People say it all the time: That’s perfect!
How’d the apple pie she made taste? It was perfect!
Did you have a good time on the date? Everything went perfectly!
Did you like that new restaurant? What a perfect place!
During a hospice team meeting, we reviewed a family’s struggle to care for a dying loved one. Since hospice isn’t present 24/7 in the home, we are on-call to answer questions from the patient’s caregivers, their sons, daughters, spouses, parents and friends. This particular family kept calling, early and often. They wanted to be sure medications were properly given. They were concerned when their loved seemed too drowsy or didn’t eat as much as expected. Several family members debated about giving too much or too little of a particular medication.
None of their concerns, and none of their debates, created serious problems for the hospice patient; she likely never knew how many calls were made to clarify decisions.
Our hospice doctor listened to the nurses and social worker’s describe the family’s quest for doing everything right. At one point, the doctor said, “Isn’t there some catchphrase about ‘the perfect is not as good as the good’?” Then the doctor grinned. “No, that’s not quite it. Maybe it goes, ‘Good is better than perfect’ . . . no, that’s not it either . . .”
After giving up on recalling the exact words (the good doctor was far from perfect in his memory!), the hospice team continued to chat about how family’s feel when caring for a parent, grandparent, child, spouse or dear friend. Too often caregivers do seek the impossible of doing everything in the right way, at the right time. Of being perfect.
Later, I searched for the phrase the doctor stumbled over: The perfect is the enemy of the good. I think Voltaire may have first expressed this truth. But I’m not perfect, so I’m not 100% sure!
Doesn’t perfect mean without equal? Perfect doesn’t consort with oddities, flaws or questions. I’ve observed red-tailed hawks in my backyard soar effortlessly through trees thick with summer growth and land on a single, flimsy branch. In South Dakota I witnessed a herd of pronghorn antelope never break stride as they appeared to fly over a fence, and then continued to glide across a meadow and vanish from sight.
Every movement of the hawk and the antelopes seemed so . . . perfect.
But nothing is perfect. Is it? All who care for a hospice patient (professional staff and family) will fall short of their self-imposed expectations. Oops is part of being human. Caregivers will have doubts; they will check and double-check a dosage and still not be 100% sure. In the quest to care for a loved one, try to release the unfair pressure of perfection. Be the good, but not perfect daughter to the father. Be the good, but not perfect husband to the wife. Be the good, but not perfect grandchild to the grandmother.
I believe that trying to be good, rather than seeking the never attainable perfect, can give caregivers more time for reassuring hugs, expressions of gratitude, and to share memories.
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My book, A Companion for the Hospice Journey, is available at Amazon.
Photo by Sarah Kilian on Unsplash