I just couldn’t think of another title for this post that better summed up how I felt as I left work at 5pm tonight. As I’ve said before, much of my time so far has been spent preparing the groundwork for actually working directly with the patients, but last Friday a member of the medical team suggested a patient that might benefit from a chat with me and asked if I would see them fairly soon. I was more than happy to do that and visited the patient later on that morning. As a result, I feel that I really properly got my placement off the ground on Friday and started doing what I’ve been really looking forward to doing most at the hospice; giving patients time to talk, using music as a catalyst, and hopefully finding some way of helping them as a result of our chat. Now, I obviously can’t go into any details, but I can tell you that the person desperately misses playing their beloved guitar. After discussing whether or not they would find it too upsetting to listen to a guitar being played, the patient was delighted when I suggested that I’d try to arrange for a guitarist to come into Strathcarron to play for them.
I contacted a friend of a friend, someone whom I’ve seen perform live locally and know is amazing on guitar, and asked if he would consider giving up a bit of his time to play for the patient. The result was that this afternoon the lovely John Boos sat on a chair at the side of my first ‘placement patient’s' bed and, amongst other things, played this:
A difference was made to that patient’s day by John’s generosity in giving up his time and by his incredible musical talent – and that made me feel, as I headed off for home, bloody brilliant!
Great stuff Jane - and really enjoyed the track. Just catching up a wee bit on some missed posts.
ReplyDeleteThis was a great idea. I'm glad it worked for the patient {and you}