, “The same as my mother, I hope.”

Dr. Delvyn C. Case, Jr. is a hematologist/oncologist, writer, playwright and director, and consultant to the Department of Spiritual Care at Maine Medical Center in Portland.

 

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