Don't X my number

Hello!



Today I will touch a rather sad event that people that work with the clinically ill have to face once in a while.



Yesterday I had a worker from the CLSC come over and give me a bath. Don't be surprised, just like you take showers every day I also have baths provided by the CLSC. Back to the point, so yesterday I had somebody come over and I noticed a change in his attitude. I asked him what was wrong, at the beginning he was hesitant. But as I kept on insisting, he divulged the reason of his melancholy.

A patient of his, only 20 years old, had passed away last week. This person was suffering from cerebral palsy. The worker had been taking care of him for the last five years. Apparently last Friday this person was going to start eating with his mouth; he had been fed through a tube for the last five years. Last week the worker got to this persons place and the father of this person came and greet the worker and informed him that his son had passed away. The stress of trying something new, in this case eating food through his mouth, was too much and the person had a heart attack.

Then I recalled a story of when I first started to get this type of help. I had a person come over and give me a bath when I remember he took a black book. This book was full of phone numbers and names and some of them had been crossed over with an X. I asked him if these were patients that had been taken away from his list. He gave me somber look and told me that these were patients that had passed away at some point.

Like all of you, I also have a tendency to forget the feelings of the person opposite to me. I take them for granted. I am nice with these people, but I will often ignore what they are talking to me about. It's like in my head I will just be going "yes, yes, yes... No, no, no..." Without caring what they are actually saying. I think I am a very impersonal person, I think I do this to protect myself but I am somehow hurting the other person.

Well starting next bath I promised to be more attentive to the other person's feelings. I will start to listen to what they have to say. I will do this so that when they X me they will have a good memory of me.