The wounded healer feels the wounds

I started my second year as a Chaplain with a heavy heart. Diana was my soul mate and I really grieved her death and the loss that it brought to my life. Whenever people have died that I’ve been connected with, I’ve always been able to carry on chatting with them. I believe they are in heaven and that they can hear me. It has always helped me still feel some sort of closeness. With Diana all I felt was an enormous void! We were very often in contact via phone or text message. All of a sudden there was just nothing. It was an awful pain. At times I felt overwhelmed and could feel myself becoming tearful with patients or staff. I never did break down in front of anyone but I came close. It’s not that I think crying is wrong but when it’s your own stuff it has no place in someone else’s pain or trauma.

The work of the hospital continued. Despite my grief I had to be along side the dead and dying and the bereaved. Eventually my pain lessened and became part of my experience. In fact now I find it has been a useful experience because I more readily understand the void that someone’s death can leave. From my woundedness I’ve been able to be a more effective healer because of that deeper understanding.

One night, in the early hours, I had a call from NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit). A much loved baby had died shortly after his premature birth. He was an IVF baby. The parents were devastated. I was able to do a naming and blessing ceremony for them. They were a long way away from their home on the South coast. They had come to the hospital in the hope that our specialist unit would be able to save their baby. Unfortunately that wasn’t to be and that left these poor parents without the support of their extended family around them. I really felt for them as I left knowing that they were going back to a grey institutional hot family room before they could return to their own surroundings the next day. Sometimes it’s the little things in life that can make a difference, like nice paintwork or colourful bedding or nice pictures on the walls. I know the NHS doesn’t have any money but I can dream.