Death has been my daily companion for years, and I refuse to trivialize it. It has given me the most intense experiences of my life. I've known the pain of being separated from people I loved, the sense of impotence in the face of advancing illness, moments of revolt against the slow physical disintegration of people I was accompanying, and the temptation to put a stop to it all. I cannot deny the suffering and sometimes the horror that surround death. I've been witness to limitless solitude; I've felt the pain of being unable to share certain times of distress, because there are levels of despair so deep that they cannot be shared.
— Marie de Hennezel, Intimate Death by Marie de Hennezel, Carol Brown Janeway, translator