The dread of death, I have come to know, is as fierce and unrelenting as a tornado in full destruction mode. Your heart sticks in panic, peaceful sleep retreats for days or weeks and you dash around desperately trying to stop the steady assault with whatever humanly means you have such as prayer and medicine. When the storm stops, its roar falling silent at the moment that the loved one's breath quiets, there is a wrenching sadness that rushes over you but, strangely, it is accompanied with relief because there is no longer a dread of death.