The above words sum up the philosophy of the Hinds Hospice of Fresno California. Founded in 1980, by Nancy Hinds, this twenty-year old non-profit organization has become known nationwide for its loving and professional care of the terminally ill. Nancy herself has received such honors as The Papal Award from Pope John II, The Social Action Award from Temple Beth Israel, and the National Unsung Heroine Award from The Mitsubishi Motors USA Foundation, as well as hundreds of personal tributes, in recognition of her tireless work over the past two decades. But Nancy's journey to Fresno, and the founding of her foundation, has been a long and winding one.

As a young Registered Nurse in 1967, Nancy left her hometown of Cleveland to pursue a calling for missionary work. Her calling would take her to the West Indies, were she learned the true meaning of poverty. A year later she was in Nigeria, which was in the middle of a terrible civil war. Nancy, along with other volunteers, were part of an emergency relief team sent to help the people of that war torn country. What Nancy found was a country in chaos. Eventually war, disease, and famine would claim the lives of over a million of Nigeria's men, women and children. However, as difficult and heartbreaking as Nigeria was, Nancy did find one bright spot at its center. It was there that she met her future husband, an Irish doctor named Godfrey Hinds. After a year of serving in Nigeria, Nancy followed Godfrey back to his native Ireland where the two were married. Their first son was born a year later.

The next several years found the family continuing their missionary work around the world. In 1971 they worked in Uganda until the political atmosphere grew too dangerous and they were forced to evacuate. After East Africa, and the birth of their second son, they made their way to a rural area of Canada where Godfrey and Nancy were the only source of medical care for hundreds of miles. Then in 1975 after the birth of their third son the two decided to return to Ireland. That same year Godfrey was diagnosed with cancer, as was Nancy's mother who had come to visit her daughter in Ireland. For the next two years Nancy worked as the primary caregiver for her husband and her mother. After their deaths in 1977, Nancy, now a widow with three children, made ends meet by taking in and caring for severely handicapped and terminally ill children. After three years she made the decision to move to Fresno in order to be near her father and brother. It was only a few months after her arrival that Nancy formed the Hinds Hospice foundation and began caring for terminally ill patients out of her small family home.

Today, the reach of the Hinds Hospice Foundation has far outgrown its humble beginnings of a small house with four beds. Today, Nancy's foundation covers three counties in the Central Valley and has over 300 volunteers and medical experts working with her. In addition to providing seven day a week care for terminally ill patients, the Foundation also offers support services and counseling for the family and caregivers of those stricken with a terminal condition. Over the past twenty years, the Hinds Hospice has help literally thousands of people with compassionate end of life care. They are not there to interfere, but to provide the day to day care a terminal patient needs, the comfort that they need, and the control they deserve to manage the remainder of their time on earth with as much dignity as possible. One would think that dealing with the death and dying every day would drag a person down, but Nancy has a different attitude. She finds that her hospice work has given her a greater appreciation of life and the preciousness of each minute we are allotted. In her own words Nancy states that, "the hospice does not add days to my life. The hospice adds life to my days."