Dear Alex,

Please don't construe the circumstance that I write to you
again so soon to mean that you shouldn't also feel free to
telephone, if you think it would help. I write because
writing is easy for me, creates a record of my thoughts 
and makes it possible for me to look for mistakes. Searching
for mistakes is important to me because I really don't know
what I am doing. I am ignorant, as I suppose most of us are, 
about the process of dying.

Margaret's sleep patterns have changed. Until about two days
ago, she would usually sleep continuously from 9 p.m. to 3 or
4 p.m., a period of 18 or 19 hours, usually quite deeply, with
her mouth open. Last night she was still awake when I went to
bed at midnight, and when I got up at 7:30 her eyes followed me
across the room, although intermittently she seems to be dozing.

And that seems to be what she is doing now, lying motionless in
bed, intermittently opening her eyes, occasionally a soft moan
as from a dream that does not frighten her. - Just now she has
begun breathing deep and regularly as if asleep.

The obvious and immediate issue is how I should address her
somnolent state, if at all. Should I kneel at her bed to stroke
her forehead, to kiss her and tell her I love her. I've done so
often enough, and ironically, each time when I then get up, 
supporting my crippled self on the mattress and tipping it
slightly, Margaret awakes, becomes frightened, and complains,
"Oh no, please don't, please don't," a sequence which suggests
that the net effect of my efforts is to cause her distress. 
I try to do the best I can; obviously it can't be enough.

Please remember that if you would like to come - for a few 
hours, a few days, or a few weeks you are always welcome.

Love, Jochen

20150906 8:00 a.m.
The sleep patterns of both of us have changed.
Margaret is not sleeping so deeply with her mouth open
as she had been, rather moaning lightly from time to time
as if commenting on a dream insufficiently threatening to awaken her.

I think all are agreed that she sjould not be aroused from sleep,
to eat or drink or be changed. There is however considerable difference
in how she should be addressed, - or whether it matters to her.
Ultimately, when we speak to her we are speaking if not to - then for
ourselves. I doubt that she hears what is said to her, or that it
has much meaning. Even "I love you" seems to have lost much of its
meaning.