How Much Time Do I Have Left?

Sooner or later the big question comes up: “How much time do I have left?”   I heard that question today at the hospice where I serve as part-time chaplain.  I don’t like the question.  Perhaps it is because I don’t like the answers we usually give. On Tuesday afternoons I leave my "balcony ministry" and  have the distinct privilege of sitting around a table with nurses, doctors, a social worker, and a volunteer coordinator as we discuss patients and issues as an “interdisciplinary team.”

Today I shared a reflection by one hospice patient who quoted her doctor as answering “the” question in the following way:  “you have every moment of every bit of time that’s left.”

I thought it was a clever answer, but the interdisciplinary team did not agree.   “It’s not clever at all…it’s vague.  Patients need more than that.”   Another said, “I tell them the truth—complete honesty.”   Another offered, “we can’t take away their hope, so I tell them nobody knows.”

As I think about it, I am not sure there is ever a satisfactory answer if you are the dying person asking the question. 

We all agreed on one thing.   We cannot put an exact expiration sticker on any soul.  We can be honest, also, without stealing whatever hope, however little or great, may remain.

The question and the answer are both uncomfortable for me. Maybe because I might not have as much time left as one of the patients I visit in the hospice.  I just don't know.  And we both have one thing in common.  We both have every moment of every bit of time that’s left.