I HAVE HOSPICE SERVICES; WHY SHOULD I HIRE DEATH DOULA DANIELLE?
Hospice is an amazing resource and I recommend that all of my clients who are eligible to receive hospice services, do so.
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Patients are only eligible for hospice care once a physician makes a clinical determination that life expectancy is six months or less if the terminal illness runs its normal course. You do not have to "qualify" for a death doula's services. We can begin working together the minute you're diagnosed to help ease your anxiety about your life-limiting illness by facing your eventual mortality and preparing for it mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually and practically.
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Hospice resources, like all medical care in our current system, are stretched very thin. Your nurse will visit for at most, an hour per day, and that's usually only in the last week or so of life. It's generally once a week or so prior to that. You may get a caregiver or CNA to come help with ADLs (activities of daily living) once or twice per week. Chaplains are a standard part of the hospice interdisciplinary team and they offer spiritual support, but you may see them once or twice per month, until the final days of life. As your Death Doula, I can spend as much time with you as you need. We can create legacy projects together, create playlists of music to listen to in your final months/days/minutes, I can help facilitate challenging conversations with family members, I can offer guided meditations and visualizations to help ease pain and calm you, allowing you to use less medications.
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Death Doula services are an accompaniment to, not a substitute for, hospice care.
WHEN SHOULD I CONTACT DEATH DOULA DANIELLE?
Ideally, you'd contact me when you are young and healthy and death seems far away in your future. We'd go through the End of Life Coaching process and determine your "Ideal Death" and together we'd write your Vigil Plan. Then, years down the line, we reconnect when you need to put that playbook into action.
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But, we don't live in an ideal world. We live in the real world. So, the real world answer is that you contact me when you need help, support, guidance, education, or a shoulder to cry on regarding all things end of life. Whenever that may be.
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You contact me when you get diagnosed with a life limiting illness, or when someone you loved is diagnosed. Or when your loved one has just been placed on hospice and you're feeling overwhelmed. Or when your loved one is lying in the ICU, on a ventilator, and you need help, support and guidance to remove the breathing tube. Or you contact me when you're interested in VSED or MAID and want education and guidance. You contact me when you're looking for ways to honor the sacredness of an impending transition with ritual and ceremony.
You don't have to do any of this alone. Let us walk home, together.
MY LOVED ONE ALREADY DIED.
CAN YOU STILL HELP ME?
I offer peer grief support services in the form of one to one sessions, grief support groups and an assortment of grief processing workshops.
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It doesn't matter if your loved one died last week, last year or in the last century. Grief doesn't have a prescribed timeline, it doesn't appear in neat, well-defined stages and it isn't really something that we are taught how to work with in our Western culture.
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I offer a safe container for clients to tell the story of their grief, to tell the story of their deceased loved one, and to tell the story of their relationship with that person. Through journal prompts, guided meditations/visualizations, breathing exercises, suggested readings and deep, meaningful conversations, my clients learn to develop a relationship with their grief that allows them to honor their loved one while still remaining grateful in the present moment.
The emotions surrounding loss are deep and complex. I am not a licensed therapist, I do not offer therapy. I will be very honest with a client if I feel that their needs fall outside the scope of "Peer Support" and refer to a licensed therapist when indicated. This Psychology Today Article helps define the difference between peer grief support and grief therapy.
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