Welcome to "Here, Angels Gather". a blog site created for those working with terminally ill patients, through hospice /palliative care, oncology, or as a caregiver to someone on the journey from this world to the next.
     Though I am not a hospice nurse at this time, I feel a "calling" and hope to join a hospice team in the next few months. My mother made her journey December of 2010 surrounded by family and supported by a wonderful hospice staff. We witnessed her smiling and reaching out to ....angels?. It was surreal.  When telling others my goal to go into hospice I am frequently asked, "how would you deal with all the sadness, wouldn't you cry, and how do you keep from being depressed ?"  I have my own answers but thought this would be a good area for research.
  I am an RN completing my BSN through the University of Texas, Arlington's online RN-BSN program. Part of my capstone requirements was to create a teaching tool using peer-reviewed, evidence-based research. I came across the term Compassion Fatigue and found quite a bit written on this subject.  After a long night of research I lay in bed thinking about how hospice nurses cope. In that twilight between jumbled thoughts and dreams I envisioned this website.  The next night I again tossed and turned and then just got up and created my blog.  My first names choices were unavailable and then " Here, Angels Gather" rolled off my tongue and into the blog title space.
   I still need to do some technological refining. I want to create pages where others can post comments or stories, and I want them organized by topic.  I will actually need to work on that after I have had more sleep!
   Thank you for being here at the birth of my new blog, just what the world needs, right?  I hope this fills a niche, and if it brings joy and reassurance to another then it was worth losing sleep over.
    Finally, I want to say thank you to those who choose to give compassionate care to the dying.  I hope you know how much you are appreciated.  Some call you midwives of the soul, and you truly make the experience of going from one life to the next a natural transition.                                      Gina Herman RN