Comfort Measures
When I was a registered nurse, working in the wards, I use to offer therapeutic interventions for people that were sick, in order to ease their suffering a bit as they stayed in the hospital. We called these comfort measures and they were documented on every shift as to what we did and when in order to ease a patient’s suffering through comfort. We were trained to do this for the patients and the family of the patients, both. We did things that seemed so simple and obvious to me in order to provide a therapeutic environment that was conducive to healing.
One of the therapeutic interventions that they taught us was touch. Another was compassion in the way we spoke to the patient. We also learned to provide safety, cleanliness and hygiene, and to meet simple needs like another warm blanket or a glass of ice water. At the time, I thought these small gestures of therapeutic intervention were so menial and trivial and I wanted to learn about medications and treatment modalities rather than how to provide comfort. I was young and in my mind the medicine and surgery seemed so much more effective and necessary. As I have gotten older, I would argue that I was wrong.
When we comfort each other in a time of need or crisis, the humanity of it is so much more meaningful than any of us realize at the time. Offering a kind word, or to complete a task that is so needed for the simplest of pleasure such as providing a book to read is often the thing that allows the person to forget for a moment how dire their condition may be and allows them to simply breathe for a moment.
As I have overcome some of the darkest days of my life, I have realized that often the smallest things that I overlooked would perhaps have been the most helpful. Had I stopped and took time to simply breathe, I may have fared better. Perhaps I should have taken a walk outdoors in nature and felt the sunshine on my face or smelled the flowers as they bloomed in spring. If I had let myself cry and just sat with the pain and not acted on it, perhaps I would have had better outcomes. Had I spent time making a delicious meal and ate it on the back porch while the moon rose and listened to the crickets at night, it may have soothed my soul out of the angry rage it was in. Maybe not, but I now have reason to think it might have had an impact I never expected.
When things go wrong and you find yourself in the darkest of times, perhaps in a crisis where you don’t know what to do, often it is just breathing and turning to the simple things that can be the most powerful medicine. Not a pill or a injection, nor a surgery or a therapy session that costs you a ton of money. Now, I go for a long walk, letting the wind whip through my hair, the sun soak my skin, and the birds fly overhead calling to each other. I get exercise, a change of scenery which renews my perspective, some alone time, and the natural benefits of being outdoors for my lungs and the Vitamin D. When I smile at someone who is down, my humanity is speaking to their’s and it is communicating concern for another human being.
If you offer someone a cup of tea, or hold the door for them or some other kind gesture, it doesn’t make everything alright. It doesn’t fix everything. Nothing will fix everything that is going on in the world right now. But it does provide comfort and connection. It does speak to their soul. It lets them know they are not alone and we are all here for each other. Human connection does a world of good for healing. It makes another feel safe and cared about. It seems so small and inconsequential but it is so extraordinarily important. Often times, we live far from our own family or maybe have moved away from the people we knew growing up and there isn’t a lot of people we know where we now reside. We don’t feel that connection with anyone on a regular basis and are perhaps even single as a lot of adults are now days. Perhaps they don’t have children and don’t often interact with anyone except during their work day.
If this crisis in the world has taught us nothing else, it is that we are all humans and we all suffer in situations like these, as a global community. There is no one that isn’t scared right now. It reminds me of those patients that I took care of in the hospital, worried about what may come of their health. We are all fearful now. It doesn’t make it miraculously disappear, but any comfort you can offer another human being may actually make it bearable and provide a healing environment. I wish I could offer us all a warm blanket or a cup of ice water right now and place my hand on your shoulder to let you know I am here and will do what I can to help. We all need those comfort measures in any way we can provide them to each other.
