Better than a Hallejuah

I cried at work today three times. Make that four.  At one point I thought I was going to have to resort to hiding in the bathroom stall for a moment to sob.  Life is hard.  Nursing is hard work but there are certain areas that are considered high loss settings and it changes you if you let it.  She is 23 and lovely and kind and full of promise and hope and she is dying.  The hole left in  her parents hearts will not close when she leaves, but their love will grow stronger.  She said it wasn't her room.  We thought she was confused but after I laid down to think about it...I remembered...it is not her room. She is going to another room.  She has already seen the room but we haven't.  She knows she is going but doesn't know how to get there or when to go but she is going and she is trying to tell us she is going to a different room.  When I worked in hospice, we saw this frequently, this getting ready to move, this leaving.  One foot in this world and one in the next and one day they walk through the door and don't return.  It is hard but also comforting if you can sit with it an talk about it and learn what the journey is like.  I hope they have sock monkeys. 

I looked at the pictures of her dead grand baby and heard the raw grief at the bottom of her heart.  It is was raw and real.  She showed me the pictures over and over.  I didn't want to see but I had to.  I had to show her he was real to me to.  That for his brief moment on earth he was a life of value.  She is scattered and looking for lost things in her room.  This what the grieving do...look for lost things....hoping to find the one they lost.  They wander in a fog and look and can't remember where the things are and then they realized they are lost.  And this breaks them.   When the lost can not be found.  And it broke me today.  The baby who didn't have a life but is captured on  his grandmother's iPhone and she looks at it everyday while getting chemo.  She said, why am I here and he isn't?  Why didn't God take me and leave him to grow?  I said, I don't know but I think it is important with God to continue the conversation and show the pictures.
And I thought of Abigail, Lily, Seanta, Trey and many names....of children and babies I have watched die....and I cried....
And then at lunch I cried again.  I remembered him.  He was 8.  He died on a Thursday night.  I had seen him Thursday afternoon and he was eating a frosty and fries from Wendy's, playing xbox.  He loved baseball.  He played third base.  He loved transformers.  He looked good. We talked about baseball and his game.  He said he was hungry.  We knew he was dying we just didn't know it was then.  But he told us too, we just didn't hear.  He said, "I am a little afraid to go home, I think I stay here for the weekend."  Kids do that.  Choose when they will die.  He knew.  He just wanted to stay in the hospital.  He was protecting his mother.  His last act of love, like Jesus, was to protect his mother.   I will never forget him.

So tonight, all my ghosts come out to visit and remind me how they were loved, how they lived and how they changed me into a better person.  It will be a sad night but I have learned to cope with them. 

It makes me a better person because I know love trumps,  life is to be savored and tasted slow, and every bite is precious and hugs are important.  It makes me better because I am not afraid of my own tears or anyone elses.  It makes me a better person because I know one day it will be otherwise for me.  One day I will be the one.