Nan Cox-Kennett

As nurses, we often do specialized things to help our patients – monitoring special equipment, complex dressings. But I have found that it is the moments of connection that stand out to me in my role as a caring professional. It was the middle of the night and Mary, an elderly woman with leukemia, was having trouble sleeping. She asked if it was possible to get up to a chair to sit at the window for a bit. It was the first snow and it was coming down in pretty large snowflakes. I moved a chair to the window and we slowly walked over and she asked if I could sit with her for just a few minutes. I found another chair and we watched the snow falling. Below at the hospital entrance, someone left the building all bundled up and looked out at the courtyard of fresh snow. They moved to the center and started to make letters – dragging their feet to make lines.

“Oh look, she is sending a message to someone in the hospital” I said. M-I-K-E, then they moved to start a new line. Mary held my hand, “Oh, how sweet”. S-M-E. She looked out at the lights of the city and sighed deeply, “I always loved the snow”. L -L-S. Our message was MIKE SMELLS! Mary and I laughed and laughed. We made up stories imagining what Mike had done to lead to such a message.

I left Mary watching the snow fill in the letters and found her sleeping there peacefully later. On a later visit with her family, she shared this story with a huge grin on her face. This moment lives in my heart – a small connection that transformed a difficult night.

Nanette Cox-Kennett, RN MN
Nurse Practitioner Cross Cancer Institute