Sutter Care at Home

Hospice was just a word that I never thought would happen to me. But when it did, I am very thankful that our first experience was with Sutter Hospice Care. The team of health professionals (especially the nurses), equipment folks, social workers, and volunteers that worked with the family was compassionate, respectful and absolutely knowledgeable and professional! The Sutter Hospice Care team was just amazing. Thank you for everything!

Dying with dignity is crap. I’ll tell you exactly what the face of death looks like. My father was a large man. He loved food, people, parties and fun. Cancer came and left him looking like an emaciated skeleton. His skin hung off of his bones — dried and cracked. Blood stopped circulating and his hands and feet turned ice cold. He eyes turned yellow and glazed. He lost his voice and could barely speak. Breathing turned into gasping for air. A grown man no longer able to eat. A grown man no longer able to go to the bathroom alone. All he could do was stare at us. Tears streaming down his face. There was no dignity.
The doctors tried their best. But they were so medical and technical. We knew his battle with cancer was over. We needed someone who understood our grieving hearts. We needed someone who could treat my father with dignity and respect. We needed help making sense of my father’s senseless pain. Sutter Hospice was informed of my father’s condition and the decision that we as a family made to take him home. My mom didn’t have to make phone calls to anyone. They were on top of it.
They brought a hospital bed and set it up in our living room. This way the entire family could surround him. They positioned him so that he was comfortable. A woman with the kindest eyes I have ever seen, came to our house from hospice and greeted us with hugs. She went to my father and spoke to him like a human being. She bathed him. She wiped his drool. She shaved him. She showed us how to give him his morphine to take away the pain cause by a body falling apart in its last days. She embraced my parents’ spirituality and prayed with them. She kept reminding us over and over that this was part of life. It may sound trivial, but we needed to hear it. Her compassion and love allowed us to fully grieve. It was the first time my brother finally cried. She made that possible.
Dying sucks. Losing someone you love may suck even more. It’s a very lonely process. Your heart hurts in ways you didn’t think was possible. Sutter Vna & Hospice gently held all of our hearts in their hands. They made my father as comfortable as humanly possible. They showered him with love. Sincere love. The people who work for Sutter Vna & Hospice are exceptionally kind and loving. I can’t thank them enough for making the worst experience of my adult life, slightly better.