In honor of Resolve Through Sharing’s 45th anniversary, we’ve asked RTS-trained professionals and customers, program founders, planning committee members, coordinators, bereaved families, and others to share their stories of what the program means to them. Learn how the program got its start and why it has remained essential throughout the decades by reading the following words from beloved members of the RTS community. Stay tuned as more stories become available.
CEO Mary Beth Hensel
Hello, and welcome to our Resolve Through Sharing 45th Anniversary Storytelling feature. My name is Mary Beth Hensel, and I’m the chief executive officer of Resolve Through Sharing Incorporated. I want to tell you a little about my journey with RTS and what it has meant for me personally.
In late June of 2008, I interviewed at RTS for a temp position as an office assistant. My interview lasted nearly 2 hours and was with Dr. Rana Limbo and the rest of the RTS team at the time. I remember her asking why I would want to work for this program. Of course I needed the job, but I was able to share that my baby brother had died in 1965 at 4 months of age when I, too, was just a baby—18 months. I don’t remember him, but the impact of his death and the care and support my mother did not receive all those years ago had a devastating impact on our family and on my childhood. Though we lovingly honored my brother within our family and held him close, a huge part of my mother died with that baby, and it was never recovered. From the time I could remember, I never really knew how to answer the question “How many kids are in your family?”
In January of 2009, I moved to a permanent position with RTS. Since then, I have served in many capacities to support current operations and build the future of this vital, essential program. The work has enriched my life, leading to personal and professional growth in ways I never could have imagined. It has offered valuable insights into my own story of loss that began so many decades ago, and I know this is true for countless others. I read the evaluation comments from professionals upon completing RTS training. “This course changed my life,” is a resounding, common theme.
We’d love to hear from you how RTS has impacted your professional and personal journeys. So please share your story by emailing a write-up or a recording to [email protected]. And while you’re at it, please consider a donation of any amount to help ensure the work continues for another 45 years. Donate Thank you so much.
Co-Founder and Director Emerita Dr. Rana Limbo
I have often been asked how my life journey led me to perinatal loss and grief. As a young girl, I always loved to see mothers and babies. My academic journey of college, two Master’s degrees, and a PhD all contributed to my learning and understanding of family and child nursing. In college, my professor assigned me to be with new mothers who needed extra care before they could move on to become the loving mothers they had looked forward to being. This window into maternal mental health served as an important lesson for my future clinical and academic interests. When I was assigned a concept analysis during my maternal/child Master’s, I chose to write about grief. That led me to the work of Drs. John Bowlby and Colin Murray Parkes, distinguished British psychiatrists and grief and bereavement experts, opened the door for my future. When Dr. Ted Peck suggested I apply for the coordinator of Resolve Through Sharing in 1981, I was eager to do so. With support from Sara Wheeler and Pam Padesky, I developed a role that is now a standard in many hospitals in the US and beyond. I am grateful every day for how bereaved families have influenced me and guided my life’s work.
Rana Limbo, PhD, RN, RTSCBC, FAAN
National Faculty Member Marie Walter
My professional career at Lutheran Hospital began in 1981, which was the same year that the seeds for the RTS program were beginning to take root. While I was not directly involved with the early planning team, I traveled alongside the founders even then. Working within an interdisciplinary team that provided care to women/ families experiencing complicated pregnancies, we often were faced with guiding these families through the death of their baby(ies). There was so much to learn. So much more we needed to do for these patients.
In the early years I gratefully embraced all there was to learn. Co-founder Sara Wheeler was my direct supervisor at that time. I even shared an office with the first bereavement coordinator. Rana, Marty, Bonnie, Madonna, and others I may have forgotten were the “boots on the ground” providing not only staff education and support, but also guidance and support for patients. The little unit-based program was recognized by professionals in other hospitals as vital to patient care, and the national program began to grow.
In 1985 my connection with RTS was deepened with my own personal experience with perinatal death. During a relatively uncomplicated high-risk pregnancy we suffered the death of our twin, Mason James, just days before delivery. Gratefully his twin sister, Briana Elizabeth, survived and is well and healthy today. During those darkest days, my RTS family provided unmeasurable support and care. My son’s story is woven into the RTS story in the When A Baby Dies Book as well as being part of the perinatal death curriculum. It is truly an honor to be able to share Mason’s story and keep his memory alive 40 years later. While Mason’s death has shaped me personally and professionally, I always add that it does not, in any way, make me more appropriate to care for bereaved families or single me out as more knowledgeable in providing this care.
Over my 47 years as a nurse, I have watched many trends in healthcare come and go. Sadly, when budgets and cost come to the forefront it seems education is the first to be cut. Bereavement education is not fluff or just a nice added extra. It is integral to fully prepare staff to give compassionate care when a family experiences the death of a loved one. I have hopes that RTS will be able to continue to share this education for many, many more years to come.
Noteworthy Member Dr. Ted Peck
I came to La Crosse in 1979, having just completed a Fellowship in Maternal Fetal Medicine. At that time, throughout the United States, there was very little organized hospital care in place for parents who had a baby die. Pastoral care was the most common type of care offered then, and it was well-intentioned but inadequate.
In 1981, the Gundersen Clinic and Lutheran Hospital began a series of steps to coordinate nursing and medical care for parents who had recently had a baby die. This effort was inspired by the concerns of two perinatal nurses, Kathy Goettl and Carolyn Smiley.
Meetings were held, problems and solutions thought out, and by the end of all these meetings with Social Services, Neonatology, OB Services, Pastoral Care, and a bereaved family, we proposed an organized professional nursing service called Resolve Through Sharing. It needed an enthusiastic, sensitive, and knowledgeable leader to be effective. Rana Limbo, RN, MS, was working part-time as a labor and delivery and postpartum nurse, and I felt she would be perfect for the directorship of this new organization. I encouraged her to take the job. It was my first important act for RTS. She is still involved in RTS, 45 years later.
As we were all getting started on this project, it was important that all the OB/GYN doctors were comfortable with it. My job was to help them get comfortable, which they eventually did. Additionally, my role was one of high-risk OB education for doctors, nurses, and conference attendees. I continued to advocate for Resolve Through Sharing throughout my career.
Ted Peck, MD, obstetrician/gynecologist and maternal fetal medicine specialist (retired)