LIVE BY DESIGN | My father taught me how to live and then he taught me how to die

Live by Design is a weekly News24 column by Dr Helena Dolny and Mapi Mhlangu on mortality and the conversations around it.

I visited my good friend who is in post-op recovery. She told me of her pre-op preparation, of her instructions to her daughter, her clarity about her Do Not Resuscitate order in the event of things going badly.

Then she asked me, “Do you remember that sentence from Abraham Verghese’s novel, Cutting for Stone?” it goes something like: "My father taught me how to live and then he taught me how to die."