Sanjay Das, President & Operations Supervisor of Always Best Care asks a question at TBJ's 2015 Health Care Symposium

Not the best photo, but it was really about the question around involvement of primary care physicians in quality of care of patients, including seniors.

TBJ image of the day

Triangle panel agrees: Better incentives needed to keep Americans healthy

Words of Acknowldegement

Last night, Saturday Night Live featured some of its more famous skits over the past 40 years. One particularly funny spoof features a character named Stuart Smalley (created by Al Franken) who dishes out the now famous Daily Affirmation:  "I'm good enough, I'm smart enough" and doggone it, people like me."

Words of affirmation get a jab because they can seem insincere or completely untrue. We laugh when in one episode, Michael Jordan says “I don’t have to be a great basketball player, I don’t have to dribble the ball fast or throw the ball in the basket”.  It sounds ludicrous.

When caring for someone who is chronically ill we are sometimes in that very place where words ring hollow.  I once heard a visitor say “You look good today” to a woman with unkempt hair and gray-tinted skin.  She rolled her disbelieving eyes at me as if to say, does he think I’m blind or just mind-numb. The visitor wasn’t trying to be disrespectful; he was using misplaced words of affirmation.

This discomfiture about what to say is why some people abandon visiting their loved ones and friends. But there are ways to communicate which are affirming without being insincere. I would call it using words of acknowledgement. It requires a bit more listening and a willingness to be in the other person’s shoes, if just for a minute. But it is powerful way to connect for caregiver and care-receiver both.

I sat and listened to a former military officer who was sometimes verbally abusive. Both his legs amputated due to diabetes; he was complaining about his care. I simply said to him what was obvious, “You have had a great loss and you must feel terribly angry.”  At first he responded, “You’re damn right I’m angry,” but he then became quiet. “No one has ever acknowledged that to me before.” It was the beginning of cooperation and friendship.

Words of acknowledgement require a gentle kind of truth-telling that can still affirm. You are frustrated but you haven’t given up, to someone struggling with disability. I see you are afraid, but I am impressed with your bravery, to someone facing another round of surgeries. I am sorry this is happening to you, it is hard, to a loved one facing another decline in health.  Words of acknowledgement state what is true. They are true because you have listened to the person in your care and heard what she said, and responded with a strong dose of kindness.

“Not feeling like Sophia Loren today?” I asked the woman after her visitor left. She laughed and said, “Give me a comb!”

Let me know what words of acknowledgement have helped you.

Honoring Valentinus

Pink handmade paper and handmade ornament

Ahem, it's almost upon us. February Fourteenth. Welcomed or reviled, shunned or embraced, this ancient holiday is rarely completely overlooked. (Woe to the young male pursuant if it is). How do you observe this upcoming, heart-adorned holiday? It probably depends on your age, your experience and your pocketbook.

Very few facts are known about Valentinus, the martyred saint (or saints) from the second (or third) century in Rome, whose name adorns this fractious holiday. 

Nonetheless, 18th Century Englishmen took this minor Christian holiday as excuse to send tokens of endearment, usually in the form of confections and flowers; to their beloved, or hope-to-be beloveds. Those supposedly staid and reserved Englishmen were given to ardent and sometimes flowery declarations of devotion. Those expressions of highly idealized romantic love influence many of our traditional customs of buying flowers, giving chocolates and sending mushy Valentine cards.

I enjoy all those traditions, but since Englishmen made up customs to suit their purposes, so can any of us, honoring the spirit of love and affection. Here are three I have observed and enjoyed with others.

Craft day

4th grader heart made of clay

Since kindergarten forward, people like to make and decorate hearts. The handmade lingers long with us, so whip out the paper and doilies, or fabric and lace, or clay and glaze, and make yourself some hearts to give to someone, anyone you love.

Day-After-Party

Don't want to buy in to the commercialism? Feeling just a tad resentful about all this emphasis on romance? Plan a day or two after-party. Buy all those chocolates the day after at half-off. Choose a theme decidedly not romantic, and invite someone you haven't seen lately. Hey, invite someone you barely know, or your neighbor you've been meaning to visit. One woman I know has a several years' running day-after-party. She's created her own tradition.

Acts of random, unexpected kindness

wrapped glass ornament with wire & beads

If there was ever a day you needed or wanted to practice random acts of kindness, now is the time to go-for-it! Buy a stranger a cup a coffee, or grab an extra load of laundry for a friend, or purposefully tell someone what you appreciate about them. If they blush, or protest, you can smile and say “Happy Valentine's Day”.