Opioid Dreams

4 years ago, Brad startled awake from an opioid induced dream, looked me in the eyes and told me he wanted to find a dock to hit off golf balls into the water. He said, matter of factly, that he wanted to have a competition with our brother-in-law, Bill. (Bill, for what it’s worth, is not what one would call an avid golfer, however he and Brad did spent countless hours absorbed in the very intense game of bocce ball).

So much of Brad’s final days were unimaginably awful. Between the cancer raging through his body, his organs shutting down, and the high level of pain meds, his brilliant mind was starting to mimic his crumbling body. He often woke up in the middle of the night, spewing sentences that I didn’t understand but struggled to string together. It was up to me to decipher - in panicked seconds, alone in the darkness of our room - whether he was having a dream or a stroke, and if 911 needed to be called.

But in the midst of all that fear and heartbreak, were tiny little gifts. Words spoken by Brad between his brief moments of lucid alertness and comatose sleep. Words jotted down for safekeeping in the notes section of my phone, to re-read long after Brad was gone.

I never thought I’d be able to think back to those days and remember anything but the nightmare we were stuck in. Witnessing the pain the cancer was inflicting on his body. Feeling the weight of the terror deep in my bones.

But today, I am reminded of Brad’s brilliant mind. Of his large laugh. Of his wonder, even in those final days. And today, I am picturing him on that dock, hitting golf balls into a lake with Bill.

And I am smiling.