Death Has Numerous Meanings. Death

¶ … death" has numerous meanings. Death can be both an event and a construct -- that is, death can be an event in the sense that one dies and is no longer alive and death can also be an event as in the end of something in a more abstract way. Death, for the most part, signifies something's irreversibility as well as something's inability to function further. Most of us think of death as being irreversible, but then how is it that some people have claimed to have "died" and have "come back to life?" If death can be irreversible in some cases, then just what exactly is this thing that we call death? And can some of us avoid it?

For the most part, most of us would agree with the notion that death is something that is irreversible. Nurses will see people die -- die in the sense that their bodies give out, their hearts stop, their brains no longer emit messages to parts of our bodies, and thus the people are no longer able to function in the world of the living. The belief of most is that once someone is dead, they can no longer return to the world of the living; that is, they can no longer walk, talk, breath and inhabit the living world. Death is irreversible for most of us in terms of the way that we think. While there are people who may have ideas about what happens to our bodies after we die, whether it is reincarnation or whether it is that we will live another life in an afterlife, the bottom line is that we are no longer a part of the world that we know. Thus, death in the world as we know it is irreversible.

Death can also be something that makes us not able to function in a more literal sense. Technically and medically speaking, the brain can die and the body can go on living if it is kept alive by machines. In this way, the body is still alive even though the brain is dead and the body is no longer able to function in the world. The body loses all of its ability to see, to smell, to hear, to touch and to be mobile, yet it lives on in the most basic sense. If we are to believe that there is a life in us that cannot die (that is, a spirit), this spirit is not able to keep up alive in the sense of what we know life to be. We may believe that we are eternal, but whatever we may be eternal in ourselves will not be able to keep us functioning in the world as human beings.

Death is something that is a universal concept. Even as children we are aware of our own mortality. Death is a concept that is ingrained in our biology. Even the youngest child cries when it is in danger. The child wants to live. We all want to live and we are deeply afraid of not being -- that is, we are deeply afraid of death. The concept of death is an abstract concept, but this does not mean that one has to be educated in order to understand this concept.

Death is as abstract a word as life is. There are people who are alive but may not necessarily be truly living. In the case of these people who are not living to their full potential, when does their life end? When does death occur? This changes the way then that we think about death. Is death necessarily evil? Is death something that can be avoided in some cases? If a person loses their family -- their spouses, their children, and all their friends -- is that person still alive if their life has been abruptly brought to a metaphorical death because they are no longer with the ones they love? Death, viewed in this way, is more philosophical and less physical.

As nurses, we are trained to look at the vital signs. When the vital signs are gone, this constitutes death. When the vital processes that keep us alive are no longer there, we are called dead. But does death occur only when the vital signs are gone, or does death occur while the vital processes are ending? When exactly does death occur? Is death something that just is -- like a state of being (or not being)? Or is death more of a process? Nurses have very unique jobs and they often play a very important role in a person's death -- aiding in a peaceful death (Alligood & Tomey 2009, p. 56). Nurses are often a lifeline for dying individuals in the sense that doctors are not always around; doctors are making the rounds and attending to other things. Nurses, on the other hand, are more present in the hospital landscape. The more nurses there are in the hospital, the more safe a patient will feel. It can be argued that individuals going through the dying process still want to have an attachment to the living world and the nurse's presence can be comforting and essential to a peaceful death. Consequently, when there are few nurses to attend to different patients' needs, the process of dying can be scary and anxiety-provoking.