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Dr. Patwant Kaur: She Gives Succour To The Dying

by GURMEET KAUR

 

 

The following story of an indefatigable and inspiring woman is offered to you today in commemoration of The International Women's Day - March 8.

 

 

Hospice: a program that provides palliative care and attends to the emotional and spiritual needs of terminally ill patients at an inpatient facility or at the patient's home. [Dictionary]

 

Katherine was in her eighties.

Dr. Patwant Kaur would see her lying on her bed, come in and out of consciousness, not unlike many other patients around her.

But there was something different about Katherine.

Day after day she would lay there alone. Not a visitor, ever. She did not have any family. Except for a niece who lived on the other side of the country. And there was a friend who was too old to visit all the way from another city.

Patwant approached her one day and offered to be her Hospice visitor.

“Would you? Would you? Would you, really ?” is all Katherine could say. She had succumbed to the fact that she was destined to die in loneliness. Her self esteem was low - she did not think she was worth anything to anybody in life or in death.

Fortunately, she was wrong. The hospice facility availed her of an angel’s arms, as Katherine was transitioning from this life to the other. To hold her hand; to listen to all things that were unsaid; to relieve her of fears. To help her make amends and, most importantly, make her feel that her life was worthwhile. 

Most of the time Patwant visited her, she was unconscious. When she was not - she was barely coherent. But each time Patwant took Katherine’s hands into hers for a meditation - Patwant knew that there were the three of them there: Katherine, herself ... and the Divine. She knew also that Katherine felt the same way even though she could not communicate.

Katherine passed on in peace.

And that’s why Patwant Kaur volunteers her time and love for the hospice patients.

“It’s the closest experience to being with God. To help someone prepare for the final journey. To let them die in peacefulness, in comfort and with honor.“

Her work is so true to her name - Patwant literally means “keeper of honor” in Gurmukhi.

[Patwant Kaur is the spiritual name of Dr. Mary Jane Nations, a long time resident of Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A., a lifelong educator and for the last decade-and-a-half, a practicing Sikh.]

She hadn’t thought about it until she lost her own parents. 

Her mother was terminally sick. Patwant knew from knowing her well that she would have wanted to spend her last days in peace in the warmth of her own home and not in a cold hospital room, plugged to all kinds of invasive equipment.

But her mother had not prepared a "living will” and even though the doctors had clearly identified her days as the last few ones, Patwant’s father was in denial. He kept thinking that somehow his wife would cheat death one more time. 

She died in agony that week.

“My mother was denied the manner of death she envisioned and prepared for. If only my father could have let her go that way …”

A few years later, when her father was dying of cancer, during his final days, the family convinced him that a hospice would allow them to care for him at his own home - where he had always wanted to be when he died. 

“Hospice is sometimes needed even for ones that are loved and cared for - not just the ones who don’t have anyone. The families may be far away, busy making ends meet or just overwhelmed and in need of a respite from caring for someone 24/7,” she says.

Patwant noticed the difference in the quality of the last days of her father and got herself educated on the concept and the institution of Hospice.

It is rather a new concept in North America, where not unlike the rest of the world, it has faced resistance because of many factors, such as  reservations against open communication about death, discomfort with non-conventional medical techniques, and finally, callousness towards the terminally ill.

Nevertheless, the movement has spread throughout the world in the last few decades. 

The first hospices are believed to have originated in the 11th century in Europe. They flourished in the middle ages but weakened on account of the vagaries of religious orders. They were revived in France in the 17th century.

Modern day popularity of the hospice attributes itself to the activism of a British nurse who later became a physician in the pursuit of a cause to help the terminally ill. Dr. Cicely Saunders, whose chronic health problems had forced her to pursue a career in this field, realized - while working with a dying Polish refugee - that terminally ill patients needed compassionate care to help address pain; physical, mental and spiritual.

Dr. Saunders advocated and disseminated her philosophy internationally that eventually led to the establishment of the first organization in the United States, Hospice, Inc. in 1971.

Today, in North America alone, close to 2 million individuals who have been given six months or less to live receive hospice care each year.

Hospice is a “Medicare” and a “Medicaid” benefit in the U.S.A. (and covered by some private insurance companies) and includes medical equipment, medications and twenty-four hour/seven day a week access to care. It also includes support for loved ones following a death. Care is available to people in homes or home-like hospice residences, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, veterans' facilities, hospitals and prisons.

Soon after she said good bye to her father, Patwant’s journey of volunteering began.

She started with a Catholic facility in Atlanta called “Our Lady of Perpetual Help” which housed several patients that were terminally ill. She would go to spend her time in the Women’s section. 

Every day brought a new story, a new patient, a death and a lesson learnt. 

This is where she met Katherine who had such an impact on her that for three years since she started, not a week has gone by (except in her own sickness) that Patwant did not spend time volunteering for someone that needed her in their last days.

“The loneliness is terrible, there is nothing worse than living your last days in despair, thinking that this life was a worthless journey," Patwant says, adding that if she can make them feel otherwise by just giving them some time, presence and love, it is a very fair trade for her.

“Honoring their life in the last moments is not a service, it is a privilege. When I was unable to take care of my patients during my surgeries, I missed it terribly”.

A couple of years ago, she was introduced to “Hospice Atlanta” which provides home-care to its patients as well. Hoping to have deeper relationships with patients, she enlisted for the training. She worked with a wide range of demographics there.

One day, on account of her Spanish speaking skills which were listed on her application, a volunteer coordinator paired her with a Latino family facing the language barrier. Patwant was very comfortable accepting that assignment. 

All her life she has made lives of immigrant children better by training educators on effective ESL (English as Second Language) programs. She spent umpteen hours with immigrant communities trying to understand their linguistic challenges in order to develop programs that addressed their needs.

Her Peace Corps assignment in Venezuela a as a young college woman had taught her first hand the struggles of surviving in a new language and culture.

This was the first time that she would care for a dying child, a baby only three months old. The baby was born with a congenital condition where a part of her brain remained undeveloped and full of fluids. She had to be on pain medication and oxygen to assist her to breathe. The mother, Ana, was completely devoted to the baby and would not leave her side. She only spoke Spanish and tried hard to work as a team with the nurses to make her baby comfortable and that’s where she relied on Patwant for interpretation.

The family situation was really tough. Not only were the baby and mother glued to home as the baby served her death sentence, but there was also a three year old toddler there, trying to cope with all that was going on around him. Only when Patwant volunteered her time would the little boy get to go outside and have his playtime or the mother could run an errand.

"There are a million things a hospice volunteer can do to help a family ... There are a million rewards you get when you do.”

Seeing the brother and infant sister interact with each other was one of the most memorable experiences of Patwant’s life. The baby lived on for four more months before she passed on.

Oddly enough, six weeks after her passing, Patwant was assigned the care of another immigrant family with a nine-day old baby girl born with a similar condition. The doctors had not thought she would live beyond a few days but this was back in June of 2011. Today, nine months later, Patwant continues to care for her and her family which does not speak much English either.

The father is a hardworking laborer who has to work at a project out of town. That leaves the mother, Rose, to care for the baby 24/7.

“This baby has defied all odds. It is amazing how much one can live even on a short road to death. She must have a reason to go on”. 

In those nine months, what Rose and her family have dealt with is a lesson in resilience and  the power of faith.

Rose has a teen son who recently went to Mexico to visit his family. And on the trip he went missing. They suspected drug cartels.

“As a mother, how do you divide yourself?”  

Rose knew her son needed her help in Mexico but what could she do when here she could not leave alone her baby attached to oxygen tubes, even for a minute?

Her days were spent in prayer and in caring for the one that everyone told her will not last long. After several weeks, the son was thankfully returned alive. 

“When I see people complain about a boring job or an annoying teenager or something petty, or when I start going in that direction, I think of this mother,“ Patwant says.

In the meanwhile, Patwant has cared for another Spanish speaking family with a five year old girl, Maria, who had cancer of the brain. One day, when she called the family to schedule her follow-up visit, she was informed that the child had just passed on.

Patwant hopped into her car and helped the hospice staff handle all the subsequent tasks which the grieving family was either incapable or unprepared to deal with. 

“Maria was a real teacher to me on life and death and the fact that the two are only a moment apart from each other.”

So what drives a dedicated mother of four, a homemaker, a grandmother of thirteen who has barely retired from her very involved career, carve out time from her packed routine to volunteer in the area that deals with the most challenging aspect of life - death?

“Each time I look at my 13 grandchildren, I realize how blessed I am that not one of them has a serious health-condition. God has given me so much, why should I not share myself with the ones who are not so fortunate ... The crises I deal with - they do affect me emotionally - but because they do, it is more apparent to me that I need to continue doing this seva.”

When asked what challenges she faces because of the emotional stress associated with her hospice work, she replied: “I am not allowed a challenge. A challenge is what a baby struggling to breathe faces; it’s what a mother - who has to choose whether to give herself to this child or another, both in life and death situations - faces. What I experience every time I walk into a patient’s room is the presence of the Divine.

"Volunteering with hospice patients has raised my consciousness to recognize the fact that we are never too far from the divine spirit, if we choose to recognize it”.

Patwant wants people to learn about the amazing institution of the Hospice.She wants the fortunate ones amongst us to volunteer in their local institutions.

“The patients can be awfully lonely and wonder what their life has been about. You can be the last person in their life that helps them go with peacefulness and dignity.”

It is especially imperative upon well adjusted immigrants to get involved. “Perhaps a patient assigned to you can only speak your language. Perhaps you will need the help of this institution someday.”

 

[Names of patients and their families have been changed to respect their privacy.]

March 8, 2012

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