End in Mind NC

03/31/2023

💙

07/21/2022

You Don’t Just Lose Someone Once…

You lose them over and over,
sometimes many times a day.
When the loss, momentarily forgotten,
creeps up,
and attacks you from behind.
Fresh waves of grief as the realization hits home,
they are gone.
Again.

You don’t just lose someone once,
you lose them every time you open your eyes to a new dawn,
and as you awaken,
so does your memory,
so does the jolting bolt of lightning that rips into your heart,
they are gone.
Again.

Losing someone is a journey,
not a one-off.
There is no end to the loss,
there is only a learned skill on how to stay afloat,
when it washes over.

Be kind to those who are sailing this stormy sea,
they have a journey ahead of them,
and a daily shock to the system each time they realize, they are gone,
Again.

You don’t just lose someone once,
you lose them every day,
for a lifetime.

Donna Ashworth
From ‘I wish I knew’: https://amzn.to/3JVMJlZ

Art by Clouded Dreams on Etsy
Clouded Dreams Studio

07/21/2022

𝐂𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝐦𝐞𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐟𝐮𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐞’𝐬 𝐚𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐬 -

My uncle loved his beaten-up old guitar and, when he died, we laid his guitar in the grave, on top of a piece of our family tartan, and poured his ashes into it. (Then we opened a can of Coke, which he also loved, and set it beside the guitar.)

My mom wants to be buried in a beautiful ceramic soup tureen that her beloved uncle gave her 40 years ago.

My dad was a geologist who loved the earth and the stones, so we poured his ashes directly in the ground with no container at all.

The more the rituals around a death reflect the symbols and imagery that mattered to the person who’s died, the more meaningful, and the more soul-healing those rituals are.

Choices about where the funeral is held, what music is played, what food is served, all make a difference in helping us integrate, because they allow us to find some beauty and meaning where beauty and meaning can be hard to find.

One of the ways we can make choices that feel meaningful and beautiful is around the urn we choose.

You can buy a traditional urn from the funeral home, and that may be exactly the right thing for your person. But it’s interesting to think about other options and how they might be more meaningful and personal.

Canning jars, Harley Davidson gas tanks, jewelry boxes, cigar boxes, anything goes.

It can also be a healing experience to make the container. Even a simple wooden box from the craft store, painted up, and filled with beautiful notes can feel personal rather than sterile.

Anything that makes it more meaningful, and gives you a way to participate, can make the whole process more beautiful and more healing.

06/30/2022

This is a letter that Fiona Apple wrote to her fans when she decided to cancel her concert to stay home with her 14-year-old dog that was dying... I couldn't help but share it here, because it is so beautiful. This was several years, 2012-2013 I believe...

xo
Gabby

Here's the thing...

It’s 6 pm on Friday, and I’m writing to a few thousand friends I have not met yet. I am writing to ask them to change our plans and meet a little while later.

I have a dog, Janet, and she's been ill for about 2 years now, as a tumor has been idling in her chest, growing ever so slowly. She's almost 14 years old now. I got her when she was 4 months old. I was 21 then — an adult, officially — and she was my kid.

She is a pitbull, and was found in Echo Park, with a rope around her neck, and bites all over her ears and face.She was the one the dogfighters use to puff up the confidence of the contenders.
She's almost 14 and I've never seen her start a fight, or bite, or even growl, so I can understand why they chose her for that awful role. She's a pacifist.

Janet has been the most consistent relationship of my adult life, and that is just a fact. It's always really been just the two of us.
She slept in bed with me, her head on the pillow, and she accepted my hysterical, tearful face into her chest, with her paws around me, every time I was heartbroken, or spirit-broken, or just lost, and as years went by, she let me take the role of her child, as I fell asleep, with her chin resting above my head.

She was under the piano when I wrote songs, barked any time I tried to record anything, and she was in the studio with me, all the time we recorded the last album.

She has Addison's Disease, which makes it more dangerous for her to travel, since she needs regular injections of Cortisol, because she reacts to stress and excitement without the physiological tools which keep most of us from literally panicking to death.

Despite all this, she's effortlessly joyful & playful, and only stopped acting like a puppy about 3 years ago. She is my best friend, and my mother, and my daughter, my benefactor, and she's the one who taught me what love is.

I can't come to South America. Not now. When I got back from the last leg of the US tour, there was a big, big difference.
She doesn't even want to go for walks anymore. I know that she's not sad about aging or dying. Animals have a survival instinct, but a sense of mortality and vanity, they do not. That's why they are so much more present than people.

But I know she is coming close to the time where she will stop being a dog, and start instead to be part of everything. She'll be in the wind, and in the soil, and the snow, and in me, wherever I go.

I just can't leave her now, please understand.
If I go away again, I'm afraid she'll die and I won't have the honor of singing her to sleep, of escorting her out.

Sometimes it takes me 20 minutes just to decide what socks to wear to bed. But this decision is instant. These are the choices we make, which define us. I will not be the woman who puts her career ahead of love & friendship.

Many of us these days, we dread the death of a loved one. It is the ugly truth of life that keeps us feeling terrified & alone. I wish we could also appreciate the time that lies right beside the end of time. I know that I will feel the most overwhelming knowledge of her, and of her life and of my love for her, in the last moments.
I need to do my damnedest, to be there for that.

Because it will be the most beautiful, the most intense, the most enriching experience of life I've ever known. When she dies.
So I am staying home, and I am listening to her snore and wheeze, and I am revelling in the swampiest, most awful breath that ever emanated from an angel. And I'm asking for your blessing.

I'll be seeing you.
Love,
Fiona

06/13/2022

Crowdsourcing time! What topics should I present on next? 🤔 If you were to attend a presentation, what would you be interested in learning more about? As I’m being invited to do more community events, I need help with ideas! 🙏🏻

06/11/2022

Just finished another great community education event! Thank you, Oberlin Library, for inviting me to speak on this important topic of end-of-life planning and advance directives.

If you or someone you know might be interested in learning more about end-of-life planning, please reach out!

06/05/2022

06/04/2022

When a terminal person accepts their condition, it's important, as hard as it is, that you, their family and friends, come to terms with it too. Being on one's deathbed is extremely isolating when loved ones are still making plans with them, recommending things that can aid in recovery, or suggesting that a miracle is possible. Valuable time is being wasted here. Once acceptance and validation happens, conversations get better. You and your dying loved one will connect on an even deeper and more meaningful level. You'll share stories, laughter, and tears, and there will be a newfound sense of peace that wasn't there before. Maximize on your time together. Truly listen to them. Empower them. When your person passes, you'll still grieve and miss the lost time and opportunity with him or her, but you'll be grateful for those authentic moments that you shared at the end, and you'll have supported them in the most beautiful way possible.

04/20/2022

Hot off the press - The flyer for the next session in the "Lets Talk About It" series! Please join me for a discussion about the ins and outs of hospice and palliative care - differences, similarities, and key information. May 4th @ 3pm at Cary Regional Library!

04/09/2022

I am thrilled to say this session was a great success! 🤩 Thanks for those that came! 🙏🏻 There was very rich discussion about the ins and outs of advance directives and I can’t wait to do this session again at Cary Regional and other libraries throughout Wake County!

Please join me on May 4th at 3pm for the next session about hospice and palliative care! 💙

So excited to be conducting a "Let's Talk About It" series at Cary Regional Library! I'm kicking off the series with a discussion about advance care planning on April 6th. We need to promote more of these discussions in our communities!

04/01/2022

So excited to be conducting a "Let's Talk About It" series at Cary Regional Library! I'm kicking off the series with a discussion about advance care planning on April 6th. We need to promote more of these discussions in our communities!

03/04/2022

Here is what grieving people want you to know: "We love you. We still love you, even if our lives have gone completely dark, and you can't seem to reach us. Please stay." And here's a handy Do This/Not That cheat sheet to help you best help your grieving people.

Want a copy of this cheat sheet to keep or give to someone else? It's available for free download here: http://www.refugeingrief.com/shop/