Something to Think About

a blog on end of life

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About the BK Team
I Believe Hospice is About Healing, Building Trust and Educating

All the hours of talking, drinking coffee, and eating homemade pies was time spent healing, building trust, and educating. It wasn’t about blood pressures. It was about people, feelings, and...

Caregivers Carry The Burden

My hope in writing this blog is to draw our attention to the “unsung heroes” caring for their special person as end of life approaches, as well as to those caring...

Don’t Let A Special Opportunity Get Lost

I believe everyone has the right to be told once that they can’t be fixed. It is the physician’s job to compassionately and honestly give that information...  

Enter The World of the Person With Dementia

I had someone ask me "Why do all people with dementia feel someone is out to get them?" My answer—not all people with dementia feel or react like someone is...

Dying Is Not Pretty

People don’t die like they do in the movies. Mom is not going not going to say some profound words, close her eyes and be dead...

Restoring Heart to Hospice: Crafting a Compassionate Orientation

Taking care of someone who is at the end of life is different from taking care of someone who is going to get better, BUT most people don’t know this—-including...

Grieving is Loneliness and Aloneness

I think a big part of grieving is loneliness. Loneliness for our person who has left us but also aloneness in our day to day activities...

How Are You Spending This Gift of Life?

The space between birth and death is the most important part of life YET we somehow go through the living part unaware. In a hurry, with a great deal of tension, and very little...

Denial of a Life Limiting Illness

Denial by the person with a life threatening illness, denial by the caregiver, and I’ll even add denial by some attending physicians. Denial is often the reaction to diseases that have...

Establishing a Bond- The Admission Visit

How do we get beyond the social conventions of strangers meeting and getting to know and trust each other in a very short time? From the time we ring the...

Do I Need a POLST and an Advance Directive?

From the time we turn 18 until our last breath, we should have an advance directive in place. Once a person turns 18, parents have no legal standing. Most physicians...

Caregivers Need Knowledgeable Guidance

...That caregivers put so much energy, time, love, and concern into taking care of their person that they can become blind to or just plain don’t want to see the...

Conversations and Cake: Death Cafes Around the World

I see Death Cafes as the start of a conversation; the start of opening ourselves up to exploring end of life issues; the start of breaking the belief that if I talk...

All The Ways We Have For Saying Our Final Goodbyes

We used to have grandma’s body “laid out” in the parlor and family and friends came to our home with support and food. Grandma died in the home and we...

Using Palliative Sedation At End of Life

When the terminal illness, the disease progression, has been a pain filled experience and all comfort management options have been unsuccessful, then sleep is our friend...

Always Offer, Never Force: Food At End of Life

My husband Jack  has been dead eight months. In processing the five months from his diagnosis to his death, what stands out most for me is the tension that surrounded food....

How Do You Train Your Hospice Volunteers?

I am hearing stories about the lack of professional staff training for new hires, which led me to wonder about volunteer training...

Keep No Secrets From Those at End of Life

When working with families who ask me not to tell mom, I say that I won’t bring the subject up, but if she asks, I will talk about it.

“I’m fine” The Universal Response From Grievers

What do I, the sufferer, want from you then, if “how are you?” doesn’t work?

None of Us Really Knows When Death Will Come

By not writing out our end of life wishes, organizing our material affairs, and talking to those involved, we are putting ourselves and those close to us in the hands, minds, and...

The Maps We Need to Care For the Dying

Because of knowledge we’ve lost when people began dying in places other than home, we judge approaching death by the treatments and procedures used in getting people better...

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