I saw a dead body today (Original Post 1/15/08)

I’ve been volunteering with Alive Hospice at St. Thomas Hospital for the past few months, so I’m not sure why this came as such a shock to me. That is, after all, where people go to die.
But when I stopped by on my lunch break today just to make up for a missed visit the night before and get my mind off of the intricacies of work, I guess I just wasn’t expecting it.

Her name was Hattie. The nurse said, “Oh sure, I have something you can do, this poor woman has been suffering terribly all morning. You could just sit with her.” But when we walked in, she wasn’t suffering anymore. She was still, with her mouth gaping and her eyes barely open, her arms gently folded across her midsection. The nurse, being much more experienced than me in these matters, began to talk and sing to Hattie. “Oh sweetie you’ve gone and left me haven’t you? You’ve gone to be with the Lord.” She instantly began stroking her head and singing “the Lord bless you and keep you…”, into her ear, and it was obvious that she wasn’t doing it for Hattie, since clearly Hattie didn’t need any more songs or human touch. She was doing it because she had tried to keep that woman comfortable all morning, and she had grown to care about her.

I wanted to touch Hattie, to pat her shoulder or her arm as to say “good job girl, you made it.” But I couldn’t bring myself to do it, since logically, she wouldn’t feel it anyway. I was halfway waiting for her to begin breathing again and ask for a cup of water. I pictured Hattie as a newborn, and then as a feisty teenager with her first love, and having babies, and doing laundry. And I thought about her son, who the nurse told me had lived with her for 42 years. He was sleeping still from working the night shift, and the nurse would have to go ahead and call him now.

As I left the room, I sensed that I had just been part of a very big moment. Although only a few people would be notified of Hattie’s death, and probably only a few would care, I felt as though I had been let in to the most important moment in her life- moving on into the next one.
It’s intimate, and I almost felt guilty that she didn’t even know me and would not have wanted me to be in the room. I felt like I had exposed her. But I also realized that Hattie, that dead woman in the hospital bed, had touched my life forever, and she didn’t even know it. I became a part of her story, and she most certainly became a part of mine.