What's in a day?
A lot when it was a Monday or Thursday in the life of the late Matt Murphy.
For this longtime Stanley Bridge resident, a few hours on each of those days were set aside for the special companionship and the listening ear of Leonard Trainor of Charlottetown, who is a volunteer with the Hospice Palliative Care Association of Prince Edward Island.
And for Matt's wife, Ruth Murphy, who was his primary caregiver in the latter stages of his terminal illness, those days were a gift of time to get things done, with the comfort of knowing her husband was having fun.
"Matt always looked forward to Mondays and Thursdays. Those were very important days on his calendar. Those were called Leonard days," smiles Murphy.
Trainor knows first-hand the help a hospice volunteer can be when families are living with a terminal illness. It was such a person who helped his family immensely when his mother was dying of cancer 20 years ago.
"We didn't know how to talk to our mother because she was dying and we weren't handling it very well at all. So somebody suggested that we call hospice . . . ," he remembers.
His family was matched with Eleanor Davies, who is still volunteering with the hospice association to this day.
"Mrs. Davies came to my house actually. There were about 20 of us gathered around and she told us basically how to (communicate) with our mother because we didn't feel comfortable going to visit her because she knew she was dying (and) we knew she was dying," Trainor says.
Because his mother was a big fan of Christmas, she expressed her desire to visit all of her children who lived on Island during her last holiday season.
"(Mrs. Davies) just made me comfortable talking to mom, which I was able to do, and take her to those places. (My mother) was sitting there and she knew it was going to be the very last time she was in (those houses) and the very last Christmas she was going to have, but I was able to deal with it," Trainor says.
"So Mrs. Davies put (our family) on the right track. Ever since then I said whenever I get the time I'm going to volunteer for hospice."
That time came five years ago following his retirement. He took the hospice volunteer training course and was matched with two people prior to his meeting Matt, who had prostate cancer.
A tumor in Matt's spine in the final years of his life had paralyzed him from the waist down.
They moved from their home in Stanley Bridge to a condominium in Charlottetown a few years ago. At that time his wife was his full-time caregiver.
"I wanted to do everything I could for him and I did my best to get him out, but it was beginning to have a drain on me," she says candidly.
"Ruth was exhausted," says Trainor, who started his twice weekly visits to Matt in their home in October of 2008 and then continued on when Matt moved into the palliative care unit at the Prince Edward Home.
"When Leonard first came, Matt didn't think in his mind he was ready for anything like that. He didn't need anyone," Murphy remembers.
"It was kind of a quiet little get-together at first, but he really got attached to Leonard and Leonard understood him. He knew certain days he didn't feel good, so Leonard would be just willing to sit and just be there. And other days when Matt wanted to talk they would talk."
On those "Leonard days" Murphy was free to do things like shopping, go for a swim or attend various appointments.
Left to their own devices, the two men weren't confined to just indoor time. They loved to head out for walks around the boardwalk, a leisurely breakfast meal or to the library.
"Basically it became a friendship. With hospice they taught us the best thing we can do is listen. And I'm pretty good at that, but you can't tell my wife that I am," Trainor laughs.
"(The hospice co-ordinator) made quite a good match between Matt and I because he travelled the Maritimes quite a bit (for his work) and I travelled. So there wasn't a little town that he had mentioned that I hadn't already been to."
In the days leading up to Matt's death in September of 2009, Trainor said his final goodbyes to the person he'd come to know so well.
"Matt had such great faith it really wasn't hard for me because he made it easy for me," he says.
In looking back, Murphy is very glad to have had this hospice volunteer come into their lives during her husband's final year of life.
"It was just wonderful and I really felt that someone from above sent Leonard to us," she says.
"He is such a special person. He and Matt just got along so well so it was such a comfort, a real comfort. He was a real friend."
mmackay@theguardian.pe.ca
