It was fun to see the old sights and several friends (although I would have liked to see many more and the ones we did see much longer...). We'll just have to head back down to stay with them for a more thorough visit...
But while we drove around town, I had many memories of the people I helped care for through Hospice in particular enter my head. I worked for Klamath Hospice for a year and a half part time when Cliff was off from school or in the evenings. I did on-call and filled in for the nurses on their days off or for vacations.
Coming from an ICU background this was very different. I liked it. It was a slower pace, I got to travel all around the Klamath Basin and into California, I was able to get to know people more (even with just working part time), I got to see how people lived and loved and grieved.
As I drove through downtown, I remembered the first patient I ever saw. He lived up on hill overlooking the city. He died on someone else's watch but the story is so funny, I have to tell it. One of our nurses was there with the family after he died. She called the mortuary and they came to get his body. But just as they maneuvered the gurney down some windy stone steps down to the street where the hearse was waiting, it pulled away being driven by two teenagers on a joyride... The two family members decided their loved one would think the situation was incredibly hilarious as they stood there on the sidewalk with his body. The mortician called the police and a back up hearse. They all watched the police lights wind around the city streets, of which there are not many in K Falls, as the cops chased the perpetrators and they waited.
Then I passed a home of a man I visited several times who lived in a low income housing apartment. He had a dog and lived by himself. He was quiet and smoked like a chimney. He lived a simple life and pretty much only left to take his dog on a walk.
A little farther down the road I remembered being on call when I was about 6 months pregnant and getting stuck at a house for more than two hours with a drunk man who was feuding with his siblings and refused to believe his mom was dying and needed hospice. I played more of a social worker role that day. The siblings wouldn't be in the house while the drunk brother was there, so I enlisted the help of a neighbor who would keep him busy while the other siblings went in to take care of their mom.
I remembered going to houses with trash and dog feces all around the carpet, and going to a huge mansion high on a hill. I took care of hoarders, compulsive cleaners, farmers and businessmen. Death is common to us all.
I was on call when the mother of a Jehovah's witness, that I had many conversations about my faith with, died.
Once I did an assessment on a Spanish woman. She didn't speak English and I spoke VERY LITTLE Spanish. They had one relative who could sort of interpret... I hope we were able to get that woman's needs met... All I know was that they offered me a mystery drink and I drank it not wanting to offend anyone even though I could tell it had some milk in it and I'm lactose intolerant...
Occasionally I would get instructions to go visit someone that lived so far out they didn't have paved roads or street signs or anything. A sample instruction would be: Go to (this) town, turn left at the railroad, then follow that till the second dirt road. Turn right at the tree that looks like a fork, then go 12 miles before you see a mailbox with a green tractor on it with one wheel. I loved those instructions. It was like an adventure!
One particularly adventurous trip came when I was on call one Saturday morning and I got a call from a family member saying they thought their mom was dead. I said, "You think? Is she breathing?" "No." "Does she have a pulse?" "No." So I said I would go ahead and come. The only problem was it was blizzard like conditions. And that's saying something for Klamath. No one was on the roads it was so windy and snowy (and it was early on a Saturday morning, but I'm going for dramatic effect). I was driving north in our Explorer with studded tires, when I realized, I'm not really very confident with where the turnoff is for Chiloquin. The snow was sticking to all the signs and completely covering them up. So I did a lot of driving and had to turn around a couple of times before I found it (people from Klamath are laughing right now, 'cause it's not that hard to find when you are from there!). When I saw the stable with a bunch of horses on the left and a red house on the right, I knew I was in the right place. I had to gun it to get up the driveway in 2 feet of snow but I made it. The only thing I did was confirm that she was in fact dead. The family said they wanted to wait for an out of town mortuary to come pick her up. So they watched me destroy (flush) the narcotics and I left.
I also remember several instances when I began to get more confident with my assessments of a human being's final moments and telling bewildered family members that it would only be a matter of a few hours. I was right about 95% of the time.
One night I drove about 45 minutes out of town to do an assessment on a new patient and got a call from someone in the same area who was confused about what they were seeing in their dying daughter. I stopped by on my way home and determined that this woman only had a few hours to live her oxygen levels were so low and her breathing had settled into that deep rhythmic gasping that frequently happens just before death. She was the youngest patient I had seen and had young children she was leaving behind. A few hours later she did die and I went back to pronounce her and call the funeral home. In that time I was able to spend time with the family and learn a little more about her. Once she found out that she would not make it, she arranged for her children to be cared for by another family. When I got there, one of her daughters was curled up in the lap of her new mommy, crying. The family talked about her and the process of the disease and the disappointments and the triumphs. And I joined with them in singing some of her favorite songs.
I felt like all these and more were sacred moments that I was able to share in. It was a privilege to do so. Many of these families were Christians, and many were not. Only God knows who truly knew Him and who didn't. But I think I could honestly tell who were believers by observing the way they died. I don't think this applies to everyone by any means, but the people who professed a faith in Jesus and really trusted Him in their lives seemed to die a much more peaceful and calm death than the ones who didn't. You could see it in the faces of the family members as well. There wasn't this sense of false hope and the crossing of fingers. They knew where they were going.
Those people were a joy to care for. But I admit, there were times when I broke "the rules" by praying with people or sharing my faith in (hopefully) an un-obnoxious way. If people asked about my life or family I would be honest and try to insert references in our conversation to The One who saved me and who gives me hope and makes life worth living for.
I'm so thankful that my friend (and former boss) Jill recommended that I work there. I was able to travel to areas around Klamath that I never would have before. I learned a lot about life and death and sharing and practicing my faith. And I met so many people that I never would have met and really gotten to know working in a sterile hospital environment.
For me, Klamath will be filled, among many other things and people in our experiences there, with many memories of those who have passed into eternal life. I was struck with all the vivid memories that resurfaced in such a short drive through town.
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