Can death be beautiful?

On the 10th of June 2022 my mother Ania Bilon, artist, interior designer, hostess, fantastic cook, and grandmother, was diagnosed with a type of aggressive brain cancer and given a prognosis of two months to live.

 

Out of the blue and into the blue.

 

Within a month she had lost the ability to speak and move the right part of her body. Within three weeks of her diagnosis, she needed to use a wheelchair and two people to help Ania move. In all this time Ania never moaned or complained. She recommended everyone to read Tuesdays with Morrie, with its message Does looking at life through the lens of death change the way we see and do life?

 

My mother didn't like the idea of funerals and certainly didn’t like the idea of us having a party without her. She asked for a boat trip to celebrate her rite of passage.  It was Ania's wish to use the time we had left together, to celebrate each other's company as well as continue painting and changing the interior design of her home.

 

Ania's wish was to die at home with the life of her family around her. 

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We had many adventures during this time and the possibility to come together in ways we haven't done for years. We had many moments filled with kindness, care and lots of laughter. Four days before my Mum's death, Ania had the impulse to see Rothko’s work at the Tate Modern, but when we got there she said No more desire.

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Ania died, on the 18th of October 2022 in London, Maida Vale, at home, with her husband Marek, her granddaughter Matilda and me by her side. We had a gathering/vigil in Maida Vale after Ania's orgasmic last breath. We gathered around her body as if she was still there with us, talked to her, hugged her and read poetry till her body got picked up and put in a fridge.

 

This was my biggest anxiety. I wanted to keep Anias body at home and bury/ burn her body myself but I wasn't equipped to do it. 

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Looking after Ania at home was a privilege and I was only able to be in a position to be there with her with the support of friends and family, Cancer MacMillian funded the support of St Johns Hospice and their ‘Home at Care’ service, which I am filled with gratitude for the NHS for making it's services available.  Thank you to all the carers and nurses who helped me day and night to look after my mum: Soula, Dina, Sonia, Brigitte, Yvette, Cristiana, Hamda, Hinda, Ifra, Fortun, Hawa, Fahida, Uber and Sophia. As well as Ania herself who in all this time facing her own death, guided, taught and protected us all.

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A cremation ceremony in partnership with the funeral directors Poetic Endings took place in Kensal Green and some of Ania's ashes were poured into a tree hollow in a mama tree in Hyde Park close to the Serpentine Gallery. The rest of the ashes were scattered in the sea in Spain, where Ania spent ten years of her life. And Ania's girlfriend Claudia has some of Ania's ashes to plant in her garden in Cologne, where Ania also spent 12 years of her life with me.​

 

The experiences I faced when looking after Ania in the final chapter of her life has awoken an agency in me to further explore The Art of Dying.

 

Can death be beautiful?  aims to shine a light on palliative at home care​​ and documents our time together from the moment of Ania's diagnosis to her death.

 

Many pictures were taken by Ania herself.

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