My Dear Barbra

Barbra was one of my first patients when I started nursing in general medicine. Most of my patients needed assistance with everything and the day was really busy. Barbra was there for a quick visit. When I went in to check on her, not only was she doing fine, but she was sitting at the edge of the bed beading the most intricate jewelry I may have ever seen. She showed me her Etsy page, I messaged her days later after she was discharged, and the rest is history. I got to see her about once a month in St Louis. She always had food to give to me, new pieces of art to show me, and animals friends to love on me. She lit up if I brought her Starbucks. She later moved to L.A. to be with her daughter and granddaughter. In 2017, I got to visit her in L.A. She drove me all around the city in her zippy little Prius, fearless, while I was white-knuckled the whole drive. I was welcomed into her most loving of families. It felt like a bonus home. In 2019, she drove all day to see me while I was at a conference in Anaheim. We had dinner together and got to catch up on life. She recently decided to go on hospice after a long time of constant hospitalizations. I drove down to L.A. and got to spend a couple nights with her. Again, she and her family let me in like I'd lived there forever. It was so hard to see her, and also beautiful, and calm, and tiring, and heavy, and all of the things. It made me question my capacity to handle my upcoming job as a hospice nurse. It also made me so grateful for the perspective and reminder: we will all die. Life is beautiful and I don't want to waste any of it. I want to surround myself with love like Barbra did. I'm so grateful that I had the chance to be around her during her time of transition. I'm grateful that we had time to talk and be together and watch a really terrible dog training show that she kept on all the time because I thought the host was handsome. I'm grateful to her family for sharing her with me. Barbra died last week. I'll miss her lots, but I still hold out hope that she will stop by in my dreams.