Category: Uncategorized

When memory making and the idea and pressure of making memories becomes exhausting

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

I endeavour to keep things real here for you.

And for me.

It keeps me grounded.

It keeps US grounded.

What a shitty thing for us doulas and death-workers to espouse the idea that deaths should be inspirational, romantic even.

Dying and death can, indeed, be beautiful.

And peaceful.

But sometimes, amongst all that beauty and love, it’s raw, it’s ugly, it rages and it is anything but peaceful.

And I tell you this so that, when the capacity to make memories reaches it’s limit or becomes suffocating, when the overwhelm or suffering becomes all-encompassing and when you encounter the raw, the ugly, the rage, the bitterness of that metaphorical pill, of things left undone and the internal noise of it all that, you don’t think that you are doing it wrong.

You are not.

You are not.

This is dying in all it’s humanness.

And no matter how spiritual, religious, easy-going you are you will very likely be taken by surprise at the strength of it.

The conscious and unconscious, the internal and external pressure to make as many memories as you can in the time you have when time is short, when you or your person are diagnosed with an untreatable, life shortening illness that memory-making ideation can become all-consuming, overwhelming, exhausting and unachievable.

Of course you want to make memories.

For yourself and for your people.

And yet, here is what my doula heart will tell you.

Go gently, my friend.

Make space for it all.

Making memories is not so much in the “doing”, in the photo opportunities, in the forced or choreographed inspirational moments or in the physical legacies but in the “being”.

They are built in who you are.

They are not built in what you do – they are built when you are able to just be.

Being in the quiet moments.

Being in the very ordinariness of togetherness.

Being held in a space of love in tumultuous times.

That’s what makes the most precious of memories.

And sometimes, strangely enough, it’s the times between the deliberate making of memories that become the richest, most exquisite memories of all.

The moments between.

Spend time there too.

This is what will hold those still living in their times of grief.

With deepest love

Nancy xx

Love is….

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

What love is in your presence at the bedside of the dying.

Love is in the moisturising of their dry lips.

The wipe of secretions from their mouth.

The tender washing with the softest of cloths of their face and hands.

The gentle brushing of their hair.

Love is in the sponge mouth swabs that ease the dryness.

Love is in the way your hands touch those of your dying loved one – the way you feel their knuckles and the soft bits of skin between the fingers, the caressing from the wrist to the fingertips and the stroking of the palm.

Love is holding back from touching when it cannot be tolerated despite your yearning to feel their skin against yours.

Love is in that gentle hand hold that ushers in a sense of support – I’m here with you.

It’s there when you lay your head next to theirs, close your eyes and just feel their presence.

Love is witnessing the difficult changes but staying there anyway.

It is being eaten up by grief as you watch your loved-one fade away ….. but staying there anyway.

It is getting up every day to care when your whole being is utterly exhausted.

Love is in your gaze as you look at their changing body yet remember times of vigour and youthful energy.

Love is listening to the rattling in their throat, the groans of discomfort and witnessing the wringing of hands without turning away.

It is turning towards their suffering and letting them know they are not alone.

Love is in the words that you share.

It’s in the conversations that you have even when there is no response.

It’s in your singing.

In your humming.

Love is in the reading aloud of their favourite books or poems.

Love is in the music that you play for them.

The music you know they enjoyed when they were full of vitality.

Or the music that you know brings them comfort.

Love is knowing what tv program or film to have on in the background.

Love is knowing when silence is necessary.

Love is in the soft kiss of the lips, cheek, forehead or hand.

It’s there as you linger in that kiss trying so hard to imprint this moment of tenderness into your memory.

It’s in your vulnerability that encompasses these very moments..

Love is in your sighs of grief.

In your gentle sobs of sorrow.

In your sense of relief that any suffering is coming to an end.

In your smiles too as you recall memorable times.

Love is in the shared air that you breathe.

Their final breaths become your first breaths in your ever-changed life.

And love is a deep understanding of how colossal these moments in time truly are.

With tenderness

Nancy ❤ xx

Grief Groceries

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Grief groceries.

Earlier this week I popped out to pick up some grief groceries.

And, I’m likely to be doing another grief grocery shop in the coming days.

Now, you might be wondering what grief groceries are?

So let me share a little bit of wisdom from those grieving.

One of the many things that are said to a griever when their person has just died is “Let me know if you need anything” or “How can I help?”

But here’s the thing, when folks are grieving making decisions or even knowing what they want or need can be just far too difficult.

And this is where grief groceries comes in.

It’s not that they can’t get to the shops (some grievers are high functioning) and it’s not that they have nothing in the house.

But…

Changes in appetite are a universal component of grief, particularly in those early days.

People can lose their appetite completely or over-eat.

Keeping it simple can be helpful to the griever when the physical, mental and emotional capacity to cook diminshes.

So picking up some groceries, food that is easy to cook, some healthy goodies and practical stuff like tissues, lip balm (lips can dry and crack so easily when people are grieving, stressed and crying a lot), hand cream as a treat and for a special touch, a candle to light.

Perhaps add in a precooked home-made meal or two.

Let’s not forget some things they can snack on too and that might include some healthy and some not-so-healthy snacks.

Let us not judge their choices or impose on them what WE think they should be eating. In those early days of grief it is sometimes all a person can do to function.

If you are unable to get them any groceries how about a voucher for a takeaway that can be delivered direct to their door?

Grief groceries.

Just a little way of showing that we care at a time when we can feel so helpless.

With love

Nancy xx

Death has a habit of taking us by surprise.

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Death has a habit of taking us by surprise.

We always think we have more time with those we care about than we really do.

Even when death is expected.

Even as our person has begun actively dying.

And the death of our loved-one almost always comes as a shock. It feels so sudden.

Again, even when it’s expected.

It’s a really strange scenario.

You know it’s coming.

You prepare yourself for it.

And yet, you are not ready for it when it does happen.

Sometimes, you sit by your person’s bedside for hours, you get up to go for a pee……..and death happens when you are out of the room.

No matter how much we prepare ourselves psychologically and emotionally nothing can fully prepare us for the finality of it.

Perhaps this is due to the fact that we are so far removed from death. Where once we were cared for at home within a community of support and helpers at the end of life whereas now we are carted off to be cared for by others. Hidden from sight of the community and those around us. As a result few get to befriend the intimacy of death.

Perhaps the shock is because this death is a stark reminder of our own mortality.

Or perhaps we are just not ready to release the spiritual and energetic ties that bind us. Similar to having the umbilical cord between mother and baby cut at birth, this invisible, yet tangible cord that connects us, sends a shockwave through all our systems when it is cut at the moment of death. Where, although this person is ever present in their love, our lives are forced to continue separate or independent of them.

Perhaps it’s a mixture of all the above?

This really, is a reminder, a call to action, to say the things you need to say whilst you can.

Go and visit and hold your person’s hand even if words fail you.

Because, quite often, that touch, that shared moment, says more than words can ever say.

Speak to them, through these words or touch, as if it’s the last time you will see them, because one day, it will be.

This moment really does matter.

With the tenderest of love and affection

Nancy 💚 xx

Doula-ing our elderly

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

You might be inclined to think that an end of life doula serves primarily those with a life-shortening or life-limiting illness.

But here’s the thing.

I can be called upon to support someone aged 5 or someone who is 95.

Those who are elderly don’t need the support of a doula LESS.

Don’t be fooled into believing that they are prepared and ready to die.

That their needs are any less.

In fact, sometimes they need that extra support all the more.

To advocate for them, ensure all their documents are in order, to provide dignity, companionship and connection, to have those difficult conversations with them that relatives and friends find so difficult.

But most of all to tend to the soul, the love, the regrets, the frustrations of life and of getting old.

Besides, there is so much living to do in those final days, weeks, months and years.

Please don’t assume that your elder relative doesn’t have any end of life wishes just because they are old, forgetful, frail or stuck in a hospital bed.

Oh, my dear, this is all the more reason to honour their humanness and spirit.

This doula is here for you all. ❤️

Nancy xx

A Prayer To My Heart

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

A heart-centred prayer to whisper to yourself and into the breeze as the moments of 2024 unfold.

“May I experience prosperity of the heart to provide enough propensity to love my way forward.

May I practice the art of living wider so I don’t get lost in the expectancy of tomorrow.

May I be called deeper into my heart so I can touch the softness of untarnished love.

Through the thoroughness of my heart may I feel safe to experience it all.

May my moments of stillness always bring me back to myself no matter how far from home I feel.”

I hope this loving prayer from my heart to yours touches just where it is most needed.

Nancy 💚 xx

I Wish You Enough

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Dear friends.

I have sent this message out to you all every year since 2021 and the sentiment stands as strong today as it did then.

I wish you enough.

Today, and everyday, I wish you enough.

“I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how grey the day may appear.

I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.

I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.

I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.

I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.

I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.

I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final goodbye.”

Bob Perks

And very importantly

I wish you enough stillness to weather the busy-ness.

I wish you enough time.

I wish you enough time to say those important things to each other.

I wish you enough time to love and be loved.

I wish you enough time to hold each other.

I wish you enough time to laugh together.

I wish you enough time to cry together.

I wish you enough time to be together.

I wish you enough time to just be.

So folks, I wish you enough for 2024 and beyond.

Because you are enough.

With warmth

Nancy 🤗 xx

A Ritual as the Year Turns

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Some people glide into the next year without any thought for the date and others celebrate with wild abandon.

And, of course, there is everything in-between.

There may be no miracles that happen as the calendar year turns from 2023 to 2024 – you are still you and your life doesn’t suddenly change, however, there is a subtle mental shift.

As we drift over the seconds of midnight whether you are awake or asleep, conscious of it or not, you will have one final 2023 out-breath and take your first in-breath of 2024.

New resolutions or intentions aren’t necessary, and yet, ceremony and ritual can bring resolution, comfort and hope for this shift in time.

And certainly, with the work that I do and the way it touches me bringing a little ritual to the evening is a beautiful way to honour that.

Since ancient times, the use of flame has been an important feature of many spiritual ceremonies whether of religious origin or not.

However, we don’t need to have any spiritual or religious leaning to feel the comfort of a candle lighting ceremony.

It’s amazing how candlelight can transform a space. How it can offer up space for reflection with it’s comforting glow.

If you wish, take time to honour those who will not be arriving into 2024 with a candle lighting ritual.

You may wish, on the approach to midnight, to light a candle and spend a moment in time with a memory of those you said goodbye to.

Or light your candle to honour yourself and all that you have endured.

Hold space for grief and suffering – yours and others.

For all the losses that you have experienced or that have touched you.

And also honour those special times.

The times that lit you up.

The times of personal joy.

And of collective joy.

Be present with whatever comes up for you.

If someone you loved dearly has died this year please know there is no pressure or expectation to wish away all that 2023 held for it is likely to hold some very special memories amongst the painful ones.

Let us live where we need to be, and hold on to those memories that help us through difficult time.

With love as always

Nancy xx

Reflections of Time

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Reflections of time as this year comes to a close and the new one nears.

Our human mind has long grappled with the idea of time.

With clocks and calendars, schedules and the keeping of time.

And, of course often dismissing time as a human construct.

Does time even exist at all?

Time, in some form, shows itself in nature regardless of whether we connect with the idea of time or not.

Times of daylight and moonlight.

The waxing and waning of the moons bringing a regularity of full moons.

The changing of the seasons.

The rings within the trunk of a tree denoting it’s age.

Our circadian rhythms.

The different layers laid down through history upon the earth each revealing of life in that era.

A snapshot of that time.

We think of time as perpetual.

Or infinite.

And our existence is just a moment in time.

A miniscule blip in the ethereal space of the universe.

This life, my life, your life, is this space, between birth and death.

That is our time.

Made up of many, many moments.

When time has passed we cannot get it back yet, sometimes, we try to make up for lost time.

Time is given and it can be taken away.

It is thought that money can’t buy time but living in poverty can shorten our time on this earth.

Time can seem to go fast or slow.

Sometimes it can feel as if time is standing still.

We can “kill” time but we can’t create time.

When we choose to spend our time with another we are offering them moments of our life. Sharing in each other’s moments. What a precious gift this time, our moments are to each other.

When we are forced to spend time with another or doing something not of our choosing is this then a theft of our moments?

For we didn’t give them willingly and we cannot get them back.

Some say we should be present with those moments too but in times of grave depravity our survival instincts may take us elsewhere – to a different time.

Some of our moments in time are etched into our memory and yet others seem lost.

When death is nearing time takes on a different meaning.

We suddenly have a very different relationship with it.

We find there is more time behind us than in front of us.

That we have taken “time” for granted.

Some pray for time.

Time to spend with their loved ones.

Time to say many I love you’s.

Time to make amends.

Time to laugh.

Time for more living.

Some pray that their time is short.

Not necessarily because they don’t love life or the people in their lives.

But because they wish their suffering to end.

Or they simply feel their life is complete and fulfilled.

Some are confused with time.

When death doesn’t happen when “expected”.

I have heard before “why am I not dead yet?

Or, “Why am I still alive?”

And sometimes “why is it taking so long?”

Some may say “How did I get to this moment so soon?”

Some try to “cheat” time by opting for medical interventions with the appeal that it may offer more time and yet, may ultimately affect the quality of their time.

Of their moments.

Time.

It comes.

It goes.

It does not wait for us.

It carries on regardless.

There is nothing more grounding of our moments in time than our closeness to the end of “our” time.

Until our own death separates us from time.

And yet, even then, our essence remains a part of time for as long as we are remembered by another.

Stored as a memory in time.

And remember, whilst many are yearning for this turning of the year into the next, of putting the time of 2023 behind them, others may feel it is taking them further away, in time, from their loved one whose time in their physical form came to an end this year or in recent years.

Time is simply made up of moments.

How we spend those moments is up to us.

Nancy – the armchair philosopher haha 🧐😘 xx

Art – Time Cemetery by Mumu

Amidst Stormy Skies

by This moment Matters, posted in Uncategorized

Simultaneously feeling relieved and disappointed when your person comes through a serious, potentially life threatening infection or exacerbation.

As an end of life doula and death educator I am here to not only share with you how beautiful death can be but also how difficult it can be.

It is only when we talk about these difficulties that we can best support ourselves and others and help each of us feel less alone.

I get to witness a lot of intense moments.

Some have this idealist view of dying and what it might look like or be like for yourself or supporting someone at the end of life and that includes those new to end of life care.

It can indeed be everything you ever wished for.

The truth is that, no matter how well prepared we are and how well we are supported there can still be suffering.

Today I will not be talking about the suffering of the person dying but the suffering of the main carer.

For some death can happen suddenly and unexpectedly.

It can happen after a short illness.

For others death comes at the end of a long, progressive and often difficult illness.

Here’s the thing – if you have been caring for someone over months and years of a progressive illness such as MND, dementia, COPD, some cancers, advanced heart disease, parkinson’s etc it takes a toll on your wellbeing.

Not least your mental wellbeing.

Along that journey of long-term caring, witnessing your person’s health deteriorate there are likely to be particularly challenging times when they present with a serious infection, an exacerbation or a relapse that is life-threatening.

You shift into survival mode, your adrenaline and cortisol levels rise. You switch up. You are on high alert.

Your whole being subconsciously preparing for the intensity of grief.

Day and night.

Sometimes with people coming and going.

GP’s, hospice, hired carers.

You wonder if this is it.

If this is the end.

Is your person dying?

And nobody can give you a definitive answer.

It might last for a few hours, a few days or a few weeks.

And then, slowly, day by day, your person’s health stabilises.

Their infection, exacerbation, relapse starts to pass.

And this is where you may experience the paradox, the duality of feeling relieved that your person didn’t die whilst also feeling disappointed.

You see, at this point you are physically, emotionally and mentally exhausted.

You are experiencing overwhelm.

Coping with the rollercoaster ride of emotions that come with caring for someone with a progressive, terminal illness long-term.

Your body and mind struggles to switch off in the aftermath.

To catch up and process the circumstantial change.

The expectation of death and when it doesn’t happen you are left with the intensity of grief that now has nowhere to go..

You are wiped out.

Stretched out.

Spent.

And wondering how many more of these times of anticipated death you can bear.

Actually, no, you may well be feeling that you can’t bear any more at all.

This is suffering.

I hear you.

And I see your suffering.

And although there is sadly no magic wand that can change any of it what I can do is rally the troops to help you ride out the storm.

We can hold space for your suffering, provide somewhere soft for it all to land and hold you in a way that you wish to be held.

And, when you tell me that you wish your loved one had died I won’t judge you.

Even if you are judging yourself.

I know this comes from a place of utter despair and deep love.

With tender loving care

Nancy 💚 xx