When It’s Time:
5 Things No One Tells You About Starting Hospice
Someone you trust (an aunt, a sibling, a doctor) tells you: it’s time.
They don’t just say it—they hand you the number.
They stay on the line while you stall, spiral, or Google “what is hospice.”
A friend reminds you: you don’t have to know what to say—these people do.
You make the call. You book the flight. You go.
Getting the Call
I was in Melbourne when my aunts FaceTimed me from Boston—both on the screen, which is never a casual call.
“Lisa, you need to come.”
“I need a few more days.”
“No. You need to come now. Your mom needs hospice. She needs you.”
There’s always that moment—where you try to negotiate with reality like it’s flexible. Like maybe if you ask nicely, it will give you 72 more hours to catch up emotionally.
It doesn’t.
“You’re the one she’ll listen to,” they said.
Pause.
“Okay. I’ll book a flight.”
Here’s what I didn’t know then: you don’t do hospice alone. You think you will. You think this is the moment you become the capable adult who handles everything.
You don’t.
It takes a small, unplanned coalition.
A friend who says, “Call hospice—they’ve seen everything.”
Another who reminds you it’s about comfort, not giving up.
Someone practical who helps you get paperwork in place.
Someone else who just stays on the phone while you sit in your car in a parking lot, not moving.
At one point, I was outside a BevMo in California, assembling wedding favor bags with tiny bottles of vodka for a friend’s kid, while talking to a hospice nurse on speaker.
Life doesn’t pause to match the moment. It just… layers.
By the time I got to Boston, it was already in motion.
The room. The nurse. My mom in the bed.
Here’s the part no one really prepares you for: your parent has to say yes.
The nurse explained it gently. My mom listened. And then she had this look—clear, aware, and scared in a way that lands somewhere deep in your body and stays there.
My cousin stepped in, steady and calm.
“Do you remember what Lisa asked you?”
“Yes.”
“And what you said?”
“I said yes.”
“And do you still feel that way?”
“Yes.”
The nurse nodded.
That was it. No ceremony. No music swelling in the background.
Just a quiet, irreversible shift.
Hospice. Game on.
Later—because people are full of surprises—my mom ate a cheeseburger. A full one. With focus. With appetite. Like life was still, very much, happening.
And that’s the thing no one tells you clearly enough:
Hospice isn’t the end.
It’s a different kind of beginning.
One where you stop trying to fix—and start paying attention.
dōte.worthy:
here is a gentle article on hospice care in america from ellen ryan in next avenue.
Beautiful and true. Thank you.