Too Many Visitors, Advice for a Hospice worker and A child's room
AUGUST 19, 2009 TAGS:
Dear Judy,
Please tell me what to do. My longtime live-in has pancreatic cancer, and he's basically not speaking to me any more.
Why? Because of his round-the-clock visitors! They come. They stay for hours. Sometimes they bring food to eat -- and end up eating it themselves (he has no appetite any more). They talk all the time, sometimes telling him their problems! And he wants more...
I try to regulate these visitors, or at least I try to cut their visits short because they're wearing him out. You can tell. He sometimes drops off to sleep in the middle of their visits, but that doesn't stop them from going on and on.
When my live-in friend, who has been my whole life for 10 years, hears what I've done, he gets really angry with me. In fact, that's the sum total of our relationship now: anger.
But what am I supposed to do? They're wearing him out!
Please help. I need someone on my side.
Claire
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Dear Claire,
I suspect what I'm about to tell you won't give you a lot of comfort. But my general rule is: Whoever is dying gets the last word. Literally and figuratively.
I think you must know by now that what your dying friend most needs at the moment is escapism and company. His friends provide that. They may annoy you with their constant presence, their irritating (to you) talk, and their narcissism. But they provide your friend with a way out of thinking about his illness.
So let it be. Pancreatic cancer means your friend doesn't have much time left. Let him spend it the way he wishes. Giving in to that will, among many other things, mean far less irritability.
And that way you will have happier memories of these last months with him.
Thank you for writing,
Judy
--
Dear Judy,
I am a hospice volunteer (novice). When I sit with some of the terminally ill, I sometimes read them the poem about a ship sailing from one shore to another shore. On the second shore there are a lot of people greeting this ship. It seems to be a source of comfort to them.
My question: Are there any other books or poems you might recommend that I could read to the terminally ill?
Thanks.
Doug
Dear Doug,
The poem about the ship sailing to a new shore is very lovely. I know it well, since reading it was part of my early hospice training too.
In almost every instance the terminally ill patients I've known prefer short bouts of literary solace. A few pages at a time, in other words. There isn't a lot of concentration when people are dying. Sometimes there's almost none.
In my experiences, a few pages from Charlotte's Web are often appreciated -- and not simply because it's often a work that harkens back to a person's youth. Its main appeal, I think, is that it's a book about an industrious life well-lived; and it's also about the salvation of a friend.
And finally, it finds resonance because it concerns a heroine -- OK, a spider, but a really smart spider -- who knows death must come, and who accepts the inevitable without much fuss.
I also had one patient who wanted to hear passages from Alice in Wonderland. And many more who prefer to hear bits from the Bible. Salvation seems to be an important part of their thoughts.
Thanks so much for writing, and keep up the good work.
Judy
--
Dear Judy,
Last month I saw you gave advice to some people who basically emptied the bedroom and closets of their child who died. This is the opposite situation.
We have really close friends who experienced years of sadness and then tragedy. Their son was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia at 14. He died at 21. That was some years ago.
To this day their whole house is a shrine to this son. His bedroom is just as it was when he was alive: stuffed with the boy's textbooks and high school papers and school knickknacks. The bed is made so that it looks like he will return home at any moment to sleep in it. The drawers and closets are filled with his coats, T-shirts and jeans. And on the desk is a picture of his one-time sweetheart.
It's very spooky.
As I mentioned, we are close. But I've never dared broach the subject of how maybe they should throw some of these things away. Or, in the case of the clothes and textbooks, maybe give them to charity.
Should we say something? I don't want to hurt them any more than they've already been hurt. But I think this is crazy.
Elaine in Toronto
Dear Elaine,
So their house is a shrine to their dead son. So what?
I agree with you that the clothes and textbooks might be put to good use if they were donated to a charity. But who are we to railroad a couple who -- as you point out yourself -- have suffered so intensely into charting a course that is not of their own choosing?
Let it go. Let it be. Sometimes the best course is to do nothing.
Thanks for writing,
Judy
Please tell me what to do. My longtime live-in has pancreatic cancer, and he's basically not speaking to me any more.
Why? Because of his round-the-clock visitors! They come. They stay for hours. Sometimes they bring food to eat -- and end up eating it themselves (he has no appetite any more). They talk all the time, sometimes telling him their problems! And he wants more...
I try to regulate these visitors, or at least I try to cut their visits short because they're wearing him out. You can tell. He sometimes drops off to sleep in the middle of their visits, but that doesn't stop them from going on and on.
When my live-in friend, who has been my whole life for 10 years, hears what I've done, he gets really angry with me. In fact, that's the sum total of our relationship now: anger.
But what am I supposed to do? They're wearing him out!
Please help. I need someone on my side.
Claire
Dear Claire,I suspect what I'm about to tell you won't give you a lot of comfort. But my general rule is: Whoever is dying gets the last word. Literally and figuratively.
I think you must know by now that what your dying friend most needs at the moment is escapism and company. His friends provide that. They may annoy you with their constant presence, their irritating (to you) talk, and their narcissism. But they provide your friend with a way out of thinking about his illness.
So let it be. Pancreatic cancer means your friend doesn't have much time left. Let him spend it the way he wishes. Giving in to that will, among many other things, mean far less irritability.
And that way you will have happier memories of these last months with him.
Thank you for writing,
Judy
--
Dear Judy,
I am a hospice volunteer (novice). When I sit with some of the terminally ill, I sometimes read them the poem about a ship sailing from one shore to another shore. On the second shore there are a lot of people greeting this ship. It seems to be a source of comfort to them.
My question: Are there any other books or poems you might recommend that I could read to the terminally ill?
Thanks.
Doug
Dear Doug,
The poem about the ship sailing to a new shore is very lovely. I know it well, since reading it was part of my early hospice training too.
In almost every instance the terminally ill patients I've known prefer short bouts of literary solace. A few pages at a time, in other words. There isn't a lot of concentration when people are dying. Sometimes there's almost none.
In my experiences, a few pages from Charlotte's Web are often appreciated -- and not simply because it's often a work that harkens back to a person's youth. Its main appeal, I think, is that it's a book about an industrious life well-lived; and it's also about the salvation of a friend.
And finally, it finds resonance because it concerns a heroine -- OK, a spider, but a really smart spider -- who knows death must come, and who accepts the inevitable without much fuss.
I also had one patient who wanted to hear passages from Alice in Wonderland. And many more who prefer to hear bits from the Bible. Salvation seems to be an important part of their thoughts.
Thanks so much for writing, and keep up the good work.
Judy
--
Dear Judy,
Last month I saw you gave advice to some people who basically emptied the bedroom and closets of their child who died. This is the opposite situation.
We have really close friends who experienced years of sadness and then tragedy. Their son was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia at 14. He died at 21. That was some years ago.
To this day their whole house is a shrine to this son. His bedroom is just as it was when he was alive: stuffed with the boy's textbooks and high school papers and school knickknacks. The bed is made so that it looks like he will return home at any moment to sleep in it. The drawers and closets are filled with his coats, T-shirts and jeans. And on the desk is a picture of his one-time sweetheart.
It's very spooky.
As I mentioned, we are close. But I've never dared broach the subject of how maybe they should throw some of these things away. Or, in the case of the clothes and textbooks, maybe give them to charity.
Should we say something? I don't want to hurt them any more than they've already been hurt. But I think this is crazy.
Elaine in Toronto
Dear Elaine,
So their house is a shrine to their dead son. So what?
I agree with you that the clothes and textbooks might be put to good use if they were donated to a charity. But who are we to railroad a couple who -- as you point out yourself -- have suffered so intensely into charting a course that is not of their own choosing?
Let it go. Let it be. Sometimes the best course is to do nothing.
Thanks for writing,
Judy
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