I’ve been a Hospice volunteer for a few years now. Hospice is an organization that helps patients and families at the end of life, who have decided they will no longer seek a cure for their illness, but rather will attempt to stay as comfortable as possible and live as fully as they can in the time they have left. Ideally, the Hospice patient will die at home, but sometimes patients need skilled nursing care. When a patient is referred to Hospice, they get a whole team — physician, nurse, CNA, social worker, chaplain, dietitian, etc., and they get assigned a volunteer if they want one. Hospice volunteers do a wide range of tasks, from relieving tired family caregivers, to running errands, to sitting with the patient and talking, watching movies or reading with them. Volunteers are trained to provide companionship and support in whatever way is needed, short of medical tasks.

I have had several patients, or “friends”, since I started with Hospice, but I am still a newbie. I attend volunteer support meetings with people who have been doing it for 20 years or more. I can’t express how much I admire those long-timers, or how much they have taught me. They are kind of like the Skin Horse in the Velveteen Rabbit. They aren’t just full of wisdom, they are full of lovingkindness, and it’s my hope that one day a little of their sheen will rub off on me.

That said, I have been doing it long enough that I am starting to notice patterns. Of course, every patient is singular — their lives, their deaths, and everything in between. But it hit me the other day that one near constant is the role of romantic love in their lives, even at the end.

I’ve noticed that when I have a patient who is well enough to be read to, they often prefer love poetry (and they always, always, have a volume called “100 Greatest Love Poems” somewhere in their house). If they are well enough to hear music, they will ask for “romantic” music, like the big band music of their youth (Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman and the rest). If they want to watch a movie, it’s West Side Story, Casablanca, or His Girl Friday.

It is a cliché to say that as you lay on your deathbed, you don’t talk about your career. This is absolutely true in my experience. I have had patients who have had amazing academic careers, won Purple Hearts, hobnobbed with political leaders around the world, you name it, but it’s the last thing they want to talk about. Instead, they want to talk about their children and grandchildren (and great-grandchildren).

But most of all, they want to talk about the loves of their lives.

Usually, they have lost their spouse or partner by the time I get to know them, but it doesn’t matter whether it happened last year or 40 years ago, the memory of that person is still alive to them. They tell me about their partner’s virtues, foibles, hobbies, youth, and — if they can stand it — final days. They love to show me pictures of their wedding, and if they can no longer see them, they describe them to me as I look. If they have the energy to say only three words, I guarantee their spouse’s name will be one of them. If they are in pain, and they call out a name, it is their loved one’s. If they reach out blindly for someone I can’t see, it is for their lost love.

I’ve had patients who haven’t been blessed in romantic love  — some have been long divorced and never remarried — and, surprisingly, they often want to talk about love as well. Whether a patient has been lucky in love or not, they often seem to focus on that specific kind of close personal relationship at the end of life, on how love has mattered to them, or not, and why.

I got the idea for this post from something that happened the other day. I was visiting with a new “friend”, who happens to be blind, and quite taciturn, and we were trying to figure out what I could read to her. It’s been a bit of a challenge this time around to be helpful (I sometimes feel like I am just useless, underfoot and unnecessary, and then I remember it is not about me). I suggested poems, the Bible, a few other things. She just stared straight ahead, shaking her head almost imperceptibly at each idea. Finally I said, “How about Nora Roberts? Have you ever heard of her?”. She lifted her head, turned towards me and said, clear as a bell, “Of course I have heard of Nora Roberts. Everyone loves her!”

We are two chapters into Sea Swept.

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