On Tuesday morning I was paged to go to the hospital. A teenage girl had hung herself. She had been found by her father and mother.
When I got there, the medical team were just pronouncing the death. The nurses got busy tidying the room and putting the emergency resuscitation equipment away. There was complete silence in the room as I knocked and stepped in.
I asked everyone to take a moment to honor the life of this young woman and to appreciate the work they had done to save her. Stopping at moments like these gives a little space to ground and center and acknowledge a really difficult experience.
Doctors are the ones who confer medical information, and sometimes news of death is the sad message they must deliver. The doctor asked me to accompany her into the room when she gave the death notification.
I arrived in advance of the doctor. Family members were anxious and tearful, having just arrived in the waiting room. They asked me how she was. I just said that the doctor would be with them momentarily to discuss her condition. I hoped that the scarcity of information had somehow given them a little preparation for what they were about to hear.
As she entered the room, the doctor introduced herself amidst the questions, “How is she doing?” “Did she make it?” “Is she going to be okay?”
The only thing the doctor said was, “I’m sorry, we did all we could.” Immediately, the room erupted into wails and screams. I realized they probably had fearfully anticipated this moment for over an hour.
Part of chaplaincy training is an exercise requiring us to step back and imagine ourselves as a person in one of the corners of the room, standing at about ceiling height and watching the goings-on. From the upper corner of the room, everything seemed to move in slow motion. I realized that I, too, was in shock.
I saw myself move toward the family, arms outstretched in a message of shelter and containment. What I was doing came of of instinct plus training, and I was surprised that I hadn’t thought about doing it before I did. (I wondered, who was I sheltering them from? Maybe unconsciously I wanted to signal the staff in the room to stay back and allow this family to process this horrible news in their own way.)
I heard several family members begging God, questioning God, blaming God, so I reckoned they were believers. Things quieted even more as I asked if I could read a Psalm from the Bible:
“The Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want
He makes me lie down in green pastures
He leads me beside still waters...
Yea, though I walk through the valley
of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil
For Thou art with me..."
(Psalm 23, Verses 1-2 and 4)
The girl's father began to mouth the words, grasping and following one tiny familiar phrase through this vast wilderness. He held himself and rocked and found solace in the rhythm of the motion and words.
The next hours were filled with consolations from family, friends, medical staff and me. I saw the family whiplash between shock, anger, denial, negotiating, and acceptance. I listened to the story of a young woman tormented by other kids at school. I heard about a school system whose employees offered little help to frustrated but loving parents. I sat with a weeping nurse who lost a son to suicide many years ago.
We are not promised even the next moment of life. More and more, I’m realizing that fact as I grow into these chaplain clothes. I’m becoming more generous and kind to people.
And I call my family at strange hours just to hear their voices and to say, "You’re wonderful! I love you!"
