Simply a Quiet Thought

-

You don't have to look far to see hundreds of thousands of people who have had to deal with very bad news. The Susan G. Komen Walk for Breast Cancer as shown by Rudee for instance.

Being around people who have been delivered bad news is not new to me. I was talking with my patient, Ms. M., this weekend. She was supposed to have been in the middle of a cross-country road trip with her husband, destination northern California. Instead, she was lying in a hospital bed, paraplegic after falling from her horse. I was asking about how her family was handling all this and I asked about her horses-who was caring for them?

Her horse's name is Ephraim. "I was going to change it, but after a while it grew on me and seemed to fit him. He's a sweet, sweet boy. So gentle. Goofy. A big galumph."
I said that I bet he missed her.

"My daughter went down to the barn the next morning to feed him. When she got there he just lowered his head and buried it in her chest." My patient and I were quiet for a moment, and we wept.

Comments

  1. RudeeSeptember 29, 2008 at 7:13 PM

    My patients have all been delivered bad and sad news. Once in a blue moon, I bond with a patient or family and truly identify just as it seems you did with your patient. Sometimes, it can be so hard to be a caregiver.

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownSeptember 29, 2008 at 8:16 PM

    I don't bring it home nearly as often as I did as a young RN, but somedays I still do. The visual of this horse burying his face with the daughter and knowing how sad he must feel breaks my heart. Seems to epitomize the whole situation. I know that you know how I feel and I thank you for your comment.

    ReplyDelete
  3. LydiaSeptember 30, 2008 at 1:51 AM

    How terribly sad and beautiful this story. I'm feeling more than I can write. What despair held in the moment of horse's head against daughter's chest. Heartbreaking. I hope they will consider keeping the horse and wonder if therapy couldn't include him in some way...
    This broke my heart but I'm grateful you shared this.

    ReplyDelete
  4. UnknownSeptember 30, 2008 at 6:12 PM

    They're keeping the horse. I told her about hippotherapy--that will be up to rehab to get together--she'll need some work first to be able to sit up straight and the blood pressure is affected due to her injuries. It will be a long process.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousSeptember 30, 2008 at 6:49 PM

    Made me cry too, how beautiful and sad. Sending her and her family, and the dear horse much love.

    ReplyDelete
  6. SanOctober 1, 2008 at 7:38 PM

    Such a moving story. You must be a blessing to the patients you care for.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Hey, thanks for your thoughts and your time:>)

Popular posts from this blog

10 Things I Love That Start With the Letter E

-
Image
Game imported from Sweet Annie at Blissful Bohemian . Name ten things you love that begin with a specific letter. In my case, the letter E. So here goes: 1. Well, first of all there's elephants . Who doesn't love those cute little faces?? And what's not to love? Elephants are actually a lot like humans. They laugh and cry. They grieve over their dead. They play games with each other and have fantastic memories so they can even remember the rules and not go to bed mad. 2. Then there's Engelbert Humperdinck, who I don't actually love and his singing's just on this side of okay, but I do love his name. 3. I luuuuuuv eggs , deviled. Nothing fancy, just classic. Best Basic Deviled Eggs 6 eggs, hard cooked and peeled 1/4 cup mayonnaise 1 teaspoon yellow mustard 3/4 teaspoon white wine vinegar pinch of salt (optional) fresh ground black pepper (optional) smoked paprika (optional) Cut eggs in half. Arrange egg whites cut side up on a serving plate and put the yolks ...
Read more

The Poet Goes to Indiana by Mary Oliver

-
Image
I'll tell you a half-dozen things that happened to me in Indiana when I went that far west to teach. You tell me if it was worth it. I lived in the country with my dog— part of the bargain of coming. And there was a pond with fish from, I think, China. I felt them sometimes against my feet. Also, they crept out of the pond, along its edges, to eat the grass. I'm not lying. And I saw coyotes, two of them, at dawn, running over the seemingly unenclosed fields. And once a deer, but a buck, thick-necked, leaped into the road just-oh, I mean just, in front of my car— and we both made it home safe. And once the blacksmith came to care for the four horses, or the three horses that belonged to the owner of the house, and I bargained with him, if I could catch the fourth, he, too, would have hooves trimmed for the Indiana winter, and apples did it, and a rope over the neck did it, so I won something wonderful; and there was, one morning, an owl flying, oh pale angel, into the hay loft o...
Read more

A Year with EB White

-
Image
"You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing. I wove my webs for you because I liked you. After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that."----- from Charlotte's Web I am a soul always drawn and fascinated by the idea of " A Year of...". A Year of Rumi. A Year of Calvin and Hobbes. A year cooking with Julia Child. A project that provides guidance for the year and a ruler we can measure inward growth in the course of our circle around the sun. One year, after an early marriage and an unsurprising--except to me--early divorce, I came across a book by Sue Hubbell titled A Country Year. I didn't plan for it to take a year to read, but it did. I only read it at night before I went t...
Read more