I have been setting up my EOL Doula website and while it is not fully functioning I am moving things over and have some information there.
It was funny trying to think of a name for myself and my EOL business - it seemed all the logical and good names where taken already. I just sat tossing names and free associating for over an hour before I hit on Crow - crow - fly - crows soar.... Dumb... ass... Christina *homer simpsons do'h* When my brother died we were at the funeral home getting things set up and it came to deciding what to put on the urn for his ashes. The usual, "RIP," or "forever in our hearts," did not fit my brother at all. I asked if it could wait for the moment and left it at that. Moments after he was cremated we all stepped outside for fresh air and I looked up over the crematory stack and saw several jets pluming as they flew by. From my angle it looked like they flew right through the smoke and I said something like, "Houston we have lift off," to sort of break the horrible grief and sobbing tears. We all laughed but the image of Tommy Soaring Eternally Free stayed with me. I used it in my memorial speech for him and I also asked the funeral home to put that on his Urn. Now I use it whenever I express my condolences to someone who has had a loved one die. It is also how I see myself during my last breath on Earth. Paused on a high cliff in the desert at sunset, waiting to Soar. So please visit Soar Eternally Free for all your End of Life Care Needs and any questions you may have.
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I cannot think of a better day to have completed the first part of my training.
When is this day celebrated? April 20 What is Death Doula Day? The day is set aside for Death Doulas to engage their communities bringing awareness to the profession and benefits for patients and families. An End of Life Doula is a non-medical person trained to care for someone holistically (physically, emotionally, and spiritually) at the end of life. This day is created to raise awareness about the profession of Death Doulas and how they can benefit patients and families at end of life. Death Doulas provide the additional support that families need in order to feel comfortable with taking care of their dying loved one at home. They are non-medical professionals that provide holistic support for the dying and their loved ones before, during, and after death. Trained in the various end of life stages, a Doula is able to assist the family with understanding the natural processes while providing comfort and support. This is the day where all Death Doulas can rise together and be a voice for social change at end of life, ensuring everyone has he most positive passing possible. How should this day be celebrated or observed? On Death Doula Day we encourage the conversation about the profession of Death Doulas. This can be done anywhere in anyway. Have fun with it! Post/tweet/market/share, have a discussion panel, show a documentary, give a training, host a Death Café – Anything to do with end of life. I am in the process of creating a website for my End of Life Care business, Soar Eternally Free. I do already have an Instagram site soar_eternally_free but need to get the website logistics in order.
In the meantime I am always available here to answer any questions you may have concerning end of life care planning. A little about myself: I am an INELDA trained End of Life Doula. I came to this work after the death of my brother and realized it would have been so much easier had we had someone to help walk us through the steps of death care while we were in a fog of disbelief and mourning. I plan on specializing in Sudden or Unexpected Deaths. My brother committed suicide and I know how devastating this situation is and how trying to navigate everything on your own can be almost impossible. I also realized that too many people are underserved and should not have to die alone. I can help with advanced care planning - including advanced directives, vigil planning (how you want your last days to look and feel and sound like) and what medical treatments you may or may not want. I can also help with Legacy projects -a great way to help you and your loved ones create a lasting memory of your legacy for future generations. I also provide after-death grief work/reprocessing to the loved ones - this helps provide closure and a safe place to start the grief process. For the longest time death was an abstract thought to me. It happened at some point but that was as far as I went with it. But after my brother committed suicide in 1997, it suddenly stopped being so academic. In having to deal with the fine points of after death care, I learned a lot more than I ever wanted to know about death. And because I have no idea why he did what he did, I read everything I could that could enlighten me. That included his very detailed autopsy report. Those are some mental images I will never get rid of, but in a way, they made it all the more real, in a good way. A way that says this really happened and is not a bad dream. During the year after his death I started studying EVERYTHING about the topic. Religions and philosophies. Books on the afterlife and what happens to the body as it dies or after it has gone. It ended up being - not so creepy as I once would have imagined it to be. All the isms and beliefs and thoughts from all those studies, led me to realize that dying may suck, or it may be beautiful, but in the end, we all do it. I just finished reading Body of Work by Christine Montross and it really added another angle to my own body of knowledge and thoughts of dying, death. She tells the story of her first year in med school, dissecting her first body, Eve. At some points graphic and others poetic she talks about her own thoughts and emotions with cutting into a human body. It ended with the realization of the gift that Eve gave her and of giving a stranger hope, in healing. It brings me back to the memories and thoughts I had of needing to view my brother's own body after death and all the inherent nightmares that brought. But after a time, those horrors faded, leaving me with a much more open? informed? thoughtful, mind about what happens to us when we die. My takeaway? I imagine a lot of people would consider this topic gory or distasteful but to me it is another facet of life. It makes me much more aware of how I live my life NOW. I am alive now and someday I will not be. And no matter how frustrating my life can be sometimes, it is still a gift I do not want to waste. It's been awhile now since I have learned about The Good Death, Death Doula/Midwifery and helping others to learn more about end of life care and the CHOICES they have. Also, that people should not have to deal with these things alone.
I wasn't sure what to do about it, other than read everything I could and it was right around February 2020 that I was looking into certification in a doula program. Then Covid hit and everything collapsed and I stopped thinking about anything for awhile. But, now more than ever, we need this information and after a series of very powerful dreams, I realized, this is what I am here to do. I think of myself more as a pyschopomp but they all mean the same. There are choices we have at the end of our lives and we shouldn't ever be told we have to do things a certain way. I want to help both the dying but also their friends and families to understand all their choices and make sure they have the information they need. They should never be in fear and they should have dignity and full understanding of what is happening. This blog section will be where I store my information/links/books/ stuff I have in my head, so that I can organize it and share it with anyone who needs it. |
AuthorWe are celebrated in birth so we should also be celebrated in death. I can help you with that. Archives
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