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One of my favorite books in recent years is An Army in Heaven, by Kelley Jankowski, a nurse who spent over 25 years in critical care before going into hospice care.
In my June 18, 2016 column, I published an email interview with Kelley. I wanted to do a follow-up column, so I very recently reached out to her to see if she’d be willing to share a couple of experiences that occurred after her book was published.
Kelley’s response is published below (lightly edited by me):
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After 37 years of nursing, I was finally able to retire as of late 2019, right before the COVID crisis hit. God most definitely has His own plans, and the Blessed Mother was most instrumental in letting me know it was time. But that's another story.
One experience toward the end of my time in hospice stuck with me as my late parents were involved. My father was a physician who passed in 2011, and my mother died in 2017. One evening when I was driving into work for my third night in a row, I was feeling particularly exhausted. I remember having a mental conversation with my parents: I know you’re both in heaven having a grand old time, but your children and grandchildren need your help, and if you wouldn't mind, could you look in on those left behind once in a while?
That night, I took care of a 91-year-old Jewish woman who had a rare form of cancer with an eroding tumor, which the surgeon explained was only 2mm away from her femoral artery. She was in our unit for pain management and on bleeding precautions, for if this tumor invaded that artery, she would bleed out very quickly.
Her daughter, who had very little faith in the afterlife, explained to me one evening that her mother was “hallucinating” – speaking to people who’ve been gone for years. She made several attempts to correct her mother, and sometimes you could hear her arguing with her. She came to the nurses station exasperated, blaming the “hallucinations” on the morphine. I explained to her that she had received no medications in 14 hours – they were given only as needed – and the 2 mg of morphine given to her had long worn off. I tried to explain that visits from deceased relatives were a common experience of people nearing their end.
“Even if you don’t believe in these things, these visions are very real to your mom. Maybe instead of dismissing her statements as hallucinations, why not ask her to explain what she’s seeing?”
The daughter dismissed that idea and left for the night, and for the most part, my little lady slept. The following morning around 5:45, I went in, freshened her up, changed her brief and positioned her on her back so she could take her morning pills. I told her I’d be back in a minute and went to the med room to pull her medications. When I returned to her room she was looking over her left shoulder and speaking to someone I couldn’t see, nodding and smiling. We see this so often and it’s so commonplace that I figured she was speaking to her deceased family.
“Here’s your morning medicine, Mrs. X….”
Continued below.
In my June 18, 2016 column, I published an email interview with Kelley. I wanted to do a follow-up column, so I very recently reached out to her to see if she’d be willing to share a couple of experiences that occurred after her book was published.
Kelley’s response is published below (lightly edited by me):
––––––––––––––––
One experience toward the end of my time in hospice stuck with me as my late parents were involved. My father was a physician who passed in 2011, and my mother died in 2017. One evening when I was driving into work for my third night in a row, I was feeling particularly exhausted. I remember having a mental conversation with my parents: I know you’re both in heaven having a grand old time, but your children and grandchildren need your help, and if you wouldn't mind, could you look in on those left behind once in a while?
That night, I took care of a 91-year-old Jewish woman who had a rare form of cancer with an eroding tumor, which the surgeon explained was only 2mm away from her femoral artery. She was in our unit for pain management and on bleeding precautions, for if this tumor invaded that artery, she would bleed out very quickly.
Her daughter, who had very little faith in the afterlife, explained to me one evening that her mother was “hallucinating” – speaking to people who’ve been gone for years. She made several attempts to correct her mother, and sometimes you could hear her arguing with her. She came to the nurses station exasperated, blaming the “hallucinations” on the morphine. I explained to her that she had received no medications in 14 hours – they were given only as needed – and the 2 mg of morphine given to her had long worn off. I tried to explain that visits from deceased relatives were a common experience of people nearing their end.
“Even if you don’t believe in these things, these visions are very real to your mom. Maybe instead of dismissing her statements as hallucinations, why not ask her to explain what she’s seeing?”
The daughter dismissed that idea and left for the night, and for the most part, my little lady slept. The following morning around 5:45, I went in, freshened her up, changed her brief and positioned her on her back so she could take her morning pills. I told her I’d be back in a minute and went to the med room to pull her medications. When I returned to her room she was looking over her left shoulder and speaking to someone I couldn’t see, nodding and smiling. We see this so often and it’s so commonplace that I figured she was speaking to her deceased family.
“Here’s your morning medicine, Mrs. X….”
Continued below.
More deathbed visions
One of my favorite books in recent years is An Army in Heaven, by Kelley Jankowski, a nurse who spent over 25 years in critical care before going into hospice care. In my June 18, 2016 column, I published an email interview with Kelley. I wanted to do a follow-up column, so I very recently...
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