Something to Think About

Grief is whole bunch of normal emotions rolled up into a package we call grieving. It isn’t new emotions. It is our emotions. It is how we have handled everything...

First, if you don’t have to clean out belongings, don’t for awhile, wait even months if necessary. There can be great comfort found in putting on an unwashed sweater of...

Counseling is a support offering, a choice. Some personalities would never consider counseling. They would not be comfortable sharing their personal thoughts and life with someone else no matter how professional...

... if we would educate ourselves before we need the information, before someone we care about is dying, before we are faced with a life threatening illness, or before someone we...

You asked why your relationship to your hospice work was affected following the death of your dad. I think because every time you entered a patient's home and life it...

Keeping Secrets: “Don’t tell mom.” Don’t say that she could die.” Don’t talk to her about “sad” things.” “Pretend everything is going to be alright.”  Mom lives inside of her body....

I get a lot of letters like the one I’ve edited below. We, as a culture, are so unprepared for witnessing a death. We have no accurate role models. We...

When someone we know or are close to dies we expect to grieve. We recognize our sadness but often we don’t recognize our impulsiveness to clean the house, or our...

Our children are not supposed to die before we do. I cannot think of any grief more intense than watching our child deteriorate before our eyes. We grieve their dying...

Sudden death by accident, suicide and certainly by violence intensifies those normal grief responses. Everything we feel with normal grief is as if we are being held under a magnifying...

Our job as an end of life specialist is to address the elephant in the room, to be direct and honest in the gentlest way possible. We are not doing...

Hospice Bereavement support, as well as any bereavement support program (church, Community Support, Senior Activity Program) is important during the best of times. Now it is vital.  Here are my recommendations;...

People don’t die like they do in the movies—alive one minute, saying something profound and dead the next. There is a way that the body dies. A way it is...

I see families devastated by not being able to be with their loved one as they are dying. I am writing this for any person who is faced with a...

I am now writing this. Here is what I am thinking: The way I have lived my life up to now will probably be changed forever. How long physical distancing...

There are many of the same circumstances with today’s coronavirus as we faced with  HIV/AIDS in the early years— lack of medical knowledge, lack of guidance, and fear. I think...

Isolation from others is teaching me this about my self ——- I do a lot for others, for their thoughts of me, why else do I wear makeup? Get dressed?...

We do this all the time. We enter tense situations where people are frightened and unsure, with people who have never seen us before. This is what we do: We create...

It sounds like she was given morphine to ease her transition from this world to the next. Not knowing your grandmother's medical history I cannot say if the morphine was...

In our culture the holidays, Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Christmas, emphasize family and friend togetherness. The absence of a friend or family member becomes more evident. Our sense of loss...

The guilt, frustration, uncertainty, and helplessness of family caregivers is as much a problem to our healthcare system as the patient with dementia...