Hospice volunteer offers human connection

Heather Butler helps people with one of life's scarier passages - the journey to leave it.

Butler, 32, Fargo, has been a patient care volunteer for Hospice of the Red River Valley since August.

While many of the people Hospice sends to homes, hospitals and nursing homes are medical professionals who deal with technical medical issues, Butler deals with something equally important: the client's need for simple human connection.

"She's a good listener," says Deb Kluck, Hospice's coordinator of volunteer programs. "She will drop what she's doing and go, she'll make arrangements with her family. It's a priority for her; it's just an important part of her life."

Butler says that whatever the patients get from her presence, she gets as much, if not more.

Recently, she says, "I saw one of my patients who hadn't spoken a word for three months. I was holding her hand and touching her hair and rubbing her cheek and she looked right at me with tears in her eyes and said, 'Thank you.' The feeling you get is indescribable."

Butler says she's never been touched personally by the work of Hospice, but heard about the program from a co-worker while she was a dental hygienist.

Hospice is aimed at providing end-of-life care, but emphasizes helping patients get the most out of their remaining time, rather than just focusing on death.

"After doing some reading about it, I really truly believe in their mission, their goals, their whole program," she says.

Families that sign up for Hospice care specify what kind of help they want and what a patient volunteer like Butler is asked to do, from playing cards to doing crosswords.

HOSPICE JUMP

"I will go and visit them," Butler says. "I've got two that I see right now on a weekly basis." She'll talk with them, read, even do hand massages. A stay-at-home mom - she and her husband just adopted a baby born over Thanksgiving and she has two other children at home and two older ones - she volunteers about four hours a week.

Some of her work is scheduled in advance. But she's also part of Hospice's Pathway program, which has a group of 10 volunteers on call to spend time with patients who are in their last two or three days.

"I bring a CD player with some inspirational religious music and play it softly in the background," Butler says. "You hold their hand, you pray with them, you talk with them. You're really there as a means of comfort and compassion. It's been an incredible experience for me."

Even patients who are fading in and out of consciousness respond, Butler says.

"They're undeniably aware of your presence," she says. "The difference in their demeanor once a volunteer comes in, I'm wholeheartedly convinced they're comforted that someone's with them."

Volunteers become emotionally attached to their patients, which can make being there at the end a bit of a mixed blessing - but only a bit, she says.

"It certainly has its ups and downs for me," Butler says. "It's 90 percent ups."

And it's given her "a whole new appreciation for life, the fragility of life," she says. "I have a deep faith that these people are moving on to bigger and better."

Kluck says the presence of volunteers like Butler is "probably one of the most comforting things we do with the patient."

Hospice nurses take care of patients' physical comfort, while social workers can help patients and families access needed services. But "a volunteer can go in and have more time, they can be friends," Kluck says. "A lot of times, patients share more with volunteers because they have more time."

Butler's availability makes her particularly suited to the work, Kluck says.

"She meets the patient where they're at. She has a full understanding of the dying process and is very comfortable being with people who are dying. She's such a comfort to the patient and the family."

Readers can reach Forum reporter Tom Pantera at (701) 241-5541