Legacy MattersDoulas is a Greek term for women who help other women with childbirth, usually at home . It's now become a term used by those who coach and counsel people who are dying and their families.
Coming in and going out. Birth doulas and death doulas.
Living in a time when most Americans are unfamiliar with death, It's a wonderful thing that these doulas bring experience, solace and sacredness to the process of dying. When done well, death can be a euphoric experience.
For the Families of the Dying, Coaching as the Hours Wane
Even a hospice team is often not there for the final hours.
"These final moments matter, but often, when families and patients need us most — to explain the process, calm the situation, take away the negative energy and allow them to be more present — we aren't there," said Henry Fersko-Weiss, vice president for counseling services at Continuum Hospice Care in New York City, which has a new program that has been keeping vigil with the dying and their families.
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It is not uncommon, hospice workers say, for those not involved in day-to-day care to bring their own fears and conflict to the deathbed and inadvertently become a burden. Into the tumult came Mr. Fersko-Weiss, a Buddhist whose religion says that "what happens to the soul is partly determined by how it leaves this life." The scene of death, he said, is a "sacred space," and the doula's job is to protect it.
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Chloe Tartaglia, a pre-med student, yoga teacher and former birth doula, had never seen anyone die when she volunteered for the vigil program.
She learned the signs of imminent death in her 16-hour training program, how to match her breathing to the patient's and use visualization and aromatherapy to calm everyone in the room. On the subway, headed to her first case, Ms. Tartaglia, whose father was a hospice physician, concentrated on her goal: to be "like water and flow to the place where there's need."
What do the families say?
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All three described feeling peaceful and reverent at the time of his passing. It was like being "inside a cocoon," Ms. Pasalbessy said, "just me and my sisters, and Daddy, all together, in a place where nothing bad could touch us."
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This dying was such a wonderful experience, if death can be that. And it's because there was no fear of the unknown."