03/08/2026
I know I’m about a week late — but Women’s History Month deserves more than a single square on a calendar and it seemed fitting to also mention that today is International Women's Day!
Deathwalker Doula Services is a womxn-owned business. And the truth is, I would not be able to do this work if it weren’t for the women who came before me.
Historically, death care was community care. It was women. It was elders. It was neighbors sitting vigil, washing bodies, preparing meals, guiding families through grief. Death was not outsourced — it was tended.
As funerary practices became more institutionalized and commercialized, communities largely stepped away from hands-on death care. Much of that wisdom was quietly absorbed into systems and businesses, and the intimate, communal role of women and elders shifted.
And now — we are seeing something powerful happen.
Just as birth doulas helped reclaim the wisdom and support surrounding labor and delivery, death doulas are helping reclaim community-centered care at the end of life. These professions are largely pioneered, sustained, and expanded by women and gender-expansive people who believe that tending to the labors of life — birth and death — matters.
This work is not new. It is ancestral.
Women have always held the thresholds.
I am deeply grateful for the foremothers, the quiet caregivers, the hospice volunteers, the birth doulas who paved the way, and the death workers who are rebuilding what was once commonplace.
Because of them, I get to do this work openly, professionally, and with community support.
And that is something worth honoring.
🖤🌿
