Take Me To Post Comment Form Although hospice care became a Medicare entitlement in the early 1980s, Statesboro and the surrounding counties had no access to hospice care until 1994 when Ogeechee Area Hospice was established. In the mid 1980s, in practice as a home health nurse, I was acutely aware that nurses were entrapped, primarily by social factors, to maintain a mutual pretense with patients and families for as long as possible; all denying the outcome of the person’s disease. Often, individuals with terminal illness had multiple emergency room visits before they were finally hospitalized as signs and symptoms of death approached. As a matter of fact, death at home elicited a coroner’s inquest.

Recently, on an ordinary day and in an ordinary way, while at a local department store, I went back to such a time and looked into the eyes, once again, of an extraordinary young woman. The store clerk looked familiar to me as she rang up my small purchase. She then looked up at me and smiled, “You don’t remember me do you? "I’m Linda, Mrs. C’s daughter." We made eye contact. I immediately recognized that they were the same eyes of a vulnerable and courageous person that I had known over two decades ago.

Linda was 21 when her mother became quite ill with cancer. Multiple therapies had not been successful. The first visit I made to their home Mrs. C. explained to me that she wanted no more hospitalizations. She knew her fate and wanted to die in the small and peaceful house that she and her daughter shared together. She wanted to stay home. I was determined to help them succeed, yet I was concerned about the physical and emotional toll that such a task might have on Linda, a person so young and vulnerable. However Linda was adamant that she could care for her mother at home and I saw, deep in her eyes, her determination to honor her mother’s wishes. “Permission was obtained from the coroner. We had no hospice social workers, chaplains or volunteers. Therefore, over the next few weeks I visited many times as I tried my best to give guidance and support to both by visiting often and making myself available for late night calls. Ms. C’s young daughter, barely an adult, kept vigil day and night as her mother’s condition declined. And just as planned, her young and loving daughter was at her side the night she died.

So on that recent ordinary day I was suddenly taken from a relatively meaningless task to a much deeper and meaningful place. I felt privileged to see Linda again, so many years later. I was now able to look into her deep blue eyes and tell her that she was a powerful inspiration in bringing hospice care to our community so that others might have the opportunity to make the same courageous choice that she and her mother made together. What I didn’t tell her was that over these years the memory of being with her in a dim lit, quiet room and watching her, so tenderly, placing cool cloths on her mother’s forehead would come to my mind, seemingly out of nowhere.

Ogeechee Area Hospice, a non-profit agency with the sole mission of providing quality end of life care, will soon mark fifteen years of service. And just like Mrs. C, home is still where most people choose to stay. However, instead of one lone nurse, patients and families can have the full benefit of skilled and dedicated hospice nurses, social workers, chaplains and volunteers. The financial burden of needed medications and home medical equipment can be lifted. Most recently, through exceptional community support and a dedicated Board we are now fortunate to have a home-like alternative setting when needed, the Ogeechee Area Hospice Inpatient Center. Keeping the wheels of hospice care turning day and night is an incredible team effort. What keeps members of the hospice team going? What inspires them and why do they possess relentless enthusiasm and dedication? I know. It is their private and powerful memories of their own “Lindas".