Wait in your heart
Anyone who works in health care knows that some of the most honest conversations happen outside the hospital building, especially with patients who smoke. Out in the sun, away from their room and the routine of the ward, people loosen up. For a brief moment, they can simply be.
At McCulloch House, a winding garden path runs between the building and the brick fence that separates it from the road. On one shift, I was looking after a woman in her late forties who was sitting out there having a cigarette. She looked thin and pale. I knew she had young children, and knowing her prognosis, my heart was heavy.