As a healthcare Chaplain with specialty in palliative care closing in on 13 years; may I be the first to say that it has been an honor being of pastoral care/Chaplain services to Frances Sneed and to her family. From one of first initial visits with her, end of life care discussions initiated by anyone can be most challenging, sometimes with humor. Visiting her during one visit, she always looked at my ID badge, engaged in giving me a tour of the many photos on the wall in the hallway, the many books in the library, her favorite crossword puzzles [she was an expert ya'll!] her love for her family visits - then talked about her church history at Scofield and the food/breakfast she tried remembering what she ate. Back in her private home, we sang brief hymns, "Amazing Grace" or "How Great Thou Art" She always sang along in bits and pieces but if she didn't understand me, she stopped and politely asked, "WHAT?" Sometimes she would share things in either incomplete sentences; leaving me to wonder what the rest was or - once she was quite emphatic - "Chaplain...a loaf of bread is just a big biscuit sliced in pieces and placed in a bag..." I would laugh, she would chuckle and at the kitchen table [in different visit encounters] I would comment and her response was always a sweet profound question, "what?". I loved spending time with Frances Sneed at the kitchen table or in the beautiful Dining Area where the scene of green trees and curtains pulled open was so meaningful to her, the very image in the Dining area was likened to what we called in North Carolina, "a post card photo." She loved it. Since I've known Frances Sneed as my hospice patient 1.21.2021 until my supposedly final visits in the private home then visits in one other facility to another; every moment spending time with her over coffee, journeying and companioning with her, reading aloud Scriptures and prayer until my last visit at bedside where she was nonresponsive but still breathing, I held her hand and prayed for her and grand daughter/family. Weeks before that, she just wanted to be comfortable as her son Phillip and I placed a jacket/sweater on her. She will always be dear and near to my heart. To this date, my response to anyone I either did not hear clearly or understand, I respectfully say it as Frances Sneed always did saying, "WHAT?" Only she could say it better than anyone else in my 60 years on this earth, "WHAT?"
"I MISS YOU FRANCES SNEED"
Donald Lee Perry, BS, ACPE, APC, FACP
Chaplain/Bereavement Coordinator-Dallas County
Legend Hospice, Inc
