The bustle of the hospital was a welcome distraction as I opened my new patient's chart and headed for her room. My son, Eric, had just brought home a disappointing report card, and my daughter, Shannon, and I had argued again about her getting a driver's license. For the next eight hours I wanted to throw myself into helping people who I knew had much more to worry about than I did.

点击放大图片

　　Rebekah was only 32, admitted for chemotherapy(化学疗法) after breast-cancer surgery, When I entered her room it took me a moment to spot her amid the bouncing forms of three giggling little girls.

　　I told Rebekah I would be her nurse and she introduced her husband, Warren; six-year-old Ruthie; four-year-old Hannah; and two-year-old Molly. Warren coaxed the girls away from their mother with a promise of ice cream and assured Rebekah they would return the next day.

　　As I rubbed(擦) alcohol on her arm to prepare it for the intravenous line, Rebekah laughed nervously. "I have to tell you I'm terrified of needles." "It'll be over before you know it," I said. "I'll give you a count of three."

　　Rebekah shut her eyes tightly and murmured a prayer until it was over. Then she smiled and squeezed my hand. "Before you go, could you get my Bible from the table?" I handed her the worn book. "Do you have a favorite Bible verse?" she asked. "Jesus wept. John 11: 35." "Such a sad one," she said. "Why?"

　　"It makes me feel closer to Jesus, knowing he also experienced human sorrow."

　　Rebekah nodded thoughtfully and started flipping through her Bible as I shut the door quietly behind me.

　　During the following months I watched Rebekah struggle with the ravages of chemotherapy. Her hospital stays became frequent and she worried about her children. Meanwhile I continued to contend with raising my own kids. They always seemed either out or holed up in their rooms. I missed the days when they were as attached to me as Rebekah's little girls were to her.

　　One day when I entered her room, I found her talking into a tape recorder. She picked up a yellow legal pad and held it out to me. "I'm making a tape for my daughters, " she said.

　　I read the list on her pad: starting school, confirmation, turning 16, first date, graduation. While I worried how to help her deal with death, she was planning for her children's future.

　　I often wondered what I would say in her place. My kids joked that I was like an FBI agent, with my constant questions about where they'd been and who they'd been with. Where, I thought, are my words of encouragement and love?