Message Received

As originally published for The Convenings on 8/17/18   “I heard my mother talking to me yesterday,” a client recently told me. “I was half asleep and I had just been talking about her, so it was probably nothing. I’m sure it was just a dream,” her tone quieted in the telling and her brow…

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Practicing for Death

It’s been 10 days since I arrived in Germany to companion my friend as she receives treatment for metastatic breast cancer. Originally, we were to fly her home to Florida this Sunday — three days from now. As it is, the doctor requested that she stay for another round of hyperthermia and chemo before she…

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Creative Engagement

I am departing today for Germany, taking my heart across the ocean in service of a dear friend receiving treatment for metastatic breast cancer. As I sit at the airport on this overcast morning looking out on the tarmac, at people coming and going, I’m feeling a strange combination of excitement and sobriety for the…

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The Return

I have been waiting for this day. After a walk in the dark around the neighborhood with my husband and pup, after a breakfast of sweet potatoes, kale and scrambled eggs, after filling the bird feeder at the window, I feel the words coming. Percolating in a way they haven’t for a while. Not because…

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Best Laid Plans

Death comes on its own timetable. As an end of life doula, you wouldn’t expect this to surprise me. Yet, it does. Every time. I was reminded of this truth most recently while companioning a woman in her late fifties. For more than three months we had been creating her vigil plan — a list of music she wanted played, poems…

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