Offenburg Full of anticipation, Helena Gareis guides us through the offices of the children’s and family hospice service at Asternweg 11 in Offenburg. Everything is set for a Christmas party. Families meet there with their terminally ill relatives. A fairy tale corner, a handicraft table and a coffee table have been set up. All rooms are lovingly furnished and offer an atmosphere in which you can let yourself go. “We want to offer moments of love and friendship,” says Gareis with a warm smile. As managing director, Helena Gareis has been the driving force behind the Ortenau association, which was founded as a children and youth hospice service, since it was founded ten years ago. The concept of families was added two years ago.
Consciously facing the finitude of life
As a child of a Durbach winegrowing family, Helena Gareis grew up with the necessary down-to-earth attitude. “Because I grew up with many animals on our farm, I understood the natural cycles of life early on,” explains the 55-year-old. She does her Abitur at the Grimmelshausen-Gymnasium in Offenburg, completes her training as a nurse and works in Stuttgart for 15 years. There she also becomes a palliative care specialist. “The finitude of life and the death of patients makes you more aware of your own life,” Gareis emphasizes the thought that a stroke of fate might also hit her. It is therefore important to her to shape life well, should it end earlier.
After 15 years, an ended marriage and her two children, she follows her homesickness and returns to Ortenau. An internship of 14 days turns into twelve years in the hospice of the Franciscan nuns Maria Frieden in Oberharmersbach, during which she accompanies people until they die. “Every patient there would have liked to switch places with me at any time,” Gareis summarizes, that she keeps learning new things regarding what she has despite all the problems and that there is no reason to complain. Care is her calling. “I’m extremely resilient and can take a lot of suffering,” she states, and patients appreciate that she’s someone “who lets herself be touched.”
She was also touched by the task that the hospice service association asked her to set up such a service for children and young people ten years ago. As director, Martin Stippich as coordinator and Melanie Braun as office coordinator, as well as a team of volunteer companions – currently around 35 – have looked following around 1,000 families since the beginning. The network of organizations and institutions built up by Gareis helps many families who might not have found out regarding the service.
Her sources of strength are her now adult children, family and friendships. “I consciously gathered these people around me. Because at home and in my private life I need an ideal world, where I want to shape my life myself and well,” explains Gareis. Because: “You can only pass on love when your own bowl overflows,” Gareis reminds of Bernhard von Clairvaux and his appeal to self-care.
As soon as a family member falls seriously ill, the offer of support is available. During the emotional Christmas season, there are the most requests for companionship. “Christmas is sometimes brought forward,” reports Gareis of fates in families.
