It would be noted that Sister Mary Alphonsus was discovered to be unresponsive in her bed by the Unit D orderly, Francis Gough, who’d immediately notified the nursing staff. Time: 7:08 A.M.
Less certainly, it was determined that Sister Mary Alphonsus had died several hours earlier — Dr. Bromwalder’s estimate was between 3 A.M. and 6 A.M. This was a reasonable estimate judging by the temperature of the corpse when it was first examined by the doctor, in the absence of a pathologist. In the pitch-black of the early morning, hours before dawn, patients are most likely to “pass away,” for these are the hours of Death.
There was a death here today. Old woman in her eighties, in my unit. She was found dead in her bed — died in her sleep, they think.
Oh Francis! That’s so sad. I hope it wasn’t you who found her.
It’s okay, Mom. It wasn’t me.
Most mornings when the early staff began their rounds we would find Sister Mary Alphonsus fully awake and sitting in the chair beside her bed, a blanket over her knees and a missal opened in her hands, though after near seventy years of the Catholic missal, you would not think that the nun required an actual book to help her with prayers; or Sister might have her rosary of wooden beads twined in her fingers as she waited for an orderly to help her into her wheelchair. Her gaze would be vacant until you appeared — and like a raptor’s eyes the vague old-woman eyes would come sharply into focus.
If you greeted her with a friendly smile — Good morning, Sister! — she was likely to frown, and to make no reply, as if you’d disturbed her in prayer, or in some private and precious drift of her mind. And so I’d learned to say nothing to her, much of the time. What would be rude behavior with other patients had come to seem, to me, expected behavior with Sister Mary Alphonsus.
Sister Mary Alphonsus was one of those residents at Eau Claire who ate meals in the patients’ dining hall, not one whose meals were brought to her room. Despite the difficulty involved in delivering her to the dining hall, which was sometimes considerable, depending upon her medical ailment of the moment, Sister Mary Alphonsus insisted upon this.
In her former life, before “retirement,” she’d been a prominent figure in her religious order — for more than two decades, director of the Craigmillnar Home for Children. This was a Catholic-run orphanage about sixteen miles north and east of Eau Claire, at its fullest occupancy containing more than three hundred children.
In the dining hall, Sister Mary Alphonsus asked to be seated at a table with several elderly women whom she might have considered “friends” — of whom two were, like herself, retired Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul who’d also been at Craigmillnar.
You would think that the Sisters of Charity would speak of their shared past at Craigmillnar, but they hardly spoke at all except to comment on the food. Like elderly sisters who’d seen too much of one another over the decades, and who had come to dislike one another, yet clung together out of a fear of loneliness.
Though it was difficult to imagine Sister Mary Alphonsus as one susceptible to loneliness.
Few relatives came to visit the elderly nuns. They’d had no children — that was their mistake. Beyond a certain age, an elderly resident will receive visits only from her (adult) children and, if she’s fortunate, grandchildren. Others of their generation have died out, or are committed to health-care facilities themselves. So virtually no one came to see these elderly nuns, who with other Catholic residents of the facility attended mass together once a week in the chapel.
Their priest too was elderly. Very few young men were entering the priesthood any longer, as even fewer young women were entering convents.
Though I’m not Catholic, often I observed the mass from the rear of the little chapel. “Father Cullough” — who made no effort to learn the nuns’ names — recited the mass in a harried and put-upon voice, in record time — scarcely thirty minutes. Once, the mass was said in Latin, as I know from having seen old prayer books in my family, that had been published in Scotland and brought to this country; now the mass is said in English, and sounds like a story for simpleminded children.
In the front row of the chapel the elderly nuns tried to keep awake. Even Sister Mary Alphonsus, the sharpest-witted of these, was likely to nod off during the familiar recitation. When the priest gave communion, however, at the altar rail, the old women’s tongues lapped eagerly at the little white wafer, the size of a quarter. My gaze shifted sharply aside, for this was not a pretty sight.
Once, when I was wheeling Sister Mary Alphonsus back to her room after mass, the wheelchair caught in a ridge of carpet in the floor, and Sister Mary Alphonsus was jostled in her seat, and lashed out at me — Clumsy! Watch what you’re doing.
Sister, sorry.
You did that on purpose, didn’t you! I know your kind.
Sister, I did not. Sorry.
You will be sorry! I will report you.
Many of the patients threaten to report us, often for trivial reasons. We are trained not to argue with them and to defer politely to them as much as possible.
Think I don’t know YOU. I know YOU.
Yes, Sister.
“Yes, Sister” — the elderly woman’s croaking voice rose in mockery — we will see about that!
I made no reply. My heart might have leapt with a thrill of sheer dislike of the old woman, but I would never have said anything to goad her further. It was said of the former mother superior at Craigmillnar, by the nurses’ aides who were obliged to take intimate care of her aged body — Bad enough she has to live with herself. That’s punishment enough.
Yet by the time Sister Mary Alphonsus was back in her room, her interest in reporting me to my supervisor had usually faded. She’d been distracted by someone or something else that annoyed or offended her. She’d have forgotten Francis Gough entirely, as one of little worth.
Not that she knew my name: she did not. While others called me Francis, Sister Mary Alphonsus could barely manage to mutter, with a look of disdain — You.
She did know the names of the medical staffers, to a degree. She knew Dr. Bromwalder. She knew Head Nurse Claire McGuinn, if but to quarrel with her.
A care facility like a hospital is a hierarchy. At the top are physicians — “consultants.” Nurse-practitioners, nurses and nurses’ aides, orderlies — these are the staff. An orderly is at hand to help with strenuous tasks like lifting and maneuvering patients, including patients’ lifeless bodies; changing beds, taking away soiled laundry, washing laundry; pushing food carts, and taking away the debris of mealtimes; sweeping and mopping floors; taking trash outside to the dumpsters. (Trash is carefully deployed: there is ordinary waste, and there is “clinical waste.”) My original training (at age nineteen) was on-the-job at Racine Medical Center plus a weeklong course in “restraint and control.”
There were few violent patients at Eau Claire, but I was well prepared for any I might be called upon to “restrain and control.” You need two other orderlies at least if you need to force a patient onto the floor. How it’s done is you force him down onto his stomach, an orderly gripping each arm and an orderly securing the legs. It’s going to be a struggle most times — even the old and feeble will put up a considerable fight, in such a situation; the danger is in getting kicked. (When you’re the youngest you are assigned the legs.) In this position — which looks cruel when observed — the patient’s back is relatively free so he can breathe, and he’s prevented from injuring himself.