Light of Love

Last Tuesday, a client of mine was happily enjoying his trip to the lake. Monday, he died.

I fall in love with my clients, not in a romantic way, but in a human way. I practice unconditional love for them because sometimes I’m the only one who can. I don’t have history with them. I don’t have years of resentment or of joy. I can give them space to be who they are without shame or guilt. I see them as whole people who, like me, have flaws, quirks, and hangups.

When one of them dies, I lose my friend. I lose the person I’ve come to love in such a non-physical intimate way. I tend to sleep my way through the initial shock of it, then gather up the pieces and rearrange things in my life.

I rearrange things by removing them from my schedule. This may sound callus, but it’s fact. I don’t lose just the person, but the income their care generated as well. It’s not just one thing, it’s all of them.

And then, there’s the family. Sometimes the families keep in touch, but more often than not, they don’t. So they, because of their proximity to my client are also loved, cherished, and respected. But after the loss of their loved ones, they tend to put me out of their minds because I represent a time in their life where they weren’t okay. They were deeply vulnerable and I witnessed that. It’s not a comfortable place to be.

I understand. I’m not complaining. It’s just what happens and I have to be okay with it or I couldn’t do the work of my calling.

The benefits of what I do are that I get to learn from incredible people. I get to hold their trust in a holy place. I get to serve them, hear them, know and love them. I get to hear stories, family legends, experience life through their eyes. I get to “travel” with them (sometimes literally) to places I only dream about. The benefits far outweigh the difficulty of the loss of them.

Miss Marge Swenson taught me that it was my job to take the love I was given by my client and give it away, sort of in their name. I’m so honored to be trusted as much as I am. I take that responsibility to move forward with my loving memories very personally. Grief, as Jamie Anderson wrote, is just love with nowhere to go. I make sure it moves forward into the world.