Well, Darn It.

People aren’t always sure what they should and shouldn’t ask about my hospice volunteering. It’s important to know that I’ll only share what I ethically am able to, which means no identifying information of any sort.

But here’s something I learned:

My new client is someone I would have been friends with in my regular life. The great thing is, this work allows us to bypass all the small-talk, getting-to-know you pieces of a new friendship. We get to jump right into sharing who we really are.

Then last night I realized, because of the open-heart this calling requires, I have a friend who is going to die (sooner, rather than later.) And I’m going to be a support for them on this journey. I’m honored and grateful to be able to do this.

It’s still hard.

My last client was already non-verbal by the time I joined the team, so this feels very different.

Buds sometimes laughs at me (in a loving, kind way) because of my comfort with death. As I shared some of my sorrow with him last night, he was asking if it was too much.

It’s good of him to ask, but it isn’t too much. This sacred work, it’s one of life’s hard lessons that I will not turn away from. There may come a day when it is too much, but today is not that day.