Why we need to talk about death
The struggles with terminal illness of beloved New Zealanders like Nigel Latta and Dai Henwood have highlighted the need for better conversations about grief, death and dying.
For Western cultures, the concept of death is uncomfortable. Unlike other cultures, which have woven the honouring of death and dying into every day custom and ritual, we are brought up to avoid talking about death, calling it ‘morbid’.
Bizarrely, we are even seeing the rise of the notion that death is a ‘disease’ that can be avoided. US tech billionaire Bryan Johnson, also known as the ‘don’t die guy’, says he is “at war with death and its causes” and is on a mission to “defeat all causes of human and planetary death”.
“Here’s the truth: we are all going to die,” says Christchurch end-of-life doula and grief coach Sue Beach.
“We are all going to experience grief and loss, and we need better conversations, learnings and understandings to deal with it when it comes. This not only helps us live better lives, but it also brings dignity, more ease, and less fear to the process of dying when there is a terminal diagnosis. Even in my previous career in the medical profession, death was sometimes viewed as a ‘failure’ rather than the natural end to a life.”
As an end-of-life doula, Sue offers non-medical, practical and emotional support to a terminally ill person and their loved ones, before and after death.
“A terminal diagnosis is scary and overwhelming. An end-of-life doula is there through the whole journey, ensuring the appropriate resources are accessed and supporting emotional and spiritual well-being,” Sue says.
Her own first experience with death was with her little brother at the age of seven. “We were at my grandparents’ celebrating my seventh birthday. I was standing right beside him when something fell on him and killed him. This was more than 50 years ago and, typical of the time, was not handled well. Nothing was explained to me. I didn’t go to his funeral and wasn’t taken to his grave until I found it myself a few years ago. I didn’t even really understand what had happened; we never talked about him or that awful day. It left me deeply affected, and it wasn’t until my sister died in a road accident many years later that I was able to process what had happened when I was a child.
“I learnt so much more about living when I did my end-of-life doula training. It taught me what’s important and gave me some direction and purpose in my life. I studied it originally to get a better understanding of death. I was already a grief companion and coach, so I thought it would help me be a better grief coach. I had worked in the operating theatre for 25 years, so I had a good understanding of how the physical body worked. I knew how to try and keep people alive, but never learnt how to help people die. I had been present at many Caesarean section births, with the joy and celebration of birth, so thought it was time to learn more about how to be present with death.”
Sue’s attitude to dying is that it is the next big adventure. “It might be wonderful and exciting, or it might be empty and nothing. Either way, it’s fine with me.”
To contact Sue, go to facebook.com/coachingandnavigation.
