An Eternity

Forever is a long time, and that's how long it feels since I've posted.  All is well here in my neck of the woods. I've got a new position at work that's part time working in the office every weekend.  Monday's are for recovery, Fridays are for girding my loins for the anxiety my new position doles out and I often pick up extra work the rest of the week.  Here and there, anyways.

I won't beat around the bush here…I initially came back here tonight to revisit a post I wrote when I said farewell to 2011.  The subject of my angst left this world today and while I thought I'd feel relief, I don't.  In fact, I've thought of this person more than she deserved in the past month.  I wish I could have found forgiveness for her in all of this time, but could not.  One sided forgiveness is really difficult and letting things go without getting to clear the air is a very difficult task.  As I said back then, it was mainly because it wasn't me who directly owned the problem and the true owner hates conflict. Still, this person's behavior had a long and lasting grasp on our little family.  Perhaps it's the pity others expressed toward her plight--themselves having forgotten the pain she gleefully inflicted on others--that bothered me most.  I could not forget and I have to say at times I think she got the best of me, even in her impending and subsequent death.  Well, it's over for sure now, and time to let her go for good, so I've come to bid her adieux.  I hope it's not too hot down there.

As I said in 2011, I'm still a work in progress.  I'll try better next year.

Farewell 2011

Since I'm not good at keeping them, I'm not usually one to put forth resolutions for the coming year. This year however is different and I am trying hard to better myself by working on the act of forgiveness.

I am neither quick to request forgiveness when I've been wrong, nor am I generous when it comes to forgiving if it's requested of me. Hardest of all is forgiving someone a particularly egregious act that they (may) have no clue they've committed against me or someone I care for and that is something I've been considering for several months now. This work has been a challenge, especially since this problem is only indirectly mine--it really belongs to someone I love. I've felt anger so profound and been so outraged at the injustice of it that it's made me feel sick to my stomach and even visits me in my sleep. Truly, this type of problem eats at the soul like a cancer. With the dawning of understanding that how I feel is not particularly healthy for me, I've embarked on a journey of awareness with the goal of learning to forgive.

I am a work in progress.

During this nasty little family drama (two years in the making), it has come to pass that the person who is at the core of this and has created all of this hurt and pain is now physically suffering in the most horrific of ways. It's the ultimate cosmic comeuppance, and I'm (kind of) ashamed to say that I have actually felt true glee at her misfortune. I'm (sort of) appalled at my feelings, but with wise guidance I have started to forgive my own self for feeling that way. In the words of my friend, Jeanne, "feelings come unbidden. We don't ask to have feelings like this, they just sort of wash over us." I didn't ask to feel that way, I just did. Self awareness is a good start. Ultimately, throughout this two year ordeal, I held my tongue. I was really angry that I didn't have the nerve to say what I really felt toward this woman before misfortune befell her and now, well, I'm in a position where I never will have that opportunity and have to learn to let it go. It's so hard.

This week, Jeanne and I met for lunch to explore this topic of forgiveness a little more closely. She gave me some material about the topic that was (oddly) given to her the first day we spoke of this. It included a quote by the theologian Frederick Buechner, “Of the Seven Deadly Sins, anger is possibly the most fun. To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back--in many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.”

Mmmm. Words to ponder.

And so my friends, for many reasons, it's finally good to say goodbye to 2011. May 2012 be better to our collective world than this year has been and may your own journeys take you to a kinder, gentler and healthier place.

Happy New Year.

Old Familiar Places

Today would have been my mother, Henri's, 84th birthday. It's hard to imagine that she's been gone for nearly 4 years, and my father has been gone for nearly 8 years.

It must be my work that causes this, but I'm much more sensitive to birthdays and anniversaries of loved ones I've lost. On my father's birthday, April 6th, I was doing a start of care and couldn't think of anyone else except my own father. It was hard to be or stay in the moment. I was busy that day and had little time for reflection.

I've been thinking about my mom a lot this past week. She wasn't the easiest person to get along with, but that's often a two way street. Though we had weighty political discussions, she on the far right and me swinging to the left, we often glossed over saying the important things. It wasn't that I couldn't handle them. She couldn't. We never went where we should have with our times together (minefields can be dangerous). I never really thanked her, or forgave her for her motherly mistakes and I never asked her for forgiveness for the things I may have done to hurt her. I'm sorry for avoiding these discussions now because I can't change this.

Henrietta was a handful after my father passed away. What my newly hospice educated eyes now see is that she was grieving and at a complete loss without my dad around. She outlived him by four lonely years. When she died, my sister and I found a journal she had started and a few letters she'd written to my dad. It broke my heart to read her entries and to think that she could not discuss her feelings with us, though at times I think she tried. Certainly, she was someone who would have benefitted from professional bereavement support. Hindsight.

I've reflected quite a bit this week on forgiveness and letting go of feelings and hurts that go back 50 years, but to honor her, this is exactly what I'm working on. I'm thankful for the things she did give me: a work ethic, a moral compass, a love of music, ballroom dance, sports in general and hockey.

I've made a conscious effort to replace how she looked as she lay dying in her hospital bed with more positive memories. I much prefer the snapshot in my mind of her sitting around the piano bar of the St. Clair Inn and singing songs of old with my dad and their friends. This time of the year, she'd have been glued to the television watching playoff hockey and her beloved Detroit Red Wings.

Happy Birthday, Henri. You are missed.

This one's for you:

Rx for Life

As any ICU nurse worth her salt can tell you, sedation and pain relief is part science, and a whole lot of art. Getting the perfect chemical concoction without going overboard is delicate. If I learned nothing in the unit, I learned this. It's why I do so well as a hospice nurse on the off shift. While I don't prescribe the drugs I use, I tend to get my two cents in to the physician on what I think will work to treat poorly managed pain and anxiety. When it comes to psychic or spiritual pain though, I feel out of sorts without a magic concoction to soothe a troubled soul. Last night, I was challenged to help ease someone's emotional pain. Though I thought our visit went well, I wasn't quite sure and I don't know if I eased any suffering. It was that intense.

Many people that I meet have come to a crossroads where pursuit of a cure for disease intersects the reality that disease has progressed despite heroic efforts. It can be a frightening and sad place, or it can be the perfect convergence where modern medicine has failed and now the spiritual work can begin. While some people can never give up the fight to survive at all costs, others are able to turn from one direction to the other without too much trouble. They're ready to move ahead and spend as much quality time as they have left with the people that they love. Often, they're tired of the frequent hospitalizations, needle sticks, chemo and radiation that sap every last bit of energy and intuitively know that they need to conserve a little for the type of work that lies ahead. The people who fight death to the bitter end seem to suffer the most emotionally. Ask any hospice nurse to describe "terminal restlessness," and they will tell you it is the most difficult crisis we encounter. I've witnessed patients run in circles around a bed as though something is chasing them and, indeed it is. Death. When I see this, I know the end is quite near for these people; sometimes only hours or a day or two away. It's a traumatic event for patients and their families, though not everyone encounters this. People who are prepared psychologically and spiritually often pass from this world quite peacefully.

Plenty of people tell me they can't do what I do for a living. I hear this a lot, especially when I go to a home to pronounce a death. They say this as though death is something that's abnormal and that it takes a special person to do this. Perhaps they think my work is of the macabre; very dark, mysterious and disturbing. After all, none of my patients escape death. There are no close calls in hospice that have happy outcomes, but I believe in my heart that there can be good outcomes. We can die a good death and this one idea is more about making the most out of life than it is about dying. This basic tenet is what I hold onto when I start to feel as though hospice isn't a good fit for me. In my mind, my job is part mission, and partly a way to pay my bills. Mostly it's a mission. There are easier ways to earn a living in nursing.

Long before I started down this path, I read the book, Dying Well, by Dr. Ira Byock. I bought it when my mother in law was dying and right after my best friend's daughter was killed. This is such a well written book on the art and challenges of being a hospice practitioner with stories that bring meaning to our human condition. I followed up this book with the second book this author wrote, The Four Things That Matter Most. My closest family members have read both of these books and have found them beneficial, too. They're not only handbooks for the dying, they're great guidebooks for living.

In a nutshell, these four things that matter so much are love, thankfulness and giving and receiving forgiveness. This book was life altering for me. It's not easy to ask for and give forgiveness, but we humans are imperfect creatures. It only stands to reason that over a lifetime, we may need to give and receive forgiveness more than once. As for love, well it seems to me it's something we all strive to feel and give. Some are luckier than others in this department. Being thankful can be difficult, especially if someone is dying, but I think it's important to tell the people who matter in our lives that we're thankful for them and long before we're losing them.

What I took away from both books is the importance of being ready for the curveballs life can throw at us. We never know when it'll be our own turn to leave this earth, so it's important to live a life embracing things in our lives that matter most. Several years ago, my best friend lost her daughter abruptly when she was hit by a car. As horrific as that was, their relationship was in a very good place which helped my friend to heal and survive this event with her psyche intact. When we talk, she never ends a phone call without saying, I love you. It's important to her. She lives the principles in Dr. Byock's books.

It's been awhile since I've read these books, but I plan on rereading them from a new perspective as a hospice nurse.

In the meantime, I do what I'm able and ask only for insight and clarity when I'm trying to help those who make me think outside the box.

video platform

video management

video solutions

video player

Letting Go

Like a wolf with a juicy femur, it's going to take me awhile to get done with this topic. In the meantime, won't you join me in listening to a song that reflects my mood?



It's no big deal right? It's just forgiveness.