My mother, sound asleep, would be shaken awake, my tiny little hands prompting her to consciousness. With a collapsing feeling in my chest, I would tell her that I didn’t want to die, that I was scared of the unknown. She calmly shared that we all would die, that a beginning necessitated an end. I remember being offended by her reaction, that she didn’t have an adequate response, that she couldn’t soothe my anxiety or give me more insight into death. I was about six years old then and, to this day, I still wake up suddenly, in terror, overwhelmed by the helplessness of dying.