Dying Wiser #3

Wisdom Through Literature; Eldering Through Dad: “On Touch.”

When I attended a three day workshop on caregiving from the Zen Hospice Project in San Francisco back in 2017, THE most vivid memory I have of that time, and the session of the workshop that has profoundly impacted my life, was led by a woman named Irene Smith who created an organization founded upon the principles of therapeutic human touch as a source of healing and comfort for hospice patients. She had an amazing presence that everyone felt when she entered the room. When she first sat down in our circle, after she was introduced, and before she said a single word, she silently made eye contact with every single one of the participants, going in turn around the circle—a silent, uncannily intimate, acknowledgement of “I see you. We are here together now.” That was a profound form of touch, a meeting of spirits, an acknowledgment of presence that, even today, impacts me because of the impression she made on me.

Growing up, I didn’t experience our family as the “touchy-feely” kind. Please always keep in mind we were never depraved—we DID grow up in a supportive, non-abusive, calm, happy, and loving home; we just weren’t very “touchy” with each other. And Dad, for certain, was NOT comfortable with touch of that variety—even as I type this, I’m wracking my brain to come up with a single moment in which I got a hug from my Dad. Consequentially, it took a LOT of years for me to be comfortable with hugs—this is ironic, especially for my colleagues with whom I worked, because I became a principal in which I learned that hugs were an essential component of human development. Developing brains are soothed and nurtured by loving human touch. So, always taking their lead to create a space of safety and sanctuary, I hugged students unabashedly. It grew their brains; it relaxed their bodies. It grounded them into the present moment.

Over my years as an educator, I got better at recognizing which kids did not grow up with loving touch—and those who didn’t receive it at their earliest, most vulnerable moments, when their brains were first beginning the initial and vital connections of neurons in response to their new environment outside the womb; THESE kids were among the ones who broke my heart the most—these children of parental neglect were children of trauma. They’re also the ones who stay in one’s heart the longest. Every teacher worth the name knows this form of heartache as a fundamental Truth.

SO much can be shared about the importance of touch. Because of that, I’ll split up Dad’s Eldering lessons on touch over two successive “Dying Wiser” posts. Here, I want to focus on the wisdom I learned from Irene Smith and how that wisdom, that Eldering, is impacting my relationship with Dad.

From her handbook: “Touch Awareness in Caregiving” (2015):

Why Touch?

Touch is the first sense to develop [in utero] in our bodies and may be the last sense to fade [upon our death]. Touch is our instinctive form of communication. When we are born, we define the people and objects around us through touching and develop our physical relationship to our own bodies through tactile exploration. (p. 3)

Caregiving on all levels is about making contact. Caregiving is about touching. (p.3)

As brain imaging has gotten better, and as neuroscientists continue to learn more about our brains, they’ve discovered that touch (actually touch of all kinds but the focus here is on loving touch) has a direct impact on neuron growth and brain region activation and response including the secretions of chemicals such as endorphins and oxytocin.

Though often referred to as “the love hormone,” oxytocin is increasingly being seen as a brain chemical that does a lot more than just bring couples closer together. New research is suggesting that oxytocin plays a crucial part in enabling us to not just forge and strengthen our social relations, but helps us to stave off a number of psychological and physiological problems as well. More conceptually, oxytocin is proving to be a crucial ingredient to what makes us human. (p. 4)

[A] seemingly simple touch of the hand on the shoulder, or an arm around the waist can stimulate the release of endorphins, the body’s natural pain suppressors. [Therefore], as caregivers, we are literally transmitting messages to [the other] through the act of touch. (p. 5)

A Strong Caution:

Touch is a vulnerable act for both the giver and receiver. So much emotion of so many different kinds can be elicited from touching another Soul (here I include human, animal (especially pets), and other inanimate Souls). So it is wise to learn more about touch if you desire to truly have a loving impact upon another—touching IS a skill that we take too much for granted and that we typically do not fully understand how it might or might not make another feel.

Text grab from p. 8 of “Touch Awareness in Caregiving”

Eldering 101:

I’m touching Dad much more often now. More than I ever have in fact. I bet were I to add up all the moments of touch my Dad and I exchanged from my birth to July 4, 2022 (the day he arrived here with us for his journey home), ALL the moments, the ones that have happened between July 4, 2022 and now FAR outnumber the prior nearly 57 years worth of touch moments. There’s no judgment there—just a realization that touch wasn’t in Dad’s communication vocabulary (likely because it wasn’t in the communication vocabulary of his own ancestors or Elders. Like any language, we learn most intuitively from those we are exposed to most often). Touch was a foreign language to Dad and one he really had no interest in learning.

Until now.

So, here’s another “Eldering by Proxy” from Dad since he’s a novice in the subtle art and wisdom of effective Eldering through touch.

Obviously, there are the practical needs and caregiver touches that must happen multiple times a day and over a typical week as I support Dad’s waking, rising, walking, eating, dressing, toileting, and showering. These moments of touch are necessary to help get us through every moment of the day—and they can be most intimate in their degree of touch: “intimate” meaning in the closeness of the practical act of skin to skin contact. Even though it is true I’m touching Dad more to do all that, those aren’t the touches I’m referring to that are now carrying the most meaning. The feeling tone behind those touches are as I said practical, firm, task-oriented, and maybe even on the “coldish-side” given the task at hand—all bordering on the objective and passion-less “clinical” tone of touch. These are necessary and important; we simply have to touch each other to get through our day. All those touches matter, for sure, especially when I forget…

… ALL touches can matter so much more.

So I should have said I’m touching Dad more often now even when the need isn’t there. Or, when it is still there, I’m touching him differently now—because in every single touch, practical or otherwise, there is the possibility of connection at a deeper level: the level of the heart and Soul. I doubt he’s picking up, at a cognitive level, the majority of the touches for their level of Soul intimacy and compassion (one of the other meanings of intimacy)—but I have to believe on the intuitive, Soul level, he’s resonating with those touches. After all, isn’t it true that YOU can “intuit” the quality and feeling tone of a touch you experience from others regardless of how they may verbalize the interaction? Can’t you FEEL the difference in a touch from one given out of love vs. one “just given” for some other purpose? (e.g. a handshake greeting, for attention seeking, for redirection?). Of course it’s true—this has been shown to be true even among babies. Babies can distinguish when a parent changes its diaper with loving vs. clinical touch. And I think we humans understand this most through the simple act of a hug—that form of intimate contact (non-sexual please) is one of the truest barometers we have to elicit the other person’s authenticity, warmth, safety, intention, and willingness to be vulnerable. That is, after all, our physiological brain chemistry at work! The better I’m getting at it, the more I’m able to feel Dad’s somatic response—through his body’s instinctual reactions of release, softness, calm, ease, and relaxation as his brain flushes oxytocin and endorphins through his system.

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Next week, I want to share more wisdom on Touch from one my favorite poet/philosophers David Whyte. He views Touch as a meeting:

“…the meeting with something or someone other than ourselves, the light brush of grass on the skin, the ruffling breeze, the actual touch of another’s hand; even the gentle first touch of an understanding which, until now, we were afraid to hold.”

“…[The] gentle first touch of an understanding.” THIS is Eldering. Elder Sages can ONLY do the work of Eldering and Sage-ing through touch. All Eldering is a meeting—a coming together of minds and souls for the benefit of “human making.” [Remember my guru Stephen Jenkinson says “Human beings aren’t born. Human being are made.” And consider again the impact Irene Smith had on me, from that first meeting, at the workshop before she said a single word.] Elders only Elder through connection and that connection, that touching, is always, ALWAYS nurturing, safe, compassionate, and loving. Any other form of touch that does not elicit such warm feelings and emotions is NOT Eldering—and certainly not loving. Elders know they have the ability to impact the lives of others through that connection—through EVERY connection. It takes something more than just being in the same room to make connection. Sometimes that comes from profound words of wisdom; sometimes it comes from profound examples of lived behavior. Sometimes it comes from looks of approval, or not.

And all the time it comes from a single, loving touch.

Text grab from p. 23 of “Touch Awareness in Caregiving”

T plus 64 days and counting. And touching—hand to hand, heart to heart. Soul to Soul.