Updates on Hospice, Podcasts, and Travel

Intermediate Phase of Waxing Gibbous

Jun 08, 2022

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First of all, if you are following along with the moon meditation series, find the second meditation for first quarter moon here. You can listen and follow me on Spotify or Apple podcasts or right from the browser through that link above. Please let me know if there is another platform that you prefer and I will see if I can send the feed that way as well.
Hospice: I’ve had lots of questions about hospice. I am not really sure what the requirements for getting on Hospice are, but here are the things I do know. A patient can go on and off hospice depending on your condition and your choices. Hospice is a change in treatment plan, moving from an emphasis on keeping the patient alive longer, to keeping the patient comfortable for the remainder of their life. Most services will come into the home or facility so that the patient does not have to go to their care. And there is not the same kind of concern about minimizing drug side effects etcetera, because the emphasis is on comfort rather than long term. Please chime in in the comments if you have anything to add to that short but sweet report on some details of hospice. My mom is receiving hospice care at the Big House in the same apartment she has shared with Bill/Will for the past 5 years. Dad is in a fancy assisted living place where he is receiving hospice services.
Travel Itinerary (see below): I expect I will be sharing about my travel often, but I thought I could run through my itinerary here and share the TikToks I made so you can get a sense of my journey. I am so aware of my privilege in being able to experience these things. Many people are forced to leave their homes and become foreigners in foreign lands due to unrest, I had the luxury to become a foreigner to learn and explore. I am so grateful to all the people (josh, my dad, my grown kids) and things (the interruption of the pandemic and staying flexible for caregiving of parents and grandparents) which made this possible.

Thank you for reading Songs of Forgiveness. This post is public so feel free to share it.

Itinerary with accompanying TikToks and links to travel posts:

When plans changed with my dad (I updated on his condition in the previous update post here), I scrambled to salvage some of my adventure. The plan had been that I join Dad, Linda and her friend Pat for their cruise and travels in Iceland, Norway, and Amsterdam. Henry was to meet us in Amsterdam so he would get a chance to see my dad, and from there I would go to England to spend time in London at Henry’s house before joining up with Josh after work was done for the school year at Augsburg. We had for a long time wanted to visit his Aunt in Girona, Spain, so somehow we were going to do it all after crossing the pond to the European side. With the cancellation of the cruise, I lost all my flights, so things had to be re-finagled. And there was the issue of my Dad’s health. At first I really resisted going to see him at his house. My fantasies of seeing him in a different setting, especially on a trip that had the renown of being on his bucket list. But as his condition sunk in, I knew I really wanted to go so I got a ticket west to Seattle and started my European Adventured from there (here is that post.). No TikTok video of that yet available.

On Monday April 18th I flew from Seattle Washington to Amsterdam via Iceland. I arrived. I spent the night of the 19th and 20th in Utrecht, The Netherlands.