Body & Mind: Last Wishes

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"For Matt, the foundation wasn't about helping himself. It was about making a difference to other people," says Reiff. He and Jen Wiederkehr are raising money for a new cancer facility in New Jersey that they hope to name for Matt. "Of course, Matt was upset and angry about his illness," she says. "He was devastated. But being able to focus on this foundation helped channel those emotions in a positive direction."

It's important for both patients and loved ones to grasp that terminal patients aren't just dying--they're also living, stresses Therese Rando, clinical director at the Institute for the Study and Treatment of Loss in Warwick, R.I. "With that realization, patients often begin doing things to give their lives purpose and meaning," Rando says. "People want to know they can continue to exist in the world after they're dead. Who wants to be forgotten?"

And who wants to let their loved ones go unacknowledged? Ruth Jacobson, 62, is devoted to preserving the memory of her daughter Sarah, an independent filmmaker who died last year at age 32. Ruth amassed 27 cartons of materials related to Sarah's work for the archives at New York University's film library, her enthusiasm undimmed by such risqué titles as Mary Jane's Not a Virgin Anymore. She responds to fan e-mail and keeps meticulous records of press clippings. "So many people remembered Sarah and were moved by her that letters keep coming," Ruth says. "In a way that makes it easier, but it's hard because I'm constantly reminded of the things Sarah wanted to accomplish but never will. She'll never get an Academy Award."

Ruth's dedication mirrors her daughter's attitude when Sarah learned she had metastatic endometrial uterine cancer. Immediately, Sarah began working harder than ever. Having already made several shorts and features, which won a cult following among college students and indie-film fans, Sarah was determined to make another feature film, creating storyboards in her hospice bed. She was unable to complete that project, but when her hair fell out from chemo, she and her boyfriend filmed each other shaving their heads into Mohawks for a short film called True Love Mohawk. In addition to that, the driven filmmaker organized a retrospective of her work to be shown at an art-house cinema in New York City. It opened five days after her death.

But Sarah had mixed feelings about this last project. "I think she knew the retrospective was an acknowledgment that this was the end," explains her sister Lee. Two weeks before Sarah's death, Ruth asked her daughter to decide the order in which films would be screened at the retrospective. "Not right now," Sarah said. It wasn't until the week before she died that Sarah told her mother, "I don't have the energy to plan the order. You do it for me." Ruth and Lee took her words to mean "I'm ready to let go."