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Outlook, not outcome

There's "nothing wrong with crying," says the chaplain at Moffitt cancer center. He's there 24/7 to help patients and families unblock their feelings.

By KAREN DAVISON
Published June 24, 2005

NORTH TAMPA - They come from across the world to check in at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, a detour that brings them face to face with scary questions of mortality.

When they get there, a nurse asks if they wish to see the chaplain. The patients who say yes meet the Rev. Wayne Robinson, a 6-foot-4 minister who deals with spirituality, not religion.

His job is to help people of all faiths find meaning and purpose in what they're going through.

"I engage them where they are," he says. "I talk about feelings. What are you going through? How do you feel about what you're going through? I listen to them. I let them know I'm there for them."

He keeps his "popcorn visits" short to accommodate the needs of cancer patients.

Recently, Robinson stopped in to see patient Rollie Watson and his wife of 41 years, Vivian. "Leukemia knocked me down," Watson said. He has endured long rounds of chemotherapy since his diagnosis in 2002.

Robinson dispensed comfort and advice and ended the visit with, "Anything you need?" Watson asked for a New Testament. Robinson gave him a Bible to keep.

Vivian spoke of Robinson after he stepped out. "He's a wonderful person, a very giving person. He has a heart of gold. It doesn't matter how many times a day you ask to talk to him, he's there."

Patient Hollis Anderson, sitting in a chair and hooked to IVs, greeted Robinson with a giant smile when he entered her room. "I am doing really well," she said. Her husband of 42 years, Elwin, sat beside her.

She and Robinson discussed nutrition, sleep and how she was doing. Then, "Anything you need?"

"Just what I ask for every day," she said.

Robinson dropped to one knee beside Anderson and poured out a spontaneous prayer that included, "Thank you that she has a smile on her face, a sign of the joy you have given her."

At the end, Robinson kissed Anderson's hand. As he exited, he said to Elwin, "Be good. If you can't be good, be careful." Elwin laughed.

"He's just really been a blessing," Anderson said. "He lets you talk to him. We have a pastor in Winter Haven, but he can't visit every day."

Robinson's own journey to Moffitt began with a slow, comfortable steep in African-American Baptist Church traditions. His mother sang in the choir and taught vacation Bible school in a Chicago church big enough for its own cafeteria. His father was an usher.

"My brother and I mimicked him," Robinson said.

All of his teen friends belonged to the church. When he felt the call, he went to his pastor who, after biding his time, called the congregation together to hear him give a trial sermon. "You had to have a sermon in your head and a sermon in your pocket," Robinson said.

The congregation voted to give him a license, after which he was in training. He learned by observing the pastor and attending a Baptist seminary, where he earned a master's degree. He was ordained in 1973 and served in Illinois until 1991. Along the way, he picked up a year's residency in hospital chaplaincy and transferred his credentials to the United Church of Christ.

Personal and pastoral upheaval caused him to search for another position. His father advised him with a mix of faith and practicality: "You don't leave a ministry until God leads you somewhere else."

When Robinson inquired about an opening at Moffitt, he was told to drop in. He didn't view that as a strong enough invitation. "If I was to be called, God would set up a time for me," he said.

He got his interview. Ever since then, he's been the chaplain at Moffitt, where he's as easy among the medical technology as a pastor in a pulpit.

"My mother would say, "I don't know how Wayne could be a chaplain. He couldn't stand the sight of blood,' " Robinson said. "The Lord gives you the strength to do what you need to do."

At times he says he has to wade through the "religious baggage" that some patients and families carry to Moffitt. Some believe it is a sin to have cancer, or if they have cancer, they are not praying enough.

Robinson has little patience with faith leaders who advise patients they won't need their medicines if they have enough faith, or with "television or radio preachers" who stop patients from expressing their feelings.

He calls it "emotional constipation." To unblock the emotions, Robinson said patients and families should feel free to express feelings, even anger at God. They should listen to each other. He reassures them there is "nothing wrong with crying." It's all about healing and achieving peace of mind.

Robinson said that's the best part of his work - when he helps patients and families "change the outlook, even though the outcome is the same."

The hardest part is being rejected by some patients and families because of race, a hurtful reality for "God's instrument."

"They called for a preacher. (I am) not the preacher they were expecting," he said. He describes it as a "big disappointment - I can only help those who want help."

He works weekdays from morning "until I get through." A pager keeps him available 24/7. His views on a minister's duty: "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen."

"You can call him at 8 in the morning, 5 in the afternoon, or midnight," nurse Cynthia Chytil said. "He'll be sitting with someone all day (who is dying). It doesn't happen. We call him back."

Sometimes he's called in for the staff when a patient dies. If he's been close to the patient, Robinson has to contend with his own emotions as well. He finds consolation in his beliefs on death. "We humans put a period to it. God changes it to a comma."

Chytil, the nurse, has worked with Robinson since he arrived at Moffitt. She calls him "Rev Baby" and feels he's like family. "I'll be down in the dumps - he'll have me laughing. If I'm not up to my teasing self, he'll get your mind off it."

But, she said, "He can be really serious. He reads the moment."

This acute attention to others all day requires its own recovery time. When he's finished at Moffitt, he goes home to his wife, Jacklyn Hickson-Robinson, a nurse he met at Moffitt. This grandfather of three sits quietly or watches sports on television, his beeper at the ready, prepared to make the 20-minute trip to the hospital.

Robinson will be 59 in October. He plans to be at Moffitt "until the Lord leads me somewhere else."

[Last modified June 23, 2005, 08:09:06]