At one point, Charlene West and Harvey Swiger were battling different types of cancers at the same time.

She was diagnosed with breast cancer in July 2021, and he was diagnosed with small cell lung cancer in November that year.

West said she was taking him from their home in Austin to the Don and Dana Myers Cancer Center in Seymour for treatments, and she was traveling down to the Brown Cancer Center in Louisville, Kentucky for her own treatments.

“It was just a battle going back and forth,” she said. “I just went to our churches and kept praying and believing and hoping and praying.”

She had three surgeries to remove lymph nodes, and fortunately, she’s cancer-free now, but she’s still doing physical therapy and acupuncture.

“It was really hard to me because I don’t get out here and tell everyone,” West said. “I held it back, but I told my kids, ‘You all keep working and I’m just going on down there.’”

Swiger, on the other hand, wound up receiving care from Schneck Medical Center Hospice a few weeks before he died in May 2022.

“We’ve been in and out of relationships all of our lives since we were 15 years old,” West said, smiling. “I was his caregiver. To me, I just take it one day by day.”

As hospice nurses got Swiger elevated on his right medicine, West made sure to be there with him to just sit and talk. Their son and Swiger’s brother were there for support, too.

“I wanted him to die like a man, have his morals and dignity,” West said.

On Monday, Swiger was among nearly 200 people who had received hospice care and died in 2022 being honored by Schneck Hospice during its annual Luminary Memorial.

A hallway inside the hospital was lined with bags with cutouts of butterflies and the patient’s name on the front and a battery-powered candle inside. Butterflies are a symbol for hospice.

Along with the bags, hospice staff and volunteers presented families with an ornament with the message “Those we love don’t go away. They walk beside us every day. Unseen, unheard but always near, still loved, still missed and very dear.”

Plus, there were people playing music on a keyboard and a violin, refreshments were served and GriefShare information was available.

West said it was nice to receive an invitation from Schneck Hospice to attend.

“I really appreciate it myself because it does help ease it a little bit,” she said. “A lot of that stuff, I went through by myself because I didn’t want my kids to be stressed out, and I just kept a lot of it to myself. But I would go to my two preachers and I would talk to them a lot. They helped me a lot. Hospice, I would tell them a lot, too, because I always kept them up to whatever was going on. They helped me out a lot there.”

This was the third year for the event. For the nearly 20 years prior, Schneck Hospice conducted an annual dinner in December to remember hospice patients who died that year.

In 2021 and 2022, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and budget cuts, it was changed to a Luminary Walk.

This year, the name was changed to Luminary Memorial.

“We learned from some of our families as we made follow-up calls for absent RSVP cards that some folks thought the event required walking, as in laps, and I can see how that could be misunderstood,” said Joyce Corya, volunteer coordinator for Schneck Hospice.

Now that there aren’t as many precautions due to the pandemic, Corya said the families could be greeted by hospice volunteers and staff, given a small gift and then guided to find the luminary with their family member’s name on the bag.

The families also could reconnect with the hospice staff members who cared for their loved one.

“We want the community to realize that when a person or their family reaches out to Schneck Medical Center Hospice for end-of-life care that we remember and respect that each patient is a person with a family and friends and a connection to our community,” Corya said. “The hospice staff and volunteers in turn become a part of that connection.”

The staff and volunteers can see how the family members are doing in their healing cycle.

“The Luminary Memorial is meant to be an outreach to families to show respect for the one they have lost and to give each party — the family caregivers and the hospice caregivers — a chance to reconnect at a less emotional time to say, ‘Thank you. We appreciate you,’ to share a hug, a laugh, a tear and to let them know hospice continues to be here for them for bereavement support,” Corya said. “The event means a lot to those who participate.”

Attendees are reminded of opportunities like GriefShare bereavement classes, which are 13-week sessions that follow curriculum consisting of a video, a workbook and discussion.

Schneck Hospice is hosting seven different 13-week classes in 2023. Corya said some are offered in the morning and some are in the evening, and they are being offered in Jackson and Jennings counties.

“Other area churches are offering these classes, as well, that are not affiliated with hospice but using the same curriculum,” she said.

Debbie Hemmelgarn is a volunteer with Schneck Hospice and facilitates GriefShare at The Point in Seymour. She said her husband died of COVID-19 in 2021, her mother-in-law died of Alzheimer’s disease the next month and her mother died in July 2022.

“Then I took my dad to GriefShare, so GriefShare has been awesome,” she said. “I went like three times, and then now, I’m helping to facilitate it for others that have been through loss.”

She said it means a lot to her to help others.

“It’s a really great program to help with the different things you go through as you deal with your loss, and I want to help others, help them through their grief,” Hemmelgarn said. “If I hadn’t have gone, there would have been a lot of things that would have been harder to get through, and I would like to see others help it grow and to help them (realize) you don’t get over it. It’s something that you get through.”

She said Schneck Hospice covers the cost of the materials, so it’s a free program for participants.

“Everyone that I’ve heard that has ever gone has really gotten a lot out of it, and it has helped them,” Hemmelgarn said. “It’s really helpful, and you can come as many times as you’d like. Each week is a different tool to help you in your grief process. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to. With no cost, you don’t have anything to lose.”