3.1.4. The Time Remaining
They did not bring the future up for discussion, but when asked they expressed severe anxiety when thinking
about the time remaining. “I wouldn’t wish this on my enemy if it should get worse” (07). The anxiety led their
thoughts towards the end of life—with varying feelings. Some experienced agony of death, which could give
rise to sleeping difficulties. Others expressed almost a longing for death because the present situation in life was
experienced as a suffering. Thoughts about death were also dealt with in other ways, such as imaging how life
after death could turn out, with hopes that this would be a far more pleasant existence than the present one, a
place filled with harmony. “I always long for the sea, so I think that I once lived by the sea in another life and
I’m going there again in another life—then I’ll live by the sea. That’s how it is” (08).