Diarmuid O'Flynn: Laughing with my dying brother

Donal O'Flynn and his wife Kathleen on honeymoon 44 years ago. They were joined in Connemara by his brother Con and his wife Dolores (left) and his brother Diarmuid and wife Siobhán (right).

There we were, three brothers, Con, 71, on one side, myself, 72, on the other, Donal, 73, in the middle, and as ever when we were together, the stories started. 

Fishing, hurling, rugby, drinking; not the ties that bind us – a very close family – but the threads.

Con was the lead story-teller, on the fishing especially. 

He and Donal were both heavily into fly-fishing, had even gone as far afield as New Zealand together, in search of that perfect spot to hook and reel in the perfect fish.

I was more into the sporting and drinking, and as the stories unfolded, Donal listened. 

Because that was all he could do – listen. 

Donal was on his death bed, the high-care cancer ward in Cork University Hospital, lying there between his two younger brothers, his failing lungs kept going by the oxygen flowing through the tubes up his nose. 

There, but – it seemed – not there. 

Until, as Con and myself laughed, he began to smile, then to nod, then, opening his eyes to glance at one or the other of us, to whisper an occasional, "That’s right!" 

He was back, like old times.

Earlier that day I'd been summoned from Ballybunion, an urgent call from Donal’s beloved wife and life-partner of over 40 years, Kathleen – this was it, this was definitely it.

It was the second such call I’d got from Kathleen in the last three weeks but it was the sixth time in the last four years that Kathleen had been such summoned: "Donal has taken a turn, come immediately and be prepared."

It had happened so often in fact that some had taken to calling him Lazarus: ‘You’re not going to believe this but he’s after rallying, again!" 

Donal enjoying some fishing.

This time though, I had a sense, came off the course and headed straight to CUH.

That was a long drive. 

Ah, Donal.

Once a big brother, always a big brother, and Donal was made for it, a natural. 

It wasn’t just that at nearly 6’4” he was the tallest of the ten of us, it was the aura – from a very young age he was a force, a leader, a commander, and we were just the followers. 

But, he was also the protector, the one to whom any of us, of this generation and the next – any of his own kids, any of our kids – could turn to for advice, for help, for consolation.

All through my own life he’s been there for me. 

This was especially so on the hurling field – he had my back. 

On a couple of occasions, when I was under pressure in another row, he’d suddenly and violently appear, looking after baby brother. 

On one memorable occasion, on my back on the field at half-time against Sarsfields, and being pummelled, though on crutches because of a recent back injury, Donal somehow made it over the wire around the field in Glanworth and appeared above me, crutches flailing, clearing all round him. 

Oh, he had fight in him.

Even in these last few weeks in CUH, and even in semi-awareness, when he half-heard a nurse ask Kathleen if he needed some food he instantly and decisively answered, in the whisper to which he had been reduced for the past several months, ‘NO! NO!’, and waved her off. 

Later, as we discussed in whispers who and when all the returning family could come to the room to relieve Kathleen and their daughters, Shannon and Megan, in their vigil, that same whisper could suddenly be heard, faint but clear: "Tell them all fuck off!"

You see, from the time eight years ago when he was diagnosed with throat cancer, Donal wasn’t for dying. 

And from the time five years ago when he was hit by an even heavier health curse, eosinophilic asthma, put into an induced coma so many times that eventually, his throat raw, he had to be given a tracheotomy, he kept coming back from the brink, back from the hospital, back to working on the old house he was rebuilding and extending for Kathleen and himself so they could downsize. 

Sheer force of will, that’s what kept him alive.

And here he was again. 

‘Larger than life’ is an expression often used to describe people like Donal, but of course nobody is. Death is a fact of life – the final fact of life – and there’s no escape. 

Once again the Grim Reaper came, November last year, lung cancer this time, once again Donal joined the battle, and once again he won. 

But there was another battle, and another, and another.

As a family, we’ve seen this so many times before, sudden deaths for our brother Tadhg (2000), sister Gráinne (2024), but bedside vigils for our father Donal (2005), our brother Jack (2013), mother Sheila (2018), sister Réidín (2022). 

Those vigils all had one thing in common – they fought, fought to the very end, no acceptance that perhaps the end is nigh.

Donal was the same. 

It wasn’t that he feared death, and his writings – his poetry, his prose – resonated with that. 

It was just that he still had so much to do — ‘A book to finish, a lot more to do on the house’ — as he told our sister Deirdre on her last visit to him, just a few weeks ago. 

That’s the way we all are, always with some project on the go, always doing.

That Friday afternoon, Con and myself and our yarns, he rallied again, back even stronger next day with his own family around him. 

But that was it and on Sunday, December 14th, he eased himself out of this life.

Donal’s work is done, that towering intellect, that great strength, that indomitable will, is no more – a free spirit, that spirit freed. 

But life goes on, we go on, exactly as he would have had it. 

He married a woman, Kathleen, who matched him in every way; his kids – Shannon, Ros, Megan – inherited that shared strength and spirit, his grandkids now also. We’ll be fine, all of us. 

Donal? As with Réidín, Tiger, Jack, Gráinne, he’ll always be among us.