Long Distance
Pastoral Care
Chaplain Tim
Ledbetter, DMin, BCC
(Hospital Chaplain from 1994-2006)
As Kadlec Medical Center’s Chaplain, I respond to the trauma code with the
rest of the team. My usual job is to find and connect with family, and
support them through the initial phases of the situation until the patient
leaves the Emergency Department. As the team worked smoothly yet
aggressively to stabilize the badly injured patient, I attempted to notify
next of kin. It was not easy. To make a long story short, our patient’s
parents, were at that time, in two different distant parts of the country on
business and tending to family business. However, due to the blessing of
cell phones, contact was possible.
The parents of our patient received from me, the chaplain, that phone call
that fills all parents with trepidation, that their child was critically
injured in an accident…and they were several thousand miles away and apart.
Thus began an eight-hour conversation of regular updates by cell phone as
their child fought for life and they struggled to arrange flights.
Supporting families as they cope with sudden tragedies is part of the
ministry of the hospital chaplain. Usually it is done at the bedside of
their injured loved one, or in a nearby waiting room. In this case, the
pastoral care took place over the airwaves as I informed, comforted and
coached the helpless and frustrated parents traveling in far-off states.
At one point later that day, as the father was driving straight through
across the northern states, he thanked me for “being our life-line”—a comment
echoed later by the mother. Twice we wept together over the phone in mutual
anxiety and dread. While professionals are expected to not let personal
issues cloud the picture, this chaplain happened to have children of the same
age, and had a personal sense of the parents’ defenselessness.
After numerous hours of frantic efforts to stabilize the patient, the
patient was finally stable enough to transfer to the state’s highest trauma
center. The parents re-routed their travel directly to Seattle. The ending
was a mixed story. Sadly, the patient did not survive the extensive injuries
and died in Seattle. The parents arrived in time to be with their child
during the final hours and then graciously elected to donate all possible
organs and tissues. The patient’s heart was too damaged and so was unable to
be shared. The family felt that in some ironic and meaningful way, his
(physical, emotional and spiritual) heart was reserved for them.
Several days later, the family returned for the first of two
memorial services. Warm, earnest thanks were offered to me by the parents as
we finally met after hours of phone contacts. Again they stated gratefully
that having a hospital chaplain had been their lifeline to their son…a bridge
over their troubled waters. And so it was that I was given the honor of
officiating at the local memorial service, where many heart-felt tributes
were offered and a vibrant young adult was blessed and released to the Great
Author of Life after 22 years of zestful living, loving, working and enjoying
God’s great outdoors. May this child rest in peace and may the family find
God’s refreshing balm for their souls which burn with their great loss.
