The Balloon in the Corner

*All names have been replaced with pseudonyms*

When I walked into Deidra’s hospital room that afternoon, she was quick to let me know how “stressed out” and frustrated she was. Stable housing had been a concern for her for the last several months, and due to a miscommunication that delayed her discharge, she had just found out that her place in the shelter had been taken by someone else. On top of not knowing where she would sleep once released, she was still in pain and likely would be long after her discharge. She expressed a small amount of relief that a social worker was coming by soon with additional housing options, and that the care team had prescribed her some medication to help ease the physical pain, but these two interventions did little to ease her feelings of being overwhelmed and anxious. What she needed from me, as her chaplain, was an ear to hear her fears, anger, and sadness that were surfacing at the moment. Or so I thought. 

While she certainly expressed these emotions at the beginning of our visit, I was surprised to find that where she ultimately landed was a feeling of gratitude. The gratitude was not for the healthcare she received over the last week, nor for the social worker coming soon, nor even for me and my visit with her. Instead, her gratitude was for Miss Suzi, the woman from environmental services who cleaned her room. Every day, while Miss Suzi made her rounds mopping the floors, picking up trash, and rushing to get rooms ready for new patients, she found time to stay a little longer in Deidra’s room. “Yesterday, when Miss Suzi came by, '' shared Deidra, “I told her that the room was clean and that she didn’t need to go over it all again. ‘That’s okay,’ she told me, ‘I will make sure it’s spotless for you anyways.’” 

With tears in her eyes, she pointed to a “Get Better Soon” balloon floating in the corner of the room. “Miss Suzi bought me that a few days ago. When she brought it by, she said a little prayer for me and told me that everything was going to be alright.” After a few moments of silence, Deidra said, “little things like that mean the world to me. Small acts of kindness that remind me that I matter; that someone cares about me. It’s people like Miss Suzi who make me think that everything actually will be okay, even if I can’t see how right now. Of all the doctors and nurses and everyone else that I met here, most of whom were good, nobody cared for me like Miss Suzi. When I’m finally discharged, it’ll be her I remember.”