Phyllis Kunz feels like she came full circle when she came to work at Seasons Hospice after spending 20 years as a nurse in Family Medicine. Her early memories include helping her mother and sister care for her father at the end of his life.  She was twelve years old when he died. Even after his death, her mother continued to care for relatives during their last days. Both Phyllis and her oldest sister became nurses.  “I never thought of becoming anything else.”

Phyllis realizes that seeing in her own family at an early age how good those last days can be is surely part of what opened her heart and mind to hospice work at this point in her life. A voice in her head kept urging her to “call Seasons.” When she did, she found out a nursing position had just opened that was a perfect fit for her. She has truly felt called to her work.

As she expected, Phyllis finds hospice work energizing and she feels honored by the trust that patients and families place in her and the whole hospice team. One of her favorite tasks is to give patients warm baths. Once when she required medical care, she received a warm bath that made a world of difference in how she felt.  “I knew what relief it gave me to have that done,” and now she appreciates sharing that gift with others.

Phyllis is grateful that she learned from excellent teachers, the nuns who taught at the Rochester School of Practical Nursing through St. Mary’s Hospital and feels that they would be “darn proud of her” today. She feels that she is part of a team that gives “stellar care, especially when we don’t let medicine and technology get in the way.”  For Phyllis, medicine and technology are great tools, but the focus should be on the human element.

“Don’t get over committed” is Phyllis’s advice for volunteers and staff.  “Truly take one day at a time, on Monday only think about Monday.”

Phyllis is also an ordained Episcopal deacon. She visits inmates at the Federal Medical Center and is part of a Drug Court team in Dodge County that supports people on probation in lieu of incarceration. When she isn’t giving to others she is reading, walking, and would love to knit, but claims she isn’t a very good knitting student. She and her husband Tom are the parents of three sons.  They have one granddaughter and two more grandchildren on the way. They have land up North where they eventually plan to move.

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