Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal

Montreal

Residents 270

Infected residents 121

Deaths N/A

Infected staff N/A

Staff deaths N/A Monic Champagne

(née Michaud)

N/A– April 14, 2020

Amid the wave of fatalities ravaging Quebec’s senior care centres, Dominic Champagne was, in a relative sense, fortunate. He got to say goodbye to his mother in person. For 10 minutes.

The renowned Quebec director and ecologist wrote about it in L’actualité magazine, a summary of which is reprinted with his permission here. His mother, Monic Champagne, was a resident at the well-respected Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal, where nearly half the residents were infected. Champagne’s doctor called. His mother was in respiratory distress. She would not live long. Champagne could have one visit. Ten minutes max, as per government protocol.

He walked by nurses exuding tension, efficiency, distress. The one accompanying him had been working 16-hour double shifts for a month non-stop. She was constantly near tears. His mother had come to feel like her mother.

Champagne donned a gown, gloves, surgical mask and visor. “Open your eyes,” he said, and she did, looking deep into his, and smiled. Eyes as blue and brilliant as ever, in a face grown gaunt and desiccated. She kept them open for a minute, then, with a sigh, closed them. He wanted to kiss her, but couldn’t. Protocol. He stroked her hair with gloved hands.

In his last minutes ever with his mother, he found his mind empty of profound thoughts. So he told her he loved her, and that he was full of the love she had always given him, so much that he always felt loved, and that she had lived a life full of love, and should be proud of that, and could go in peace. He called his loved ones so they could tell her the same. Then he kissed her cheek and left the room.

“I took a last look over my shoulder, then found myself in the corridor, where, as in my heart, it was the end of the world.”