Compassionate, informed advice about healthcare decision making

Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Book Review: Nothing to Fear: Demystifying Death to Live More Fully by @hospicenursejulie

Posted by

Perhaps Hospice Nurse Julie’s book should come with a TRIGGER WARNING: Do not read this book if you do not like the words “Clean, Safe, and Comfortable.” More on that in a minute.

Nothing to Fear: Demystifying Death to Live More by Julie McFadden, RN, is the latest in a long line of books showing the way to a more peaceful and more meaningful dying experience. Why another death and dying book? Why not? Sitting at #8 on the New York Times “Advice” best-seller list, Nothing to Fear is full of advice about navigating the last six months of life under hospice care.

McFadden is better known as @hospicenursejulie to her followers on Instagram (357K), YouTube (432K) and TikTok (1.5M). An influencer with numbers like that has a ready-made public to drive her book sales. It works the other way too. In a way, her fans helped write the book. She often refers to questions she received from followers or experiences they shared with her. Here’s an example:

“Some people ask me, ‘Why is it so important for people to know that they’re going to die?’ It’s a great question. When people choose to learn about their particular illness and what their death might look like, their fears often are eased as they acknowledge what’s happening. The people who are willing to discuss end-of-life issues and to accept that they’re going to die seem to carry about them a certain type of freedom, and they truly live their last days well. Their fear tends to decrease, and they tend to be freer and more full of life, even though they’re dying.”

I listened to McFadden read the text on Audible my first time through. She comes across as the same nurse Julie we know on social media. I don’t think any actress could have captured the conviction, empathy, and compassion we hear in Julie’s own voice. Typical of me, I liked this book so much I bought it a second time in print form. There were too many quotes I JUST HAD to have.

A Very Practical Book

At bottom, Nothing to Fear is a very practical book — a sort of “how to” guide to a peaceful death on hospice. It is user-friendly with lots of lists with numbers or bullets. Here’s one of my favorites from the “Grief” chapter:

THINGS NOT TO SAY WHEN SOMEONE IS GRIEVING

  • “At least she had a long life.”
  • “God needed her in heaven more than we needed her here.”
  • “Everything works together for good for those who love God.”
  • “He’s in a better place.”
  • “There’s a reason for everything.”

Three Themes Stand Out

  1. @hospicenursejulie

    Is the patient “clean, safe, and comfortable”? The answers to this question are always on minds of those on the hospice team. Julie reminds family members to strive to always make sure the patient is clean, safe, and comfortable.

  2. Dying peacefully can be like the process of childbirth. Nurse Julie is not the first to make this comparison. The hospice movement grew out of the same mindset as the “natural childbirth” revolution in the 1960s. Probably the first book to start us thinking about death positively, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s On Death and Dying, came out in 1969. Just like a baby “knows” how to be born, the dying body knows how to die. “Listen to the body” we read often in these pages. Again, from nurse Julie:

 

“After years as a hospice nurse, I can share this strange but true fact: our bodies are biologically built to die.

  1. We need to talk about death and dying for a peaceful death to occur. The quote above about why it is important for people to know they are going to die comes from the chapter titled, “Death Is Not a Dirty Word.” In another chapter titled “Advice for the Dying” we find:

 

“When you look death in the face, it loses its power to bully you. If your death has not yet been part of the conversation in your family or in your home, then your loved ones may not know it’s okay to talk about it with you. Bring it up first, so they know you’re okay with it, and when you do, don’t sanitize it. Use all the d-words: dying, death, dead, died.”

Spirituality in Nothing to Fear

As a hospice chaplain, I am always on the lookout for how an author handles things spiritual. Nurse Julie seems to be so typical of the scores of hospice nurses I have worked with. It varies widely, but 25% to 75% of hospice patients decline visits from the hospice chaplain. Therefore, often patients and their families get spiritual support from the nurse.

Throughout Nothing to Fear we see nurse Julie addressing spiritual concerns of her patients and their families. She devotes a whole chapter, “Deathbed Phenomena,” to stories about patients having visions of long dead relatives. Here’s her understanding of these experiences returning to her theme of the metaphor of birth:

“As much as we’d like to, we simply don’t understand everything about these encounters. They’re mysteries. For my part, I can say that my own few experiences have given me nothing but confidence that a better world awaits us. I do believe that there’s an afterlife because of experiences like these.… In many ways, it feels a lot like the wonder of birth. When I get to see a baby being born, I weep from joy. I look at that baby and wonder, ‘Where did you come from?’ When someone dies, I have that same feeling I get when babies are born. It’s a feeling of home. Of comfort.”

In the chapter titled “What the Dying Process Looks Like,” Julie encourages families to pause just after their person dies and allow this “sacred” moment to sink in. In a section headed, “Death Is Not an Emergency,” we find this:

“Whether you’re with your loved one when they die or you discover that they have died after the fact, there is nothing you have to do immediately. Simply notice that what has happened is sacred. Death is a natural part of life, and you have, in whatever way, participated in your loved one’s journey toward this sacred moment.”

This Book Is Just That Good

I place Nothing to Fear up there with Dr. Ira Byock’s Dying Well (1998), Dr. Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal (2017), and Katy Butler’s The Art of Dying Well (2020). This book is just that good. Nurse Julie combines the powerful bedside stories of Ira Byock and the boatloads of practical advice of Katy Butler.

Even with all these wonderful books, we still see a lot of unnecessary suffering at the end of life. Hopefully by exposing the TikTok generation to a more peaceful way of dying, Nurse Julie can help relieve more of that suffering.

___________________

Author Chaplain Hank Dunn, MDiv, has sold over 4 million copies of his books Hard Choices for Loving People and Light in the Shadows (also available on Amazon).

Follow Hank: LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube

Guest on “Seeing Death Clearly” Podcast

Posted by

I am the guest this week on the “Seeing Death Clearly” Podcast with host Jill McClennen. We talk about making end-of-life decisions and my Hard Choices for Loving People book.

Here is the link to the podcast on Jill’s website: https://www.endoflifeclarity.com/seeing-death-clearly-podcast

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/seeing-death-clearly/id1661355352?i=1000652400832

Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6BxGAdDYkkfcXKue3RUQca

_____________________

Author Chaplain Hank Dunn, MDiv, has sold over 4 million copies of his books Hard Choices for Loving People and Light in the Shadows (also available on Amazon).

Follow Hank: LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube

“God’s Child” Holding Still in Jail

Posted by

“Before every person there marches an angel proclaiming, ‘Behold, the image of God.’” —Jewish Proverb

It’s Wednesday. Any Wednesday. 2:00 PM.

Photo by RDNE Stock project:

I am sitting in silence with inmates at the Lafayette County Detention Center in Oxford, Mississippi. The local pronunciation of the name is “la-FAY-et.” The men are here awaiting trial, sentencing, or their “more permanent home” in the Mississippi or federal prison systems.

You can stand at the front door of my church, St. Peter’s Episcopal, and see the jail less than a half-block away. Some men in the church have been coming here for years, doing various outreach like starting a library or bringing Christmas cards for the inmates to send to friends and families.

Weekly Centering Prayer

About four years ago, I joined the group in a weekly “centering prayer” session, a form of silent meditation. Twice a month, we bring communion. I previously wrote a blog about me offering “The Serenity Prayer” to those gathered.

Our gathering was modeled after a group at Folsom Prison in California. The Prison Contemplative Fellowshiphas a great website with resources for those who take on a project like ours. They have also posted a 22-minute documentary video about the Folsom work titled Holding Still.

“God’s Child”

Ken begins every session here in Oxford by saying, “We want you to know that we know you are here. You are not forgotten.” In my mind, I recall the words of Jesus, “I was in prison, and you visited me.”

As the men gather each week, we hand everyone a name badge. Instead of “Hello, My Name is Hank,” each one says simply, “God’s Child.” We all wear one. Incarcerated and free.

The Jewish proverb says it best: “Before every person there marches an angel proclaiming, ‘Behold, the image of God.’” It refers to the story in the Hebrew scriptures about how humans were created in the image of God. All of us. Us do-gooder Episcopalian men and those jailed men — all the same image of God.

On the weeks we bring communion, we read from the Book of Common Prayer as part of the service:

“Lord Jesus, for our sake you were condemned as a criminal: Visit our jails and prisons with your pity and judgment. Remember all prisoners and bring the guilty to repentance and amendment of life according to your will and give them hope for their future. When any are held unjustly, bring them release; forgive us, and teach us to improve our justice. Remember those who work in these institutions, keep them humane and compassionate, and save them from becoming brutal or callous. And since what we do for those in prison, O Lord, we do for you, constrain us to improve their lot. All this we ask for your mercy’s sake. Amen.”

_____________________

Author Chaplain Hank Dunn, MDiv, has sold over 4 million copies of his books Hard Choices for Loving Peopleand Light in the Shadows (also available on Amazon).

Follow Hank: LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube

The First Stage is “Denial”

Posted by

“Denial is a protective device, a shock absorber for the soul. It prevents us from acknowledging reality until we feel prepared to cope with that particular reality.…  We do not let go of our need to deny by beating ourselves into acceptance; we let go of our need to deny by allowing ourselves to become safe and strong enough to cope with the truth.”  Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go

“Denial is a sacred place. Denial allows us to stay in control. It is a ledge we sit on above a cliff. Sometimes we need to stay there a little longer.” Chaplain Rev. John, quoted in “Finding Faith Through Listening,” by Andrea L. Merrill, MD, JAMA Online, July 13, 2023

Denial can cut off meaningful conversations

We were told to take off our hospice name tags before entering the home because the wife didn’t want her husband to know he was dying. On my one and only visit into the home, the man appeared yellow because of the progression of liver cancer. Even his eyes were yellow, and it turned out he was within days of dying.

When I first walked into the home, I sat alone with the wife in the living room. She was very comfortable talking about her husband’s impending death. I asked her, “What is all this about not wearing our pins or talking about death? Does your husband know he is dying?” She said, “Oh, yes, he knows he is dying.” I asked, “How do you know he knows?” She responded, “Because he asked me.” I asked how she responded to him and she had told him, “Not while I’m around.”

I suggested, “What if you had said, ‘Yes, you are dying and I’m going to miss you. We have had a wonderful marriage and I love you.’” She said, “I couldn’t do that. That would be too painful.”

Living in the shadow of a life-threatening illness is difficult. Worse yet, when it becomes clear that there is going to be no recovery, we naturally resist any thought of what really lies ahead. Understandably, this wife wanted to avoid such a painful discussion. That is why we have such a strong urge to deny the reality of the incurable nature of the disease. We want to avoid the emotional pain of saying good-bye. The man died while his wife was at the grocery store—remember she said, “Not while I’m around.”

Denial is normal

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash

Denying the reality of the terminal phase of a disease is normal, expected, and perhaps even necessary. It gets us through the initial shock of such a fate. Acknowledging the truth may cause anger and depression, which are, again, normal responses.

The father of a twenty-nine-year-old son who died of leukemia told me, “I lived in denial of the certainty of my son’s death to the very end. I was completely surprised when he died. I feel so guilty about that denial.” I thought guilt was a strange feeling for such a natural response as denial, so I asked him about that. He said, “I felt guilty because if I had accepted that he was dying, there were so many other things I would have said to him, but I lost that opportunity.”

[This blog post was adapted from my Light in the Shadows: Meditations While Living with a Life-Threating Illness.]

________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

Words Matter: “Want” and “Need”

Posted by

The ethics committee turned to me, “Chaplain Dunn, we will have you talk to all the patients and families about ‘No CPR’ orders and advance directives.” I was just six months into a part-time chaplain’s position for which I had no training. The arc of my career was set for the next forty years in this one assignment.

Four decades later, I am still learning our words matter.

“Need” implies you have no choice

I read a recent JAMA Online article titled “Reconsidering the Language of Serious Illness,” which illustrates that when healthcare professionals use the word “need,” aggressive treatment is often the result. Example statements from the article:

  • “If her breathing gets any worse, she will need to be intubated.”
  • “He needs a central line, a special IV catheter in his neck, so we can give him blood pressure medicines.”
  • “If she doesn’t make any urine soon, she will need dialysis.”
  • “If she can’t be extubated soon, she will need a trach.”

The article’s authors argue that once you say the word “need,” it implies that the family has no choice but to proceed with the treatment. Who would deny their mother what she NEEDS?

“To need is to lack something essential”

From the article: To need is to lack something essential. As clinicians, we regularly use the word need to think about and describe the condition of patients with acute serious illness. These patients lack something essential for survival, and clinicians have the technologies and therapies to sustain their lives. So need rolls off our tongues as a shorthand to convey our clinical assessments of patients with acute life-threatening illness.”

Their suggestion for changing the language: When a patient is facing a life-threatening illness, instead of saying she ‘needs to be intubated,’ we suggest that clinicians say, ‘Her illness is getting worse. I would like to talk with you about what this means and what to do next.’”

This language change opens the conversation up to more options than just “the need to be intubated.” What does the patient think about their current situation? What are her preferences about being kept alive on a machine? What are her chances that she will ever get off the vent? Intubation is one possible choice, but others are equally possible, including shifting the focus from cure to comfort.

Changing “What does the patient WANT?” to “What does the patient THINK…”

Six years ago, I made a significant change in the language in one sentence in my Hard Choices for Loving People book. Once again, a medical journal article convinced me to change a question I had used for almost three decades. I wrote about this in a previous blog, “You Can’t Get What You Want.

Since the first edition of Hard Choices in 1990, I have included “What does the patient want?” as one of five questions to ask as an aid to making end-of-life decisions. In 2017, I changed it to: “What does the patient think about their current and probable future condition?”

A career using language to help with end-of-life decisions

Soon after I became a part-time nursing home chaplain in 1983, our administration formed an ethics committee. Virginia had just passed a “Natural Death Act,” which gave patients a right in the code to refuse treatment and provided a form (e.g., “living will”) to express their treatment preferences.

The committee included the director of nursing, the medical director, a lawyer, an administrator, and me. In response to the new law, our plan was to inform all patients and their families about advance directives and the option of a “No CPR” order. But who would deliver the information?

The committee turned to me, “Chaplain Dunn, we will have you talk to all the patients and families about ‘No CPR’ orders and advance directives.” I had no healthcare experience and had yet to take basic chaplain training. So, I learned how to talk to patients and families…by talking to patients and families

Over the next year, we went from less than 10% of our patients having an advance directive and/or “No CPR” order to over 80%. And I learned the importance of using my words to help the process along.

We published the first edition of Hard Choices for Loving People seven years later.

[Cover Photo by Kampus Production via Pexels]

________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

Thoughts on turning 75: Is it Leaving a Legacy or Denial of Death?

Posted by

“The [gentleman] doth protest too much, methinks.” Shakespeare

I just celebrated my 75th birthday with my children, their spouses, and grandchildren. Twelve of us gathered in Leesburg, Virginia. The highlight of the trip for me came on Friday night as I gave each of them a copy of my recently completed “Spiritual Autobiography.” It runs seventeen pages of 12-point type. But wait… there’s more.

A lifetime of writing left for “whoever”

In 2020, I completed the first phase of gathering my writings in a 3-inch binder called My Life as a Journey: Hank Dunn, 1948 – ____. I printed out every document I could find of my writings, 767 pages worth, going back to the 1970s. I will add a couple hundred more pages in the coming months.

The thought is to leave a paper copy of my thoughts and the experiences in my (so far) three-quarters of a century. One could say, “Oh, Hank must be afraid of dying because he is going to such lengths to make sure he is not forgotten.” Okay, maybe that is true. I have always said that I won’t know how I will handle my own impending death until I get that terminal diagnosis, which is still yet to be on the horizon.

But I have another motive for leaving such a significant paper trail. Here is an excerpt of the preface of my spiritual autobiography addressed to my kids and grands:

“You might not read this in the coming days. You don’t have to read it at all. I just want you to have it in case you are ever interested. I think back to how I was not curious about the lives of my parents and grandparents while they were still alive and of sound mind. Now, I can think of tons of questions like, ‘Dad, what was it like for you after your father died when you were ten years old?’ I never asked him. I wish I knew.”

I am just now reading The Worm at the Core: On the Role of Death in Life, written by three social psychologists in 2015. They build on the work of Ernest Becket’s Denial of Death (1974). The Worm goes to great lengths to prove that we all live in terror of death and that our actions and those of the culture we inhabit seek to comfort us. NOT ME.

Doth I protest too much? I like to think that, in my heart of hearts, I am leaving this extensive paper trail of my life and thinking and beliefs in case my children, grandchildren, or other descendants are ever curious about me. I am very comfortable with my deepest convictions, even though some would say they are not orthodox. Perhaps there will be other seekers of spirituality in my family who would benefit from reading about my path.

I have no control over whether anyone cares about what makes me tick. I cast these words out into the sea of my legacy, perhaps to drift on as flotsam. It’s what I can do in these last years of my life. Well, hopefully years.

__________________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

More Nothing than Something — True Solace is Finding None

Posted by

I was such a scaredy-cat at 8 years old. All I can remember of two particular movies in 1956 was that I kept my eyes closed during the entirety of each film. I have just discovered, through Wikipedia, that Earth Vs. The Flying Saucers and The Werewolf were released together as a double feature that summer. Who knew?

Bingo. Those were the two movies of my childhood fears. I was sitting through 160+ minutes of terror.

From my youth, outer space and the heavens brought a recuring sense of awe. Yes, the fear of flying saucers invading was real. But, there was also a sense of reverence as I gazed into the night sky. I was pretty small in the vastness of the stars above.

I just placed the latest “deep field” photo from the new James Webb Space Telescope to my home screen on my iPhone. This is a time exposure photo of a portion of the night sky the size of a grain of sand held at arms-length. Thousands of galaxies appear as we look back billions of years. Each galaxy has billions of stars — each star is not unlike our sun.

We come out of childhood, hopefully, putting away childhood fears. We gain a sense of control of our own lives. I am somebody. That is, until….

That is, until something reminds of how small we really are — how we really are not in control. Serious illness ranks up there with things that shake us to our core.

The Deep Field photo brings so many thoughts to my mind. What is really amazing is that there is more of nothing than there is of something. More empty space than stars. Perhaps “nothingness” is more important than “something.”

Even down at the microscopic level, scientists tell us that the is more empty space in each atom than solid matter. Doesn’t make sense when you fall on asphalt after a spill off your bike, but, I have to take the experts at their word.

The point is that emptiness and nothingness are where we live. Yes, I am glad I have family, friends, community, and this beautiful earth to enjoy. But, I also feel at home in the vastness of empty space or the silence which is a space empty of sound.

It is the message of the mystics and the dying have been telling us since the dawn of time. I am reminded of Gretel Ehrlich’s comment, “True solace is finding none. Then, of course, it is everywhere.”

________________________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

On The Other Hand, “I don’t want to die at home.”

Posted by

Conventional wisdom says, “A good death is at home with my family gathered around me.”

An alternative view says, “I don’t want to die at home.”

How many times have we seen in an obituary, “He died peacefully at home with his family gathered around him.” Families wear this as a badge of honor. They provided the best of care and met the patient’s wishes to remain at home.

Home is generally considered the preferred place to die. For the first time in generations, more people are dying at home than in the hospital*. I have seen some studies that consider dying at home, as opposed to dying in the hospital, as a “good outcome.”

“Not so fast, my friend.”

“Not so fast, my friend,” as Lee Corso would say on College Game Day. Many people die away from home by choice. As I said in a previous blog, there are some people who just feel more comfortable dying in the hospital. Some families do not want to live in a home where a family member died.

I have a friend who is in his 70s and his preference is to die away from home. He is in a second marriage, this time to a widow. He does not want to put his wife through the caregiving burden again.

Besides, he told me, he has so far paid for long term care insurance for years and would hate for all that money to go to waste. With the insurance, he is prepared financially to live for years in assisted living or a nursing home. “I will not put her through that again,” he said.

*See a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine, “Where Americans Die — Is There Really ‘No Place Like Home’?”

________________________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

________________________________________

Cover Photo by Zac Gudakov on Unsplash

Curious After Seven Decades Above Ground

Posted by

Hank and his sister Janice with their brother Dennis two weeks before he died

My birthday passed last week. Number 74. Now, a bitter-sweet day.

Bitter-sweet because I miss my younger brother, Dennis. He died on my birthday five years ago. When his wife called my sister to tell her Dennis had died, she said, “Don’t tell Hank. It will ruin his birthday.” She was right. My sister immediately called me, and it ruined my birthday.

The day now brings the appropriate mix of gratitude for another year of life and grief that my brother is no longer here to call me with birthday wishes. Bitter-sweet.

I find I’m getting more curious about myself as I settle into over seven decades above ground.  What am I curious about? About me. My thinking. My spiritual beliefs. I’m curious how can I still find new ways of thinking about and experiencing things spiritual. Curious how I find new ways of verbalizing these experiences.

An old man listening to books

Hank’s 74-year-old self

Last week, I told the story of an old man at the nursing home where I was the chaplain. I was in my 30s and he was in his 90s. The story was about his loveless marriage (according to his wife), but I mentioned that he listened to recorded books.

Every day, he’d be bent over in his wheelchair, leaning down, straining to hear history books being read on a record player. As a young man, I thought, “What is he doing? What is this 90-year-old man going to do with this new knowledge?” He talked very little. He was years past teaching children, or anyone for that matter. He just sat in his room and listened as the day crept slowly by. Now, I think, “I am the old man!”

You start dying slowly

Late last year I was introduced to the poem “You Start Dying Slowly” by Martha Medeiros. In Portuguese it is A Morte Devagar — “A slow death”. This poem meant so much to me that I printed it out and glued it to the inside of the journal I just started in November.

Here are a few lines:

You start dying slowly…
If you do not risk what is safe for the uncertain,
If you do not go after a dream,
If you do not allow yourself,
At least once in your lifetime,
To run away from sensible advice…

Referring to the poem, I wrote in the journal on November 21, 2021, “I am profoundly moved by this piece. I still marvel that, at my age, I am still wanting to make something of my life. I still struggle with taking risks.” Weeks later, on January 4th I wrote, “‘Who are you God and who am I?’ St. Francis said and I BOTH say. I am almost 74 and have not settled this.”

My 24-year-old self meets my 74-year-old self — it is not pretty

Hank’s 24-year-old self

Fifty years ago, if my 24-year-old self met my now 74-year-old self, he would have called me a heretic. I was so certain about things at 24. Now, being “right” is less important. Rather, following the teaching of Jesus, right action is more important that right theology.

Now, questions are more important than answers. Curiosity feels better than certainty. I am the old man listening to books. I listen not to know more but to be comfortable with not knowing. The mystics are my favorite guides. Thomas Merton summed up, for me, the mystery of knowing and not knowing God:

 

Thomas Merton

“Your brightness is my darkness. I know nothing of You and, by myself, I cannot even imagine how to go about knowing You. If I imagine You, I am mistaken. If I understand You, I am deluded. If I am conscious and certain I know You, I am crazy. The darkness is enough.”

 

__________________________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

My 2021 books on a Civil War that will not go away

Posted by

Sometimes a wound is so deep and unhealed that I can’t stop myself from trying to understand what it all means. One only has to look at the images of the Confederate flag being carried into the U.S. Capitol last January 6th to know this war has not gone away.

“This war” is, of course, the American Civil War. In 2021, I again read books looking at “this mighty scourge,” as Lincoln called it in his second inaugural. I recorded a brief video at William Faulkner’s home. I quoted him, “For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it’s still not yet two o’clock on that July afternoon in 1863” (Intruder in the Dust, 1948). I was that lad growing up in the Deep South. I knew Pickett’s charge on the third day at Gettysburg was the “high water mark” of the Confederate nation.

I started my review of my 2021 reading with spiritual books and then books on science. Here are my Civil War reads:

Grant (2017) By Ron Chernow

I listened to all 48 hours of this 900+ page book. It was worth every minute. Grant overcame so many setbacks to succeed as a general and President. Most significantly, according to Chernow, was his conquering his struggles with alcohol, a fact he does not mention in his own memoir. Had the Civil War never happened, history might not have known the name of U.S. Grant. It was his strategy to cut off the Southern states from beyond the Mississippi River with the fall of Vicksburg (July 1863), send Sherman through Georgia (1864), and capture Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox. There was no finer moment in his life than when he offered generous terms of surrender to Lee. He hoped to begin the healing of a fractured nation. Sadly, as President, he had to fight the South again as it rose in the K.K.K. We are fortunate, as a nation, that Grant and Lincoln rose to the top when we needed them.

Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause (2021) By Ty Seidule

Author Ty Seidule was born on July 3rd into a family culture steeped in the myth of righteous cause for which we Southerners fought. When people said, “too bad you weren’t born on the 4th,” he’d reply that he was glad to have been born on the day of Pickett’s charge (there it is again). Seidule rose through the ranks in the U.S. Army and taught at West Point. Through his academic research and soul-searching, he concluded that the “lost cause” myth of the South was wrong. According to Seidule, the Civil War was about slavery and the Confederate soldiers who took up arms against the U.S. government were traitors. He makes a compelling argument that we no longer need to honor these traitors with monuments or U.S. Army bases.

 

 

In the Hands of Providence: Joshua L. Chamberlain and the American Civil War (1992) By Alice Rains Trulock

Like most, I knew of Chamberlain for only a few hours of his life on July 2, 1863, at Gettysburg. He commanded the 20th Maine at the extreme end of the Union line on Little Round Top. His troops were under repeated assault and running out of ammunition. Had he failed in defending his position, the entire U.S. Army on the field could have been destroyed in a flanking maneuver by the advancing Confederates. He ordered his men to fix bayonets, and they charged downhill, capturing more than 100 Southerners and saving the day. Many books and movies have captured this one moment. He was a college professor before the war. He became a college president and served four years as governor after returning to Maine. One other moving scene in Chamberlain’s military career was the last day of the war. He was the commander in charge of the ceremony at Appomattox, where the defeated rebels would surrender their arms. In the spirit that Grant set in the terms of surrender, Chamberlain ordered his men to salute their defeated foes, now countrymen once again.

Baptized in Blood: The Religion of the Lost Cause, 1865-1920 (1980, 2009) By Charles Reagan Wilson

With all believing God is on their side in a war, it is especially hard for the losers to explain what happened. This presented an exceptional problem for the dominant version of Christianity in the South (evangelical Protestant). In their view, the Yankees were more secular, more liberal, more urban, and less devoted Christians. This book by Charles Wilson, a former professor at the University of Mississippi and fellow church member with me in Oxford, explains the mental and theological gymnastics my Southern ancestors went through to explain how God was on their side. God sided with the South because their cause was righteous, but the North’s industrial strength was too much even for God. Dr. Wilson recently gave three lectures on this topic at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Oxford, and they are on YouTube. If there is any doubt that Southerners saw their cause as God’s cause, you need to look no further than two blocks from where Dr. Wilson lectured at St. Peter’s. On the Confederate monument (1907) on the Square is the inscription “They gave their lives for a just and holy cause.”

Fighting to defend slavery was “A JUST AND HOLY CAUSE.” Monument on the Square, Oxford, Mississippi

__________________________________________

Chaplain Hank Dunn is the author of Hard Choices for Loving People: CPR, Feeding Tubes, Palliative Care, Comfort Measures and the Patient with a Serious Illness and Light in the Shadows. Together they have sold over 4 million copies. You can purchase his books at hankdunn.com or on Amazon.

 

Quality of Life Publishing Logo

Quality of Life Publishing Co. is the proud publisher of Hank’s books, as well as other branded educational materials for health care & end-of-life care.

www.QOLpublishing.com

Copyright 2024, Hank Dunn. All rights reserved. Website design by Brian Joseph Studios

Volume Discounts for Branded Book Orders

Minimum quantity for branded books is 100. English and Spanish branded books are sold separately. Click here for more information or contact us with questions.

Black

  • 100 to 249 copies: $4.50 each
  • 250 to 499 copies: $3.50 each
  • 500 to 999 copies: $3.00 each
  • 1000 to 1499 copies: $2.25 each
  • 1500 to 1999 copies: $1.75 each
  • 2000 to 3999 copies: $1.60 each
  • 4000+ copies: $1.45 each

Color

  • 100 to 249 copies: $7.00 each
  • 250 to 499 copies: $4.50 each
  • 500 to 999 copies: $3.50 each
  • 1000 to 1499 copies: $2.50 each
  • 1500 to 1999 copies: $2.00 each
  • 2000 to 3999 copies: $1.85 each
  • 4000+ copies: $1.70 each


Volume Discounts for Unbranded Book Orders

Each title/language sold separately.

  • 1 to 9 copies: $8.00 each
  • 10 to 24 copies: $5.75 each
  • 25 to 49 copies: $4.50 each
  • 50 to 99 copies: $4.00 each
  • 100 to 249 copies: $3.50 each
  • 250 to 499 copies: $3.00 each
  • 500 to 999 copies: $2.50 each
  • 1000 to 1499 copies: $2.00 each
  • 1500 to 1999 copies: $1.50 each
  • 2000 to 3999 copies: $1.35 each
  • 4000+ copies: $1.20 each