Poem Swentzell

I turned my life upside down when I decided to go to graduate school. I ended my 19-year massage therapy practice and moved three hours away from my husband. I knew that continuing my education was my ticket back home to New Mexico and out of Indiana where we had raised our children. I also knew moving would be the end of my husband’s career as a college professor at the University of Evansville, Indiana. The stakes were high. However, becoming a Buder Scholar eased my concerns about the
future. The Buder Center provided both financial and moral support–and an incredible education!  Learning about the history of Indigenous peoples in light of historic trauma was eye-opening. It helped me to understand some of the behavior of the people in my own pueblo in regards to privilege, identification with the aggressor, and lateral oppression. And even though it was not discussed much in the classroom, this knowledge helped me have a greater understanding of entitlement. My main interests
of study while at the Brown School were American Indian Studies and hospice. Since I have left school, I have done research with different elders and governors in the surrounding pueblos about traditional pueblo beliefs and customs at end of life and how those values and ceremonies can be incorporated with hospice care.

I am currently a hospice social worker in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Just recently I had the honor of serving a Navajo Code Talker from World War II who was under our care and staying in a skilled nursing facility 40 miles from his home. His daughters told me about how their father was taken at an early age to a boarding school where his name and identity were completely changed. They also told me about his contributions during the war. The daughters thought they had completed the Medicaid application in order for his bill to be paid at the facility but did not understand that they needed to complete a
phone interview. They hung up during the interview because they thought it was a prank call. I spent many afternoons discussing with his daughters the dire consequences of their not paying the bill and the necessity of finishing the interview. The facility threatened to put a lien on their house until I informed the manager that the house was on tribal property. The banks denied the daughters access to their father’s bank account and threatened to call Adult Protective Services against them for financial abuse. To
counteract this, I was able to produce notarized documentation stating that the father gave financial control to his daughters. At last, the manager of the facility told me I had to find another facility for the patient. Unfortunately, the daughters, when interacting with the facility or the bank, would be monosyllabic or silent causing those organizations
to accuse them of alcoholism and manipulative behavior. I continued to discredit those beliefs based on my own interactions and knowledge of the daughters.

The daughters, by this point, finally felt someone (me) had listened to their side of the story and they contacted the Medicaid office in order to finish the interview. After two days of phone calls to the Veteran’s Affairs office, I was able to get the patient transferred to a VA-contracted facility where there would be no charge for his room and board; however, this added another 60 miles to his daughters’ trek to visit their father. Every day they brought him traditional foods: atole, apricots, green chile, and posole.

I know I would not have been able to handle the pressures of this case without the fundamental education about the history between American Indians and the US Government, racism, and privilege that I received while a student at the Brown School, especially as a Buder Scholar. There were times that I felt that the daughters’ reticence in dealing with the facility, bank, and Medicaid office was, in part, due to their belief that their dad was entitled to much more than what was given. I had to convince them
that regardless of how much their family had already given to the country, and therefore its institutions, they still needed to go through the proper channels in order to receive what was due to their father.

It was not easy being a student. And it is not easy doing hospice work. However, the rewards are great. I am very grateful for the opportunity to work as an advocate for people experiencing the end of life and their families.

Thank you to all who traveled with me through the Buder Center. Khu-da-wa-ha.