Tara, in her 30s, requested that a chaplain visit her in her locked psych hold room in our Emergency Department.  She’d attempted suicide twice that week, and was undergoing evaluation for inpatient placement.  Her room has nothing in it besides a simple bed, so I wheel in a small stool and sit down beside her, as she sits cross-legged on her bed.  The tears flow immediately.

“Thanks for coming, I know there are probably lots of other people in the hospital who deserve your time more than me.  I just want you to know that I’m not as bad as everyone says I am.  I’ve done a lot of bad things, things I regret, but not everything they say about me is true.”

“Tara, I don’t know what other people have said, and I don’t need to.  I’m here just to listen to you.”

“Well, I actually wanted to talk to you about my mom.  I haven’t seen her in a long time—maybe 10 years—and I don’t even know how to find her.  But I’m worried that she’s not in a good place.  It’s the same thing with my sister.  I worry about them so much.”

“It’s really hard when you’re worried about someone you love and you feel there is nothing you can do.”

“I mean, my mom was not a good mom.  She abused me and did other terrible things to me, and I got put into foster care.  So I was really bad back to her, and to my sister, and to everyone else around me.”

“Sounds like you were angry with her.”

“Really angry.  But now I realize that the family she grew up in was terrible, too, maybe even worse than mine.  And now I feel really bad for her.  It’s like, I don’t think she wanted to be that way—just like I don’t want to be this way—but she didn’t know any different.  I wish she could know that I understand this now, and that I feel sorry for her and forgive her.”

“Tara, your heart is so huge and filled with love.  It’s incredibly difficult, after all the hurt you’ve known, to want to show understanding and love back in return. I’m really moved.”

“The other night, when I was up on the bridge, staring at the water, getting ready to jump, I realized I didn’t want this to be how everyone remembered me.  I want people to know that, despite all of the bad things I’ve done, I have a good heart.  But now I don’t know how they’ll ever know that.”

“I don’t know, either, Tara.  Sometimes, it seems, there’s nothing we can do but pray.”

“I’ve been wondering about that.  What does it even mean to pray?  Do you have to believe in God? I’m not sure I do.”

“That depends on who you ask, but for me, it can be as simple as focusing on what’s on your heart—like your mom—and sending your love and concerns out into the universe.  We may never know how it’s received or if it makes a difference, but just putting out that positive energy can feel like a good thing.”

“Can you show me how to pray?”

“Sure …” I say, and I take her hand and settle into silence.  “Dear God, thanks for being right here in this little room with Tara and me.  Help her to feel your love, to know that she is your beloved daughter, that you are always with her.  You have listened to her pain, and to her love and longing for her mom.  Please help her mom to feel your love, and Tara’s love, wherever she may be, and bring peace and healing to both of their hearts.”

“And God, please do the same thing for my sister,” Tara adds.  “I miss her so much, and I want her to know I love her.”

We open our eyes and look at each other, and I say, “And that’s how it works.  You just did it—you added your own prayer—and it was beautiful.”

“It’s different when you think about God as being down here, in a room like this.  Everybody talks about God being ‘up there,’ but I’ve always thought, what good is a God that doesn’t understand what it’s like down here—how hard it is down here.”

“Well, there are many wonderful faiths, but one reason I’m a Christian is that Jesus really knew how hard it is down here—he lived a hard life, and suffered a lot of cruelty, and despite that he never lost his capacity to love.  You haven’t lost your capacity to love, either, Tara, and I hope you never do.  I’m so glad you got down off that bridge—we need your light down here in this world.”

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I always draw in a deep breath when I’m called to visit the unit where Tara was being held.  I only have a little formal training in mental illness; while I see plenty of it on other hospital units, the patients here are truly in crisis, and I often feel inadequate to the challenge.  Then I remember that my job isn’t to treat them, just to listen and offer support, and to remember that while it doesn’t seem like much, it can still be very helpful.

Despite the seeming confidence of my answer—“Sure …”—the question “Can you show me how to pray?” is as intimidating as it gets, at least for me.  As a Quaker, I don’t reach for well-known prayers from any tradition, even if I love many of them.  Instead, we try to center in silence to hear the leadings of the Spirit and then give them voice.  Whatever these prayers lack in elegance and grace tends to be made up for in authenticity, which I find especially helpful with patients like Tara.  Or anyone, really.

I don’t think I’ve ever encountered anyone with as much self-loathing as Tara. I don’t know what was done to her to cause this, nor what she’s done since then to build her own case against herself.  In her condition that day, I don’t even know what was grounded in fact and what was delusional.  But I do know what it’s like to feel undeserving of love because of mistakes you have made, and I do know how it feels to be told that you are deserving of love no matter what you have done.  It can transform lives.

In my post What Remains, I reflected that “nothing [feels] more worthy of doing than serving as God’s hands down here in this mess.”  The sense that God was present in the mess of her life is what opened the door for Tara to pray.  And I reflected that my work these days is “seeking to touch with love all that has been touched by fear.”  I can only hope that my small touch of love stays with Tara long after our time in that room, and that she remembers that she knows how to pray, so that she can feel the touch of God’s love once again.