Humor to a man is like a feather pillow.  It is filled with what is easy to get  but gives great comfort.                         ~ Irish proverb Social Worker Ann-Patrice Foley has been working with Bob Diebolt since August 2015. They've bonded over their Irish heritage and love of humor. A true Irishwoman, Ann-Patrice Foley loves to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day. But in 2016, she had just returned from vacation a few days before the holiday, so she couldn’t take another day off. That was the first time she worked on St. Patrick’s Day as an Angela Hospice social worker. Of course she was going to make the most of it. She was making her regular visit to her patient Bob, and as her Irish luck would have it, that visit would make a big impact on Bob. “I started telling Irish jokes,” Ann-Patrice said, and Bob was loving it. “I had no idea he was Irish!” With a name like Diebolt, Ann-Patrice...

Sometimes the unimaginable happens. As a single mom, 44-year-old Carrie was used to a life of struggles, yet she seemed to get through them all with an inner strength. Call it perseverance – or maybe stubbornness – but Carrie did not give up easily.  Carrie worked hard to provide for her daughter. She was independent, but devoted herself to taking care of others. Maybe that’s why it was easy for her to overlook her own needs. So a seemingly harmless wound on her leg felt like a minor issue, not something she needed to get checked right away. What she never would have guessed is how that one decision would change her life forever. On October 28, 2015, Carrie went to bed fatigued, with a fever and chills, hoping to sleep off what she thought was the flu. But she was about to begin a traumatic journey.  Awaking in a delusion, without a sense of place or time, Carrie was rushed to the hospital. She would be flown to the nearest trauma center for emergency surger...

The two rooms are right next to each other and we enter the one on the left first, Shirley Potts leading the way. There’s something instantly likeable about her, maybe it’s her warm smile or the fact that she’s a self-described “hugger.” When she introduces me to her mom, Mary Mitchell, rather loudly (she’s hard of hearing), her mom smiles back, and so do I. Shirley shows off the clothes and jewelry box her mom had her bring from home, the rings glistening off the light when she opens the box. Her mom has always been stylish and being a hospice patient wasn’t about to stop that.  Now her rings, which sparkle off her fingers , just go with a patient gown instead. Mary’s jewelry isn’t the only thing familiar to her in the Angela Hospice Care Center though. Her son and one of Shirley’s brothers, Lawrence, is a patient in the room next door. “To have them here is a sense of relief,” Shirley said. “I know that they’re taken care of if I can’t just run down here.” It’...

At 95 some would be slowing down, but that’s not Doug Williams’ style. He might be a hospice patient but that doesn’t mean he is going to stop doing what he loves: karaoke. “I’d be lost without karaoke,” he said. “It’s definitely your thing,” laughed Mary Wolfe, one of his daughters who is with her dad six days a week. He spends four days a week at her home, which Doug helped build, and three nights at his room at Fox Run, where she stays a couple nights a week. One of her brothers stays with him the seventh day. This isn’t Doug’s first hospice stay though. He tried hospice back in January, but just kept on getting better. And he was finally discharged before going back on hospice in November. Doug (center) with two of his daughters, Mary Wolfe (left) and Nancy Ray. He sings karaoke every weekend. When he isn’t at home Doug, who has congestive heart failure, can be found at the VFW or American Legion every weekend with his family. Sometimes he sings with his brot...

While many people start looking at Angela Hospice for a loved one after hearing about it through a friend or relative, it was an Angela Hospice radio ad that caught Sue Baumberger’s attention. “That really is what initially started me looking at Angela Hospice,” said Sue, a Woodhaven resident. Sue with a photo of her dad, Robert, who was in Angela Hospice care. Sue and her sister knew that they would have to put their dad, Richard, on hospice care eventually. He had kidney failure and congested heart failure. So with the help of her sister’s friend, who used to work in hospice, their search was on. “There were a couple that we had narrowed it down to,” Sue said. “We choose Angela Hospice based on her recommendation as well as what I was able to find online.” And all those radio ads. Even though Sue had no prior hospice experience, she had only heard good things about using it. Her sister had first-hand experience after using hospice for her mother-in...

Mary (far right) with her three sisters and her dad, Norman. For Mary Jardine having her dad’s hospice care set up in the living room made life a little easier, and a little funnier. “It was just funny because it was like a drive-through,” she laughed. “It’s a family joke. That’s how we (the family) get through a lot of things; we have to have a sense of humor.” Laughter is after all the best medicine, and one that’s helped Mary and her family after the passing of her dad, Norman. Norman was an Angela Hospice patient for about a month-and-a-half before dying in August, a day before his 88 th birthday. While Norman, who had diabetes and dementia, lived with Mary, it was her other sister, a nurse, who often took him to his doctor appointments and noticed how rapidly he was losing weight. Mary said that her sister talked to the doctor about hospice and then took the necessary steps to see if Norman qualified, which he did. Angela Hospice started coming to the house...

Patty Ralko holds a photo of her mom, Mary, and dad, John, on their wedding day. The couple were married for 68 years before John’s passing last May. In today’s digital age, hand-delivering a letter to someone is a rarity. But that’s exactly what Patty Ralko did when she brought her thank-you note to Angela Hospice. After dropping it off, Patty said she got in her car, picked up her phone, and saw a photo pop up. It was a picture she had taken outside of her dad’s room at Independence Village in Plymouth, where he had been living the last few years with his wife, Mary. “I thought, ‘Well Dad, guess you’re talking to me,’” Patty laughed. Patty’s dad, John Hoffman, had received Angela Hospice care for about two weeks at his assisted living facility before passing in May 2015. John had vascular dementia, which can be caused after a stroke blocks an artery in the brain, and then developed aspirated pneumonia. “We didn’t expect him to go quite that quickly, but...

By: Dana Casadei When a doctor suggested hospice for Rita Leonelli’s aunt-in-law Ella, she first thought that was like giving up on Ella. She quickly learned that wasn’t the case. “I had some guilty feelings about putting her on hospice,” Rita said. “But once I kind of got what it was all about, then it was like a weight lifted. Something goes wrong...I have somebody to call. You have a huge support system.” Ella’s previous support system (aka Rita and her husband Lance) may have been small, but it was mighty. In 2012 the decision was made to put Ella in assisted living after she was diagnosed with dementia. At the end of 2012, Ella had a hospital stay that seemed to escalate her dementia, leading to lots of anxiety and confusion. That’s when Rita and Lance hired caregivers for Ella at her assisted living home because she couldn’t be alone. A year went by before Ella’s anxiety got worse and the combativeness started. Rita Leonelli with a photo of her aunt-in-law ...