My grandpa recently passed at 92. It was pretty chaotic because lots of people had pulled loved ones from hospice and care homes, so the home nurses and PSAs were stretched very thin and couldn’t come as often as they needed to.

A few days before he passed, the nurse who was supposed to come cancelled and couldn’t find someone to replace her for the same shift, so they had to wait for the next one and my mom filled in as caregiver and to give meds according to their instructions (this happened a few times). A nurse finally came and it was one my mom hadn’t seen before. Grandpa kept saying to her « Don’t I know you? I’m sure I know you from somewhere » and she would just reply no with a little wink. The thing is, she didn’t call him Mr Lastname, she called him a nickname based on his first name.

Her name was Rosie, which is his eldest sister’s name who had passed about 10 years ago. She was indigenous like him, which is rare in our area. The next day he fell asleep and didn’t wake up, but for the next couple of days he would call out in total fear « help me (my mom’s name) » over and over again. Just screaming it at the top of his lungs in his sleep. Finally he seemed to settle down and in a very calm voice he said « help me Rosie » and then passed away.

My mom’s tried to confirm if there was a nurse called Rosie who came to the house. They said they didn’t see one listed, but that didn’t mean anything because it was so chaotic. My mom firmly believes that it was his sister Rosie.