Last Visit: Reflections of a Hospice Nurse

About her career as a Hospice Nurse and her book, Margaret Dodson says: I have been honored to share in the living, dying, and deaths of the most extraordinary "ordinary" people. I have entered into lives months away from their dying and moments away from their dying. Each person I have met in this work has been etched into my heart; how could I help but be touched by them? I realized that I needed to go away for a few days with a list of the people and families I had cared for during the year, and I needed time to spend my "last visit" with them privately to say goodbye. As I sat looking at the sea and feeling so full of these stories, they began to pour from me onto these pages. I would look at a name and I was transported not only to that person but also to that family, their home, the conversations, the intimacies, the suffering, the peace and even the joy. It would be presumptuous to say I have become wise by these experiences, but my gratitude for this enrichment is boundless. Much of the time I do not feel wise; yet, as the years have passed and the stories accumulate, I do feel as though I have acquired lessons to share. The lessons Margaret has learned are this book.