At twenty years of age, I feel fortunate that I have not yet lost someone in the only way in which they will never again walk this beautiful, vibrant, yet often unjust Earth. Nothing compares to that loss; just the same, we often find ourselves in the throes of the grieving process in other areas of our lives in ways we could have never contrived. We feel the pain of others, watch helplessly as we are unable to use the skills we know to do anything more than hold a hand or simply listen, which is never as “simple” as it seems. We grieve the loss of parts of ourselves, wondering where we might find seeds hardy enough to let roots grow in the internal coldness we feel deep within. Just as much as the grand moments of bliss that we hold onto in moments of strife, pain and the inevitability of mortality remain part of the human experience.
When I first began conducting my hospice calls, I was enthused by the idea of providing a listening ear, a chance to offer resources, but more than anything, a depth of experience that could not and would not be fathomable within the context of the day-to-day pressure of student life. It so often exerts a false call to conformity, especially for those who are learning to grapple with the daunting weight of joyfully choosing to sacrifice, learn, and advocate as a future physician. After all, in the end, our primary duty is to advocate for our patients as we would ourselves. This requires an authenticity of experience that often comes only quite sparsely, occurring in “little miracles” whose origin confounds even the most logical of those who experience them. They come to you when you need them most.
My need for a little miracle came at the end of freshman year and grew throughout the summer before I began volunteering, haunting me into the beginnings of my sophomore year and even now. I felt my confidence plummet, my motivation to call reaching levels so abysmally low that I convinced myself that my lack of experience and current life situation merited falling into the pain with no clear way out. I called my Volunteer Coordinator in tears to express that hopelessness and quite honestly to try to quit. When I look back at that precise moment of not giving up, but giving into the deep loneliness and emptiness, I recognize a pain that I hear in the voices of so many of the clients with which I’ve had the blessing of working.
One of them has been not just a little, but a big miracle within my life. As I write this, I’ve just finished talking to her. I still feel relaxed from the conversation we had about everything from the struggles her aunt has been having in health and treatment, the flowers she grows to honor her father, and anecdotes about quirky neighbors, wigs, and tractors. Unfortunately for you, these sorts of stories are kept so unbelievably close to my heart, carried with me everywhere I go as a manifestation of the effect that this particular client has had on me. They are also a constant reminder of the impact I aspire to have not just on my patients, but on my family and friends as well.
This Client has been a caregiver her entire life, a natural-born advocate in her own right, and the most independent of women. We send pictures of flowers, creating a safe space every Friday to honor the loss of old lives, old friends, and loved ones in hospice. In our empathy for each other, we find healing. In her voice, I have found a lifelong friend, and a passion to not only care for the vulnerable, but to truly know and love them, especially when that person is yourself.