Now we can do this the Right way!

 

It was supposed to be someone else’s shift.

Maybe I wasn’t meant to be there at all.

But death had other plans.

The daughter’s eyes lit up the moment I walked into the room. Relief. Trust. That strange kind of recognition that happens when grief meets someone who knows.

She said, “Thank God you’re on duty. Now we can do this the right way.”

At the time, I didn’t grasp the weight of those words. I was just doing what felt right—bringing presence, calm, care. But now? Now I hear the calling in her voice. The confirmation. The beginning.

Her mother was dying.

The daughter was unraveling.

And I was there, not just as a nurse, but as a witness. A calm in the storm.

I stayed through the night. Sat with them through the silences, the breaths, the slow undoing. The mother passed before dawn. The daughter stayed strong until the moment she could finally let go, and then I held her, too.

At sunrise, something shifted in me.

It wasn’t just about being there anymore.

It was about how I was there.

That night taught me something sacred:

Death isn’t just a medical event. It’s a human moment. A holy one.

And the people standing at the edge need more than clinical care. They need companionship.

They need someone to say, We can do this. And we can do it the right way.