Bethesda chaplain a faithful presence during pandemic

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This article was published 02/01/2021 (1661 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A hospital and care home chaplain in Steinbach says the COVID-19 pandemic presents her with more opportunities to minister one-on-one to patients and residents.

Lydia Summerville is the spiritual health care practitioner for Bethesda Regional Health Centre and Bethesda Place. She stepped into the role in June 2018, following the retirement of Larry Hirst.

“My gift that I try to give people is the gift of listening,” Summerville said. “I often call myself a minister of mercy, accompanying them on that journey of whatever they’re going through, whether it’s something that’s terminal, something that is temporary, rehab or medicine, ER or surgery.”

Both of Summerville’s workplaces have experienced coronavirus outbreaks. The hospital’s medicine unit outbreak was declared over Dec. 16, while the personal care home is currently battling its second outbreak.

“I believe that God has brought me here to Bethesda for such a time as this,” Summerville said.

Over the past few months, she has often found herself at the bedside of a COVID-positive patient or resident.

“That is a real precious moment for me, because it’s something that I feel gives me the opportunity to be with those who are needing care the most,” she said. “When they have someone to journey with them, it removes the fear of the future and it lessens the difficulties of the moment.”

Pandemic restrictions on visitors mean clergy from the community can’t always visit parishioners staying in the hospital or care home. As a result, Summerville is ministering to more people than ever before.

“My responsibilities have amped up twice as much, I would say.”

The pandemic has also required her to provide more end-of-life spiritual care.

“It’s definitely brought me to a place where I am paying attention to my own need for self-care. It has helped me to be more aware of how I process (grief), and I pay attention to how others process,” she said.

The pandemic has also changed how and where Summerville delivers spiritual care. During the Bethesda Place outbreaks, one-on-one visits in rooms have replaced the daily chapel service. At first, it wasn’t an easy shift.

“I had to really rethink how I was a chaplain,” she said. “I’ve had to provide more care individually in their rooms, and that was hard because they were used to that group activity and that group socializing.”

But the new emphasis on individual interactions has enabled Summerville to further personalize the care that she provides.

“I’ve had the opportunity to really sit with and hear the hearts of residents,” she said. “This individual interaction allowed me to really engage with their spirits at a new level that I don’t feel like I had before, because when I had chapel, I was going from one thing to the next.”

“While the energy and the attentiveness required on my part was amplified, it also gave me great joy to build deeper and more meaningful relationships during a season characterized…by hardship and loss and loneliness.”

During a visit, Summerville might pray, sing hymns, read from the Bible, or simply listen.

“It’s just giving them a space and a place to be heard,” she said.

She knows she could contract COVID-19, but instead of dwelling on fear and the unknown, she focuses on following health protocols and taking her job one day at a time. The words of 1 John 4:18, “Perfect love casts out fear,” cross her mind often these days, she said.

Earlier in the pandemic, Summerville had to adjust to wearing personal protective equipment during her visits. Face masks and visors, while necessary precautions, can make it harder for someone to hear her voice or read her facial expressions, she explained. She also can’t comfort someone by holding their hand.

Recorded music is one tool Summerville has used to foster a sense of togetherness and community in Bethesda Place.

“To see the joy that comes from them, to see them clapping and happy…that communicates to me that they felt heard, they felt seen, they had a good time, they don’t feel like they’re in a place that they have been forgotten.”

Technology has been another helpful tool, especially for those isolating in their rooms. Summerville has access to six iPads—two for the care home, and four for the hospital—that residents and patients can use for video calls with clergy or family members.

Summerville’s job description also includes caring for health-care staff, many of whom are battling burnout and exhaustion after more than nine months on the front lines of the pandemic.

Summerville said she tries to “linger with intent” around staff, “just kind of taking the emotional temperature.”

“I listen with a non-judgmental spirit,” she explained. “The motto that I’ve had is, ‘Help where needed.’”

Sometimes that help takes the form of a one-on-one conversation. Other times it might involve running out to get coffees for a shift of nurses or health-care aides.

As the first doses of COVID-19 vaccine arrive in Manitoba, Summerville said the mood among frontline staff at the hospital and care home is one of “tiredness and hope.”

It’s an emotional place she can understand. Summerville said her self-care regimen involves walks in nature, phone calls with friends, painting, and journaling. Once the pandemic ends, she looks forward to returning to two other favourite pastimes: choirs and swing dancing.

No one knows when the pandemic will subside, but Summerville said her faith is providing her with the hope to carry on ministering to those in need.

“When you have a hope of something more to come, you keep your eyes focused on that, and you know that the circumstances around you are not what characterize your existence.”

She often encourages those she cares for to identify their own source of hope and dwell on it.

“COVID might exist, but joy still exists and life is still good, despite the difficult circumstances.”