Bringing Liz Home (RIP – April 5, 2026)
David R. Weiss – April 2, 2026

This tale is built of a million shards, some jagged, others glistening. I can’t pick up them all. And there are simply too many places to begin, so I will begin here, there, and everywhere.

In 2002, Margaret and I—a year married but finally able to live together—moved with our children into the house next to Liz. She was 65 that year, tending her elderly mom. Today Margaret and I are 66 … tending an elderly Liz.

In 1937 Liz was born in this house. She moved into her own apartment as a young woman, but at some point she moved back home. She helped her mom care for her dad whose health waned for years following a heart attack, then stayed to keep her mom company after he died, then stayed to care for mom. Altogether, Liz has lived about 87 of her 89 years in this house. No wonder she was determined to die here, too.

About three years ago, Liz—by then an aging 86-year-old—began to lose things: her watch, wallet, credit card, checkbook, telephone handset … and finally her mind. She found them all sooner or later (or we found them for her). Even her mind. Until that developed a mind of its own: Lewy Body Dementia. After that, no matter how much we chased it, her mind was always a step ahead of all of us.

Thursday morning at the hospital, waiting for the ambulance to arrive to take Liz home, Claire from Palliative Care stopped by for the third time. She’d helped us navigate the decision to shift Liz to comfort care as a prelude to home hospice. “Hi, David, how are you doing?” I started to reply, but my words were already awash in my throat. “It’s … a lot,” I croaked, my voice breaking. “Yes, it is,” she said. “These can be hard days.” Through my tears I explained, “This isn’t sadness. It’s awe at being trusted by another person—who has no one else—to hold their life in our hands and our heart. So many feels, and today they just overwhelm me.” “You and Margaret have done a … very … good thing.” My tears trickled down in agreement.

In high school Liz got a job in the boys clothing department at The Emporium (think a locally owned Macy’s Department Store). By age 19 she was their youngest and first woman buyer, travelling to New York to help select items for the next season. She was being groomed to be a senior buyer, but after several years she left. She remained a sharp dresser until her latter years, but she preferred variety to advancement in her jobs.

The first few years we lived next to Liz we barely knew her. She was busy with her mom. We were busy with our own lives and our kids. We waved to each other as we came and went and exchanged pleasantries across the fence. Nothing suggested we would carry her into hospice at home.

In the 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s Liz was potential in every direction. Every job had its own set of stories. Margaret and I heard many of them. Over these decades she worked for the telephone company, a Catholic parish, the Minnesota Attorney General, a bank, an insurance company, a plumbing shop, and many others. She seemed to excel at everything. After writing family and children curriculum for her local parish, the bishop, who was being moved to Washington D.C. to establish the new (Vatican II inspired) US Catholic Conference, asked Liz to come with him to D.C.—to help shape Catholic education nationally. She considered it—she respected and admired the bishop—but ultimately chose to stay near her family. Until all the family she’d stayed here to be near died and left her all alone.

Around fifteen years ago we slowly but surely became Liz’s family. I took over cutting the grass and shoveling the walk. Putting in and pulling out her three window air conditioners each season. Pleasantries across the fence became longer conversations—including colorful tales about the house we’d bought since she’d witnessed generations of shenanigans next door. Eventually, the three of us went grocery shopping every Sunday. I pushed one cart for our groceries while Margaret walked with Liz, reading the shopping list Liz couldn’t make out for herself.

Liz’s life was transformed in her twenties by her participation in Young Christian Workers, a Catholic young adult program that blended education, critical thinking, faith, and action. Some of Liz’s dearest and longest friendships date from her YCW days. From attending conference around the Midwest to the many YCW get togethers she hosted in her own home, this circle of friends became a second family to her. Many were scattered over the years; by now most have died as well. But a couple of them remain: a silver thread running through seven decades of Liz’s life.

On March 17, we found Liz on the floor in her TV room, awake and upright, but with no memory of how she got there or how long she’d been there (somewhere between 2 and 22 hours). She assured us she could get up. It was perhaps the most preposterous thing she ever told us. And over the past year Lewy-Body-Liz said some pretty preposterous things. Liz couldn’t get up to save her life. (Turns out that was all too true.) When the EMTs (after checking her out) lifted her to her feet, she couldn’t put any weight on her left leg. No broken bones but it seems she badly twisted it on the way to the ground. Liz wouldn’t get up ever again. And so here we are today.

Over the past several years, Margaret and I resolved all manner of little troubles for Liz. From fixing her TV remote to reassuring her that she didn’t need to respond to that letter about her home warranty running out. We made sure her property tax got paid and that her cable got cancelled—soon after which she could no longer remember how to work the remote.

Just a day before she died her friends Bill (88) and Mike (82) came by to see her. Unplanned, they arrived within minutes coming from opposite directions. Liz was aware enough to know they were there; she managed a couple sort of twisted smiles and offered several garbled comments in response to the many memories Bill and Mike recounted from childhood antics to YCW adventures. Seated on either side of her bed, they regaled Liz (and us) for nearly two hours. Liz fell asleep before they left. These were her last moments of awareness—they were moments of joy.

Quite a few of Liz’s other neighbors on Blair knew her. She was something of a keeper of neighborhood lore, and most of us who got to know Liz even a little bit received from her unexpected trinkets of history, legend, gossip about the earlier occupants of their house. She loved telling these tales. It was her way of weaving community across the generations in each house.

In 2023, Liz made the two of us (me and Margaret) her health care agents, co-executors of her will, and power of attorney over her affairs. At the time she still felt quite in power of everything herself, though, truth be told, the precarity of her power was building with each passing week.

On her second day in the hospital, Liz had her last day (ever)—and her first day (ever)—of genuine clarity regarding her circumstances. As we sat with her, she explained with painful honesty how lost she felt—as though part of her had gone missing, and she couldn’t find the missing part. No desperate abstract reflection, she was speaking from inside the lostness itself. We knew the name Lewy Body Dementia and the list of symptoms. Liz had been swallowed entirely by the inner chaos of it. Her walk had become a shuffle; her sleep a wishful idea; her executive function no longer functional; and her world populated by more hallucinations than real people. On this day alone, we heard Liz speak plaintively from within this swirling chaos—fully aware of it for a passing moment, but unable to find her bearing. With Lewy Body Dementia there are no bearings. Margaret and I knew that … from a safe distance. Liz was knowing it up close and speaking that anguish—as it tore her apart. And we held her in helpless love as she was swept away.

One of Liz’s dear friends from YCW days is Marilyn. They met at a conference in Chicago in 1963 and became pen pals, phone pals, and more through the ensuing decades. Marilyn, now 86 and living in Portland, Oregon, remains quite a traveler. For years she invited Liz to travel with her. For just as many years Liz demurred. We know she took trips into her 60’s: there are photo albums to prove that. But at some point, Liz decided to stay home for good. Marilyn would call Liz from her travels and recount her adventures of the day by weaving Liz directly into them: “Let me tell you what Liz and I did today …” That’s friendship.

We’ve gotten to know Marilyn a bit ourselves as we’ve kept her updated by phone and text on this last trip Liz will take. The two of them spoke by phone for the final time last Saturday. Since then, Liz has gone radio silent. Moving steadily toward completion, pulling her energy, her self, ever inward.

Altogether Liz spent seventeen days at United Hospital. Initially the doctors and therapists thought a stay at a transitional care unit (for physical and occupational therapy) would be her stepping stone into long term care or memory care someplace. But Liz’s leg never regained its power, and each day of continued immobility cost the other leg strength as well. Plus, her dementia severely limited her ability to follow instructions or even pay attention. We were regularly joined by children painting on the wall, a parade of adults strolling by, and others whom she was sure wanted a taste of her meal.

Then there was the delirium—when she slept all day for 5-6 days in a row and another couple at the end, never waking, but moaning and offering garbled remarks, free for the taking. Those days she barely ate. By Day 11 the hospital staff suggested it was time to consider hospice. No restorative measures were going to offer any gains for Liz. So, with our consent, we turned to comfort care and began exploring what it would mean to bring Liz into home hospice in her home.

Theoretically, we could have brought her home into hospice at our home. That might have been marginally more convenient for us (though with its own mighty challenges and complications), but we never considered it. Liz had been clear and consistent over the years. “I just want to die in this house. It’s where I feel most safe.”

By the time she was carried in on Thursday she hadn’t eaten for days. And her eyes only fluttered open on occasion. Her ears only very rarely perked up any sound. And her voice mumbled from somewhere far away. Still, the familiar smells carried the scent of safety. From wood floors to ancient carpets to roving dust bunnies (mostly vacuumed in advance) and the million magic spices in the air, this house reaches into Liz’s labored breathing and whispers, “Welcome home, we’re so glad you came.”

Indeed, as we settled her into the hospital bed, liz did something she hadn’t done before: opened her mouth and wept. Not loud weeping. It was more a shoulder-trembling mouth-wide-open silent sob. For two hours. We were transfixed. Margaret, me, the home health coordinator, and the hospice nurse. We tried to comfort Liz, but nothing worked. Ultimately, I decided (I do not know, but I believe) that what we witnessed was Liz’s two-fold recognition that she was finally home and that the only thing left to do was to die. I didn’t hear pain or grief or fear in her sobs. I heard the emotion of sheer awe. Overwhelming, wordless, nothing but tears and sobs could give it voice.

Before Liz came home, we needed to arrange for 24/7 wakeful presence in the house. Margaret and I could keep vigil long hours with Liz, but we’d need to sleep, too. (It being Holy Week, Margaret had a full slate of choir-singing at church.) We also chose a hospice agency to coordinate Liz’s end-of-life care. And we cleaned. Liz was actually pretty fastidious, even as age and dementia slowed her down. On a day’s notice, seven neighbors showed up to prepare her dining room for a hospice bed, raise some shades, chase down cobwebs and dust bunnies, give her bathroom and kitchen a thorough cleaning, and tackle her fridge—the only project that was a bit scary.

Thursday, as I rounded the corner to Liz’s room, I passed a pair of hospital social workers. Linda had given us leads on hospice and home care agencies days earlier and had been at pains to make sure we understood what we were getting ourselves into. I had just cared for my dad through home hospice in February, so we had a pretty good idea—although providing home hospice in someone else’s home is a unique undertaking. But as I passed Linda I turned back and told her, my eyes brimful of joy, “We’re ready. We have hospice and home care lined up. The house has been cleaned; the bed was delivered yesterday. And today we bring Liz home.” It’s possible my voice cracked with emotion. Linda beamed. I’m not sure how often hospital social workers get to beam, but on Thursday Linda did. She said, “You two make my heart happy. Thank you for being there for Liz.” It’s possible her eyes sparkled with a tear as she spoke.

Countless people—nurses, aides, friends—have told us we did something extraordinary. And we don’t argue with that. But I think we understand that the really extraordinary thing is that we (me and Margaret) found each other. We couldn’t do a fraction of this on our own. But as a couple we amplify each other’s better angels. We reach after goodness in so many ways we’re no longer surprised—but never less than delighted—by the things we manage to pull off.

Once Liz stopped sobbing, she breathed. Quiet, labored, sonorous in turn. Heaving at times. Groaning now and then. We repositioned her, gave her comfort meds, swabbed her mouth to keep it moist, combed her hair, lotioned her skin. Anything to ease the transition. But this last step was for Liz to take on her own. She seemed to spend much of Friday and Saturday near the edge. Her breath would slow, or her body would stiffen, and we’d think, this is the moment. But it never was.

We found a small book (a reading journal) in which Liz had collected favorite quotes from her current reading in the late 1980’s. As she crested fifty, she was enamored with woman’s self-worth and gender equality in both society and church. We took turns reading these quotes to her as she slept. They hinted at a woman far more daring in her ideas than 80-year old Liz, whose worldview was shaped around the fear mongered by talking heads on right-wing TV.

On Easter Sunday, Mary Jane (89) stopped by. Friends since elementary school and later YCW, they spoke on the phone regularly in their 80’s. By the time she came to visit, Liz was wholly unaware. There was no twisted smile or garbled rejoinders today. But Mary Jane greeted Liz nonetheless, told her what a good friend she was, and then chatted with us for thirty minutes about the Liz she knew. When she left, Margaret and I accompanied her outside to her car because she’s gotten pretty unsteady on her feet.

Unbeknownst to us, as we crossed the street to Mary Jane’s parked car, Liz was inside taking her last quick gasps of air. Alaysia, the home care aide on duty leapt to Liz’s side and held her hand until she was still. She knew Liz wanted someone near when she died. Only then did Alaysia come to the door and call us in.

We called hospice and did some cleaning. We hugged Alaysia in gratitude for her steady caring presence to Liz over the past three days. To be fair, we were moving in a bit of a daze. Overtired and overwrought. But this was the sweetness in our hug at the end: some three years ago Liz asked us to make choices for her if it ever came to that. We knew what she wanted. And with the help of many others, but especially the grit and love between us, we chose to bring Liz home. And we did. And now, having taken that last leap on her own, she was.

Home.

***

David Weiss is a theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, “writing into the whirlwind” of contemporary challenges, joys, and sorrows around climate crisis, sexuality, justice, peace, and family. Reach him at drw59mn@gmail.com. Read more at www.davidrweiss.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.” Support him in Writing into the Whirlwind atwww.patreon.com/fullfrontalfaith.