Harbor Pilots

Hey, I think I started the live stream. Hello, Cadre. My name is Kathy. My. My Cadre handle is Speak Wonder. And my topic is harbor pilots. The way that we come alongside each other in the harbor and steer one another into safe mooring at the dock. As we tend to our loved ones, particularly on this caregiver day, we have all kinds of caregiving. Mine is my aging Mama, who's 93. She will be 94 in May. Hi, Anna. So this is a vulnerable live stream, and this is fresh from the edge of death. My mom has rallied, and she's going to be okay.

But it's been a tough, tough five days in the hospital. I'm now back at home in Erie, Pennsylvania, on the lakeshore of Lake Erie. And I've learned a few things, and I wasn't going to share this because it's so close to me emotionally. And yet because it's close to me emotionally, I think it is vital to share it with you because I'm fresh from a vigil, something I thought was end of life, and it turned out not to be. And in the midst of everything, while being with mom in the hospital, while she was struggling so hard, some insightful moments came and some important conversations were had between herself and me.

And also in the midst of that, I ran across a young man online. His first name is Justin, and I can get the information for you. I just know he's a young father named Justin, and he has a presence on Instagram. And reach out to me if you'd like to know more about Justin. He's. He's just got some fabulous parenting tips. He has four young boys, and he and his wife do something called a bedtime liturgy. And I was interested. As a grandmother, I thought, that's pretty cool. This bedtime liturgy or prayer over his four young boys.

I'll read it to you and I'll tell you why it's important to me, not just for beginning of life, but for end of life. It goes like this. Lord, bless their feet. May they carry good news. Bless their legs to go on in times of trouble. Bless their backs. May they be strong enough to bear the burdens of others. Bless their arms to hold the lonely and their hands to do good work. Bless their neck, which you turn their heads to the poor. Bless their ears to discern truth, their mouth to speak encouragement, and their eyes to see beauty.

Bless their minds, may they grow wise in the knowledge of you. And above all, bless their heart, may they come to love you and all that you've made. In the right order, our bodies were fashioned to carry us through life. And this blessing of the different vital parts of the body is so sacred, I got thinking, why not bless the body as it's shutting down? And so I did. I prayed a prayer. I adapted it to my mom. And she has been sharing with me lately that she can no longer stay housed in her body.

I said, what do you mean? She said, well, my body is no longer friendly to me. Everything is breaking down. I've had this terrible infection and nothing's working. And I'm in constant pain and I can't stay in this earthly shell anymore. I'm looking forward to my glorified body. So I read this prayer to her. I'm going to commit it to memory, and I think she'll want to hear it every night, whether I'm with her in person and can touch her precious limbs or on the phone. And it basically the same one, but.

Bedtime liturgy. Bedtime liturgy for my mom, June. Lord, bless her feet, they have carried good news. Bless her legs, they've gone on in times of trouble. Bless her back, she has been strong enough to bear the burdens of others. Bless her arms, she has held the lonely. Bless her hands, they have done good work. And her neck, which you often turned her head to the poor and needy ones. Bless her ears, she discerns truth and shares it with her children. Bless her mouth, she speaks encouragement. And her eyes, she sees beauty.

Bless her mind, it has grown wise in the knowledge of you. And above all, bless her heart, she's come to love you and all that you have made in the right order, a blessing over the physical body of your loved one at end of life. You guys, I think I'd make a h*** of a doula. A death doula. Have you heard of such a thing? I've heard of a birth doula and a death doula is fearless in the face of death because it's a sacred moment. It is not something to fear. Mom has taught me that. She has informed me that it is not something to fear.

And so it feels as though we had a dress rehearsal for end of life. Why do I say that? Because the nurses were bringing me swabs to dip in water and swab my mother's mouth. Hospice does that for people who can't swallow, but they need some kind of refreshment or hydration. Hospice does that. But she's not on hospice. She was unresponsive. I said to the hospitalist, jule says, we've got you. Lean on the community. This is, this is tough stuff, you guys. I said to the hospitalist, I'm just going to say the doctor, the person on duty when people are in the hospital.

By the way, he's really good looking. His name is Dr. Bernardo. I loved it when he came in the room. Nice looking man. He said, you know your mom is unresponsive. This was in the early days. She's now talking and sitting up and everything she has rallied. He said, your mom's unresponsive but all her vitals are good. I said, how can those two things coexist? She's not responding, but her vitals are good. He said, because she's using every molecule in her body to fight this infection and it renders her unable to communicate with us.

And that's how the body's designed to fight illness, pain, infection. Sometimes it shuts down cognitively and I found that very interesting and very reassuring. After three days of her five day stay, she began talking and accepting nourishment through her mouth. Prior to that it was through an iv. She had a UTI for the unschooled in this arena. It's a urinary tract infection. It hits hard with the elderly. Hits hard. It was raging through her, causing cognitive decline, temporary and also just break with reality and hallucinations.

It's so weird how it can hinder the intellectual parts of the person as much as physical. As mom became more aware and saw me and wanted hugs and affection, which I freely gave, we began talking. We revisited her end of life directives. She has a dnr. We made sure that's still good. She still wants no unnecessary interventions. We talked about her funeral and the music that she liked to have. And it wasn't scary. She asked me if I could be there when she lets go. I said, you know, God willing, I'd love to be with you.

I'd love to be with you. She said, does that make you afraid? I said, no. It's a holy hush. A holy hush. It's a transition from one reality to the next and I'm good with it. I can be with you. Lord willing. We may have her for a handful of days, for some months or a couple of years. This is an unknown. But mom and I, her name is June. We were given the gift of having very important, difficult conversations that turned out to be very meaningful life giving conversations about end of life. She is back in the nursing home.

She's with her sweet roommate Pat. And there have been some changes. She is definitely an assist for eating that's hard to watch. It's a dignity thing when people no longer can feed themselves. However, they're trying to get her strength back so she can do that. She's in a more adaptive wheelchair now, and I think these things are probably temporary until her strength returns, her core strength so that she can sit up and so on. I invite you to not be afraid of end of life. It is a topic we often avoid and when we're ready to talk about it, sometimes the words are unavailable because the emotions are too big.

And I do feel like we were given a gift of time and space to talk about how things are going to look at the beginning of mom's next life. So thank you for letting me share my heart. Thank you for joining me on this live stream. If you'd like this bedtime liturgy, I'll make sure you get it. I might post it anyway in the community chat and I think you are fabulous. I am also doing something that I normally wouldn't do. I tend to push myself. I think caregivers do that. We push ourselves to the edge and only then do we come up for air.

I'm going to honor my body today by resting. I've had two invitations to lunch now that I'm back in town from the hospital and somebody wanted to see a movie this afternoon and I declined. Now I'm a social person and I love connection, but I am feeling a great need to draw back to stay under my afghan. This is a handmade, my favorite colors and I'll probably watch some TV and cuddle with my corgi, eat something and stay in. It's a beautiful day, although very cold and eerie. We're above freezing now and blue skies and sunshine and I'm going to enjoy it from the inside of my apartment.

There are birds that make feeder and it's a fine day to stay inside and it's okay not to be a social butterfly today. So thankful mom is back but very aware of the tenderness of end of life and the fragility of all of us and the need to have these big conversations. What a gift. No? Now I know what she wants and how to tie up all the ribbons when the time comes. So this afternoon we have on deck. Hello, I wrote it down. Rob Gorski, autism Dad at noon, at least my time, noon. And at three, Shannon Paul comedy through the chaos.

At any time you can do replay. You can go in and look at the videos and the community stream has been a wonderful resource as well. Cadre is my people, my tribe and you all are wonderful. Thanks for joining me.