PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — Since opening their doors in spring 2018, the staff and volunteers at the Aroostook House of Comfort have served 70 individuals in need of hospice or respite care.
Margaret Wright and Virginia Packard, who passed away at the facility in January 2019 and August 2018, respectively, were among the people to take advantage of the special care afforded at the Aroostook House of Comfort in their final days.
Margaret Wright came to the hospice home on Jan. 4, 2019, after enduring multiple surgeries for oral cancer over three years. After Wright lost a tremendous amount of weight and hair from her chemotherapy treatment, the family’s medical provider suggested that they try respite care for five days to get her pain under control.
“For three out of the 3½ years that Margaret had cancer, she could not eat solid foods without being in pain, so I was her caregiver,” recalled her husband, Gene Wright. “Once you walk through the doors [of Aroostook House of Comfort] I got to be her husband again.”
The Aroostook House of Comfort began accepting patients in May 2018 after a nearly 10-year fundraising effort that the 501C3 organization Aroostook Hospice Foundation — led by Rick and Nancy Duncan and Dirk and Sharon Duncan of Presque Isle — spearheaded. After Rick Duncan’s mother passed away in May 2009, the couples decided that all people in Aroostook County needed to have access to a comfortable, homelike environment during their final months of life.
Today, the Aroostook House of Comfort, managed by Northern Light Home Care and Hospice, sits on 15 acres of property on 18 Green Hill Drive in Presque Isle and includes six bedrooms, an open-concept dining area, living room, chapel, conference room and children’s play area. All bedrooms feature a common area for family members to visit with one another, wheelchair accessible showers and bathrooms, couches and chairs that can double as beds, and a microwave and refrigerator.
It’s that homelike environment that Gene Wright and Judy Kenney, daughter of Packard, say helped both their families persist through the worst time in their lives.
“The staff and volunteers here are phenomenal,” said Kenney of Castle Hill. “My sister, Gloria, and I were taking turns sleeping on a roll-out bed. One night I was going to sleep on a chair but one of the nurses came and rolled out another bed. I got to sleep next to Mom and hold her hand.”
Packard died on Aug 12, 2018, at the age of 91. Prior to coming to the Aroostook House of Comfort, she had endured operations to fix complications from internal bleeding and had stayed at hospitals and a nursing home. Kenney noted that the physical setting of Aroostook House of Comfort, surrounded by an open backyard, garden and trees, helped to give her mother more comfort as doctors and nursing staff helped her pass away without the pain of her illness.
“Even in the four days we were here, there was always somebody popping in and asking, ‘How are you doing? Is there anything you need?’” Kenney said. “It was small things like that that I don’t think we would have seen anywhere else.”
Kenney is also a former high school classmate of Wright, who died at age 69 on Jan. 8, after spending five days at the Aroostook House of Comfort. Gene Wright said that he would recommend that families in similar circumstances reach out to the home not just because of what staff and volunteers do for patients but also for the comfort and care they provide to family members.
He remembered that the night before his wife died, she was sitting up in bed and singing her favorite gospel hymns. She later said, “I’ll never hear my boy sing again.” Wright was referring to Brian Mosher, one of the lead singers of local Motown band Star City Syndicate, whose music she loved.
Not long after, she and Gene’s daughter, Angela Wright, called Chris Morton, owner of KMH Music and a founding member of Star City Syndicate, to inquire about Mosher’s whereabouts.
“Fifteen minutes later, Brian walked into the room with his guitar,” Gene Wright said, tears welling up in his eyes from the memory. “He sang to her for two hours.”
Moments like the ones Kenney and Gene Wright have experienced are what has made the past year a rewarding one for staff, volunteers and Aroostook Hospice Foundation members. Rick Duncan said that interacting with patients and their families has allowed him to connect with people on a deeper level than anywhere else.
In order to keep those crucial end-of-life services available to people across Aroostook County, the Aroostook Hospice Foundation must raise $200,000 to $300,000 annually. Every June, foundation members host the Aroostook House of Comfort Golf Classic at the Presque Isle Country Club and they are currently thinking of other unique community events to host as fundraisers.
The foundation also allows family members to purchase commemorative stones for loved ones that are placed in a memorial garden outside the home. Many family members of patients also donate funds to the Aroostook House of Comfort that they collect during the funeral or celebration of life for their loved ones.
Rick Duncan said that the foundation accepts donations from all members of the public. He hopes that, despite the difficulties of talking about end-of-life care, more people will become educated about how such care can help ease the emotional burdens that families face during times of crisis.
“The amount of support we have received from the community has been amazing,” Rick Duncan said. “I think people like Gene and Judy are going to be our strongest advocates.”
