Check out the Channel 6 Morning News broadcast that spreads our message to the community. I joined Rob Merritt to talk about the seeds of our mission to celebrate the end of life that began with my book Parting Ways, my column at the OC Register and this blog–a collaboration with Hospice Care of the West.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2jNXJ2DdJk
Our conversation is timely and important at this stage in America’s history when thousands of baby boomers are dealing with these issues and in search of new ways to approach this stage of life.We discussed the changing attitudes that have fueled the wider acceptance of hospice and growing specialty of palliative care in hospitals that have enabled families and communities to be more involved and clear-eyed in life’s last chapter. I shared my personal experiences losing my parents who were cultural markers for these changes. In the late 1980s, my father’s cancer was veiled in denial that led to him to dying, alone, in a hospital while my mother’s cancer prognosis at the turn of the 21st Century was the opposite. My mom had one of those end-of-life experiences at home surrounded by friends and family who came in her last week to celebrate her much in way you would at wake. Check out my most recent OC Register Column about our experience.
I talked about the commonality of hospice in all the families I report on. We discussed my experiences sitting bedside with patients at Hospice Care of the West. These patients were interviewed in life review to video record the stories of their lives to pass on to the
next generation. I’m convinced video recording a life review interview better prepare the individual, family and community for end of life. This should be a cornerstone in the psychosocial care of a patient and family in hospice.
My hope is one day all the stories I write about here on Celebration2life.com, my column Parting Ways in the OC Register and my book Parting Ways will one day be the norm and not the exception.