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In praise of ARCH angels (7 photos)

People with loved ones who passed through ARCH Hospice shared their stories at a charity walk on Sunday

People with loved ones who passed through ARCH Hospice teared up talking about their experiences with the end-of-life care facility on Sunday at the 2016 RBC Hike for the Hospice, an annual fundraiser.

Michael Butt, at 53, was diagnosed with cancer last year and then spent his last two weeks of life at ARCH.

Eileen Doyle, his mother, and Terry Vaillancourt, his sister, walked in Butt's memory Sunday.

After a car accident when he was younger Butt suffered chronic pain.

Over the years he became addicted to pain medication and, along with his own mental illnesses, he became socially marginalized and started living on fixed income and working with mental health organizations.

Doyle and Vaillancourt said for years no one really took him seriously when he complained about an increasing pain throughout his body — they thought he was just an addict that wanted more pills.

“He lost weight and nobody thought it could be medical issue. Instead, he was treated more like a drug addict . He became stigmatized and lost in the system,” said Vaillancourt.

Finally, a case manager with a mental health organization fiercely advocated for Butt and demanded some thorough tests be done and that’s when they found out he had stage 4 lung cancer and only weeks to live and was admitted into ARCH.

Butt had lived a long life of extreme suffering. and at ARCH they had “the unlimited ability to keep him pain free” and so he went from living a life of hardship to having everything taken care of for him in is final days.

"We put him in front of the fireplace in the common room and he literally had tears in his eyes and said ‘They’re going to have to evict me from here because I’m never going to leave. I don’t want to ever leave.’" said Vaillancourt whose eyes were watering herself as she spoke.

Doyle and Vaillancourt spoke highly of the 24-hour care, treatment of pain, compassion of the workers, and how ARCH workers went above and beyond to meet almost any need a person has.

Vaillancourt remembers Butt not really being able to eat much but the chef would make and hand deliver special pancakes and blueberry-shakes even though he could only finish a third of his meals.

“After Michael was at ARCH for a couple of days we saw our old Michael again (for the first time in years). He was smiling, his eyes were bright. He had such a soft heart; he was a big cuddly Teddy Bear,” said Doyle.

Lori Jarrett’s wound was still quite raw as her best friend Dave Lapensee passed away about one month ago from brain cancer after spending over two months in ARCH.

“Dave was a very proud person but all he kept saying was ‘This place has given me dignity, even when I didn’t feel like I had any' — That was his saying about ARCH. He was embarrassed at first but the people there made him feel like he was part of community and family,” said Jarrett.

Jarrett remembers that Lapensee really wanted to smoke but couldn’t get out of bed so they found him a special wheelchair and by using a painful lifting process that included a harness, they accommodated him.

“I couldn’t have asked for anything better at all," she said.

Carrie Ontonovich has had a father, a cousin and an Aunt pass through ARCH.

She remembers that it took four ARCH staff members over an hour to get him dressed and ready just so he could spend three minutes outside in the fresh air and that they were more than happy to do it.

Like all the other people interviewed, Ontonovich mentioned the great lengths that ARCH staff went to provide the best meals possible to residents.

During his stay, her father was starving but couldn’t even move his mouth.

“My father had cancer and he couldn’t eat. The staff made a special trip to Ricardo’s in the Station Mall and bought my father gelato ice cream and fed it to him with a cue tip. So he had the joy of that sweetness and the nice flavors and the coolness in his mouth and no one asked them to do that, they just did it.”

Her father became unresponsive two days later and then passed away.

“The people of ARCH are absolute angels,” she said.

ARCH doesn’t just support those who are dying but also their families long after the loved one has passed on.

Johneen Jones’ husband Robert passed away in 2010 after spending his final days at ARCH.

Next year would have been their 50th wedding anniversary and she said losing her best friend never gets any easier.

Jones still goes to ARCH for mediation sessions and to socialize and get support from workers and volunteers.

Eventually, once she’s strong enough, she plans to become a volunteer herself.

230 people showed up to walk in Sunday’s charity event and about $28,000 was raised, $20,000 of that coming from the Royal Bank of Canada and its staff.

ARCH organizers said they aim to raise $750,000 through community raised funds and donations and that these funds account for about half of their annual budget.


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Jeff Klassen

About the Author: Jeff Klassen

Jeff Klassen is a SooToday staff reporter who is always looking for an interesting story
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