hospice nurses gain an insight into death and the opportunity to witness the signs

of a life beyond our own.

I had one gentleman three months after I started working in hospice I thought I can't

do this anymore this is just

too much. I'm gonna get burned out or it's just too stressful.

So just as I was really trying to debate whether I was going to leave this field or

not

I had an experienced that just kind of blew me away

One of the LPN's came up to me and said

"Mr so-and-so just died" and so

I took that information and we said alright, we'll call a physician and call the coroner and

get all the information that we need and I was walking down the hall making bed checks

to ensure that everybody was okay

and this one old fellow was climbing out of bed and he was really out of pain control

and I was thinking we need to get him settled down

and I walked into the room and I said

"Let me help you get taken care of." and he said, "I gotta get outta here!" and I said,

" I understand." and he "I have to die." and I said "You know I would probably want to die too if I

had that much pain

and let me help you, let me see what we can do." He said "No you don't understand" He said

"I have to die." and I said well

I don't even know where it came I said, "Well you have to wait to get your own invitation

sometimes just because we want to die it doesn't mean we get to die. We have to

wait until

tell it's time." "Well that guy down there

just got his invitation." "he said "I knew him from Lyman

and I said, "What do you mean?" and he said, " well he just shuffled by here!"

and the hair on the back of my neck stood up and

I thought that was a curious term "Shuffled by"

and he said.

"I want you to go get my son." he said "I knew him, I knew him from one Lymon when we were kids." and he said,

"And he just shuffled by" and he

points from his door to the window and how he went across in front of his bed and I thought boy

there's a lot I don't know yet!

I had a kid that I lost last week who saw horses

but he saw a horse and his dream

was about two weeks before he died he was on this big brown horse

and they were going through this field and it was very smooth

it wasn't like a gallop but they were flying

and he said that all of a sudden they kinda jumped over

a barrier and when they landed they landed in a riverbank that had overflowed

its beds

and it stopped the horse stopped and turned sideways waiting for

this kid tell him which way to go. Whether to go into the woods or out of the woods

and I asked him which way he chose and he said we went out

and I said, "What do you think would of happened if you'd of gone into the woods?" He said, "I think I'd

be gone."

and I told him I thought he would too and I told him that that horse would

probably come back for him when it was time for him to go

that horse would be the one to come back. Well that afternoon

his mom was washing dishes and

the horse came and she went to talk to him

and she asked David if this horse was there and he said "Yes."

and she said I think he's probably here to get you

and she said I think so too and within two hours

he had gone he died on his horse. You feel a presence,

you feel something is in the room, you know there's something there.

One time there was this man and

he was really really close to death and

he was very very weak and and he looked up and he was looking at something and he

looked very very scared

and the nurse said to him "It's okay

they're there to help you. They won't hurt you."

and he put his hand up and he had his hand up like somebody was holding it and he did

this for a few minutes

and there is no way this man had the strength

to hold his hand up by himself and he died just a few minutes later too.

So, there's something. I had one really neat fellow

that we were taking to the hospice unit

and he was really close to dying and his

son was nearby.

This poor guy went through an incredible bath from the nurse

and he didn't move at all he didn't blink and eye so we would say he was an

unresponsive

and as we were walking down the hall pushing his bed down the hall he opened his

eyes and

he looked straight up and his little toothless mouth and he went ( Excited Smile )

and waved and

just smiled and closed his eyes and 5 minutes later he was gone.

I don't know who he was waving at but that's not uncommon.

As death approaches patients may have visions of angels or see tunnels of

white light.

Other people receive angelic comfort from someone they already know.

Patients who are closer to their dying time will see those who have already died

often times. They'll talk about their dead grandparents sitting at their bed side

brothers who have died before.

I'm not so certain that we just see spirits running around I don't really

believe that and

I've never heard anything that scary but I have heard of a lot of patience

who are very afraid of dying talk about seeing a father in law in the kitchen

and that would scare me out of my mind but they're not afraid

and it really made me realize about how they

are just sort of drifting to the other side they have one foot here in one foot

somewhere else

and a patient who is very frightened will tell you that and yet for some reason it doesn't

bother them.

That would bother me. Mary was a 52-year-old woman.

She had Lou Gehrig's Disease and

it was getting pretty bad she was pretty close to death and the

muscles in her throat were closing up they weren't working very well and

she had a fear that she was going to drown which was essentially

a real possibility for her and one of her last wishes was

that her mother not be told. Her mother was 90 years old and her mother

liked to be called Grandma Rose and she just said this is too hard for mother to

go through

to watch a child die and especially the way I am dying. I don't want my mother to know.

Now the family was in conflict with this but it was her last wish so

what could they do and then

the story as Grandma Rose tells me is

she lived in Texas and one night she went to bed.

She was getting into bed and she saw her husband standing there

and her husband had been dead for twenty years

but she says that he was as real to

her as I am to you and he said

"Rose, I've come to take Mary home." and at that point Grandma Rose just started to

scream and said no no please

let me go back and hold my baby one more time

don't take her until I've gone and I've held her and I've said goodbye

and I've kissed her please don't do that!" and so he just kinda smiled

and faded away and she knew at that point

that he would allow that. So she got on the next plane,

she came to Denver and

for three days she stayed with her daughter and she told her stories and she

combed her hair

and she gave her a bath and she was holding her daughter

when she died and I was there and she just looked at me and she said, You know

I brought her into the world and it's only right that I'm with her when she goes out."

and that would have never happened if Mary's husband wouldn't of come

to her and told her that he was taking her home. Like one person said to me

Well, it's easy for you to say it's going to be peaceful you're not going to die.

and I said, you know you're right. All I know is what I see

and all I know is that somewhere along the line

you're not going to be afraid anymore. Somewhere in those last hours

it's going to go away and somebody will throw you a lifeline .

It will be okay.

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