Mom's illness worsened rapidly. She was staying with her sister in Epsom, a small town near London where she went to help with her baby. I realized that I had to go see her one last time since the prognosis was not good. She had been in the hospital for two weeks. While I was waiting for the visa, I stopped by our hometown to get a certificate that she had health insurance and had it translated into English by the court interpreter, because they asked us for that document. The worst days of our lives followed, but one thing made the whole situation easier - the behavior of the staff of the state hospital where everything happened.
I arrived on Saturday afternoon, said goodbye to my family and immediately went to the hospital with my sister. A large labyrinthine building, something between our more decent hospital and some private one from America like we see in the series. Mom is in a coma in intensive care. She is alone in the room; the three remaining beds are empty. Next to her is a large whiteboard with paper on which her results are tracked; at the top is written in bold letters: "Daughters want to be informed about all changes". The nurses have already been informed that I will be coming and they greet me warmly. Would I like tea or coffee? I have a cafeteria downstairs if I want to eat, one of them tells me and shows me a room with a sofa and an armchair where I can rest.
I am allowed to stay with my mother as long as I want, both day and night. He leaves us alone with mom and tells us to call if we need anything. She is on call, assigned to be with her throughout the shift, but wants to ensure our privacy. She comes back quickly, announces that she called the doctor, asks us what religion we are and if we want her to call a priest. We look at her blankly. Mom has never been much of a believer, but we are grasping at straws and she calls a Greek priest because he is the only one she can remember as Orthodox. She also asks us how she can help us, because she thinks about how it would be if something like that happened to her far away from home.
The doctor, who normally had the day off, arrived at the hospital on that icy Saturday in January for one reason only - to talk to me. He looks at me and explains in selected, simple words my mother's current condition, what they will try, what will happen if it works and what if it doesn't work. The end is either near or very near. He then explains to me what the two of us will go through, the famous five stages: denial, anger, negotiation, grief and acceptance. The nurse tells me that when she was told the news, there were at least five members of the medical staff in the room, including the doctor. Afterwards they asked her if she wanted someone to stay with her. She chose an older nurse with whom she remained silent. Then I remembered the rush of doctors around the local hospital when my grandmother was in a similar condition. Days passed, and something went through the pocket until we found out what it was about; I compare that situation to this doctor who missed his dinner just to talk to me.
I spent many hours by her side in the hospital, caregivers took turns, discreet and subtle; they talked if I wanted to talk, I chose the topics, they answered my questions, they kept quiet when I kept quiet. I asked one of them how she copes with a job where someone dies every day. "Death is a part of life, our job is to make that process easier. We get strength from that help," she said gently. I told her about the corruption in our hospitals.
"Dignity, that's the first thing we're taught when we enter the NHS," was her reply.
When the end came, they left us plenty of time to say goodbye.
There was another important element - who will pay for all this? Remember that translated receipt? The lady from the administration found some yellowed agreement between Great Britain and Yugoslavia from the seventies of the last century. She referred to him and we didn't pay anything. We just gave that confirmation. When we were leaving the hospital, we asked one of the nurses if there was anything we could do for them. We felt endless gratitude. Let's send a card, that's the maximum, she said and pointed to a small board on which the cards were hung.
Listening to my friends who have come of age to take care of their parents and go through the calvary of the Serbian health system, I realize how lucky we were in the accident back then. Unfortunately, the British NHS today is nowhere near what it was fifteen years ago. Their budgets have been slashed and if you don't have private insurance in these post-Brexit days, you're unlikely to get treatment. However, this is not a story about the wealth of a health system, but about the humanity shown by everyone in that chain towards our mother, a foreign citizen, and towards us who were going through the biggest loss in our lives.
