Restrictions due to the pandemic continue to isolate family members from one another. As I make calls to our patients’ families, I hear in your voices the anguish that this separation causes. From my heart to yours, I assure you that I ache for the time you are losing with someone who means so much to you. By way of a bittersweet blessing, I want to share a thought with you today.
Journaling is increasing in popularity. “It has become a hallmark of the so-called self-care movement, right up there with meditation,” Hayley Phelan wrote in a New York Times article in 2018. “Scientific studies have shown it to be essentially a panacea for modern life... with benefits like boosting mindfulness, memory and communications skills.”
Memorial Day weekend marked the unofficial start of summer. Driving across the countryside last weekend I saw people rafting, barbecuing, motorcycling, and soaking up the sun. Soon there will be fireworks, vacations, and family gatherings. These are the things of summer season.
Hospice work moves fast. A person is given a diagnosis of six months or less to live. The team moves in with rapid pace: managing medications and equipment for comfort; assessing emotional and spiritual needs; swiftly building trust to provide intimate personal care; creating a holistic environment for patient and family to move through this short time.
Any hobbit fans out there? Here is a deeply meaningful line from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. "The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, love grows perhaps the greater." (J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring)
The theme for Spring 2020 is “we’re all in this together.” I have been pondering what “this” is. “This” is not a virus that kills people. That’s not what we’re all in together.
