This is the crying I wasn't able to do when I had to do this.

I had a patient, an old man with terminal lymphoma, who was being held over the weekend for placement because he was homeless. When the MD found out that he had $193 in the hospital safe, he discharged him.

After many attempts to find excuses to stay, none of which I could then justify to the MD, the patient resigned himself to go. He had multiple bags of possessions and no shopping cart waiting. I had to take that sick old man down to the street and dump him out, in the driving rain, on a Sunday.

I don't care what he did in his life to become homeless. He didn't deserve that. I was sorry to be the instrument of that cruelty.