Death Ed with Erin

09/16/2025

Module 1 (the first 4 classes, live over zoom)

09/16/2025

The doula movement grows. More people requesting doulas. More doulas looking for training. Many programs to choose from. This is a good thing - it means the narrative around death and dying is expanding, and that’s always been my mission. In this series of videos, I share the syllabus and content of my 8 week Deathschool Evolved certificate program, directly and week by week. In and of itself it’s an interesting lineup of topics.

09/14/2025

We’ve designed The Sea and the Soul around three essential pillars that help us move through grief and back toward ourselves:

REST:
Grief is exhausting; physically, emotionally, spiritually.

We need real rest to soften the nervous system and come back into the body. Each day will be spacious and offer more than it takes.

RITUAL:
Rituals help us locate ourselves in the story. They give grief a shape and a way to move through. In a gorgeous retreat space by the sea, we’ll gather casually and ceremonially, learning practices that reclaim the sacred in a culture that often skips over the soul.

RECLAMATION:
Grief can strip us of identity. This is a space to call home the parts of yourself that got left behind. To reclaim the truths that cannot really be lost, but often misplaced.

Each day includes a workshop with Amy or Erin, time for rest or solitude, and optional excursions to explore Jamaica's beauty: waterfalls, beaches, catamarans, and more.

Much is included, and everything is optional. DM me to ask your questions!

Learn more and enroll: https://www.erinmerelli.com/the-sea-and-the-soul

09/12/2025

Deathschool Evolved isn’t just another death doula course. It is the living library of my life’s work. The grief I first met as a teenager thirty years ago, the lessons learned at sacred bedsides, and the rituals and practices that continue to teach me every day. This isn’t surface-level training. It’s a deep descent into the teachings of death, into the places most of the world turns away from, so we can meet them with love instead of fear.

You’ll walk away with a certification in 33 hours of professional training in death philosophy and doulaship, equipped with a solid foundation of skills to build an ethical, sustainable practice, and carrying with you a new way of living life.

October 1 – December 4, 2025
Mondays and Wednesdays, 6:00 PM - 7:30 PM MST on ZOOM
9 weeks, 16 classes (12 live zoom sessions and 4 recorded)
Investment: $1,795.00 with payment plans available at checkout.
Scholarship coming this week.

erinmerelli.com/deathschool-evolved

For years, Deathschool has been a transformative space for those seeking to engage deeply with end-of-life care, doulaship, and the mysteries of mortality. Now, after 5 years, 19 sessions, hundreds of graduates, thoughtful evolutions and big changes, Deathschool is back in its new evolution: Deathsc

09/11/2025

I call upon my dead loved ones often. It’s not always spiritual 😂 last weekend for example, I had a little too much to drink (after flying) at my brothers pre-wedding celebration. The next morning, sick, you could find me petitioning my dead sister (a much more experienced drinker than I) to help me recover. I think it worked.

There are more serious and sacred applications, of course. Some messages and ministries are handed down through generations, ie, there are certain things Id ask certain ancestors for support with. Those who carry the same torch. But that’s a sidetrack (adhd brain 🧠).

My point is the big picture. Our loved ones up in the sky, scanning our signal. Our faces like a big screen before them, almost like it’s real life, watching every moment that matters. Right there when we call their names. Right there in the skin bumps that rise or the cool wind that blows or the scent that waifs in to announce: I’m still here.

09/11/2025

He goes on to say: "It occupies the core of our being and extends through our fingers to the limits of the universe.

Within that whirling gyre all manner of madnesses exist; ghosts and spirits and dream visitations, and everything else that we, in our anguish, will into existence.

These are precious gifts that are as valid and as real as we need them to be. They are the spirit guides that lead us out of the darkness."

🖤

09/10/2025

Fall is my favorite season to teach deathwork. While each season has its own collaboration with the wheel of life, it is autumn when the earth asks us to let go. It is autumn when the trees die for the winter. It is autumn when the world agrees (a rare thing these days) that the veil itself has thinned. All Souls. All Saints. Día de los Mu***os. Across cultures and time, we know the dead are near this time of year.

Deathschool Evolved is one of the most comprehensive death education programs in existence. Over 33 hours together, you’ll earn a professional Certification in end-of-life care and philosophy, gain the tools to begin a sustainable and successful death doula practice, and discover a new way of appreciating life itself.

Scholarship coming this week.
October 1 – December 4, 2025
Mondays and Wednesdays, 6:00 PM - 7:30 PM MST on ZOOM
9 weeks, 16 classes (12 live zoom sessions and 4 recorded)
Investment: $1,795.00 with payment plans available at checkout.
erinmerelli.com/deathschool-evolved

09/09/2025

09/02/2025

🌙 Night School 🌙

At night I can feel the slightest chill. I know that feeling. It’s the Fall cohort calling.

This season I’m doing something rare. I’m offering NIGHT SCHOOL. I rarely offer evening classes. But you want them. You work all day and need to get that death community in - in the evenings.

I don’t mean to be bias (I love almost all of my students 😉) but the Fall session is always my personal favorite. Deathwork and autumn just go together. The veil is thinner. It’s palpable.

We start October 1 and meet on Monday and Wednesday evenings for 8 weeks. At the end, you’re different than when you began.

If you want to become a death doula in 2026, get in on my final cohort of 2025. You’ll be done just before the holidays.

Link in bio

09/02/2025

Once I worked with a woman who claimed she had no legacy. She sat in her tall chair, crocheting a blanket for someone she loved, to deliver after she died. She claimed she had no legacy, because she had no children. Because her career wasn’t “impressive.”

She was my first MAiD patient (medical aid in dying). She taught me so much. As a professional, as a doula, as a human.

She gave me permission to share her story, and I have - in many classes, in public talks, online… I’ve shared the story of Susanne and her brave choices. The unique and brave way she met her death.

Now, through the generosity of her family and her estate, I offer scholarships in her name. Every single class I offer has at least one full ride scholarship, thanks to Susanne.

That’s a hell of a legacy, I think.

08/29/2025

We are seeing death surround us like never before. In 2020 😷, death moved from behind the curtain, into the living room. Into your chest. We didn’t just watch in our communities, was also watched on our screens, death all over the world.

Now, replace “2020” with “Gaza”.
Death all over the world, all over our screens.

Every other week a school shooting in America. Thoughts and prayers they say.

And then there is you, and your personal losses. Your grandmother, your partner, your friend who took her own life.

And yet - most folx are too afraid to learn. To learn how to help. To learn how to process. To learn how to navigate. To learn how to grieve.

How foolish of us, to deny ourselves fundamental education about a *literal life and death* topic, because we are scared.

Im a death educator. I teach a lot of things, but the thread is that at the core we can approach deathcare with more love than fear. If we love someone, we love them all the way until the end. We help as much as we can.

I’m not blaming you. You don’t know how. Nobody taught you. But we’re trying to now.

The bad part? Death education doesn’t stop the pain. The most educated among us are not immune to grief, and it wouldn’t be good if we were.

But just live everything in life - being educated before crisis is a net positive. Having skills and language for something that WILL assuredly come (death) is wise and self loving and responsible. On deeper levels, it’s everything.

08/25/2025

🩷

With lots of new faces here, we wanted to take a moment to re-introduce our co-founders Lauren Harrison-Carroll & Erin Merelli.

Their work at Deathwives laid the foundation for death to go mainstream and they’re continuing to build on it!

🖤 Lauren Carroll continues her death education work at www.instagram.com/lamortcollective
🖤 Erin Merelli is expanding death education through www.instagram.com/death_ed_with_erin

They’ve trained thousands of death doulas, educated countless families about their options, and changed how people think about dying and death.

Their individual offerings give deeper dives and nuanced discussions in death education, planning and support. If you’re ready to explore more — follow them both!!