(I wrote this for my hospice co-workers, imagining what our patients might say to them. It is also to anyone who has cared for the dying.)
In your line of work, you don't always get a "thank you." But that doesn't mean we aren't grateful. maybe we can't talk anymore or express ourselves clearly. Or maybe we are so overcome with gratitude at such grace that we are speechless.
But I want to say "thank you." You saw me when few others wanted to look at me anymore. Many people thought I wasn't all there, that I was just a body parked in the hallway. But you touched me. You touched my body with gentleness. You cleaned it, you lotioned it, you cared for its wounds. I felt every touch. You painted my nails and fixed my hair like I was a princess. You did all these things even when you weren't sure that I even knew you were there. I did.
You were with me at the end of my life. Sometimes you were the only ones other than the facility staff to come see me. Sometimes my own children stopped coming to see me, and often you still believed the best about me. You didn't know my whole story. You didn't know whether or not my kids had good reasons to be resentful. You believed I deserved kindness no matter what I'd been like before. Or maybe you knew me before, and no longer recognized me in the throes of this illness. But you still saw past the disease that made me act like someone else.
I was at your mercy. Sometimes I was angry that I couldn't control anything anymore, much less my own body. Sometimes I lashed out at you with my hands or with words just because you were there. And yet you still came back.
You treated my dying body as if it were beautiful. You never treated it like it was ugly or repulsive. You didn't shy away when I was as helpless as an infant. Others were embarrassed at my lack of control of my body or were sickened by my odors. You weren't. Some people knew me when I was strong and bright and in control, and they're embarrassed and uneasy now to see me this way. But you aren't.
You stayed for hours sometimes, even when you could have been at home. You often tried to mediate between my crazy family members when they fought over what little I had left. You took their abuse when they insisted you be like Jesus and make me rise from that bed and walk. You gave them hugs when they didn't know how to handle what was happening to me.
Sometimes I know it was hard on you when I was a person close to your age. Caring for me reminded you that any of us could get sick, even you, and all of us will die. I know that was hard on you. But still you came. You opened your heart and sometimes fell appropriately in love with me even though it was guaranteed that I would leave you and break your heart. Sometimes I reminded you of someone else that you loved and lost and you felt that grief all over again because of me. You did everything you did because you're one of god's human angels put here to make death a little less frightening and a lot more peaceful. I know you get very tired. I know sometimes you get emotionally drained. I know you get frustrated at the limits of what you can do in the face of death and conflict. I know it would be easier on you to do some other kind of work that doesn't demand so much of you. But I'm glad you're still here. My family will never forget what you've done. I will never forget what you've done and I have all eternity to remember.
So when you're tired, think of me. When you get to wondering if what you do matters at all to anyone, think of me. When you're drowning in paperwork or fighting to stay awake while driving home after a ridiculously long day, think of me.
They say that someone always come to meet us when it's our turn to die and enter eternity. I can't help but think that when it's your turn to come home, I just bet there will be hundreds of people who will be eager to say, "thank you," and "welcome home."
one day
