I think people are changing very much spiritually.” “We know that by looking at the brain it’s not changing biologically or functionally. “There’s this assumption that people have these visions because their brains are changing, becoming deoxygenated, or they are medicated and confused, but that’s not the case,” he says. He cannot offer a scientific explanation for these phenomena. “Children don’t have the same language that we do to talk about death, but the visions they describe give them a sense that they are loved and that what is happening to them is okay,” Dr. Kerr adds that dying children often see pets who have passed away. Often these visions-vividly real to the person experiencing them-are of people who have died before them, and they provide a great sense of comfort, peace, and even joy.ĭr. He says 88 percent of his hospice patients report seeing visions as they die. Kerr says something that has surprised him the most about working in hospice is the peaceful visions that often come in a person’s final hours. While many people equate death with suffering, Dr. Experiencing comfort unexplained by science It was extremely meaningful to her, and also to them.” In these ways, a death doula can help make saying goodbye easier for both the dying and the living. And we used her old clothes to make an apron for her daughter. So for her legacy project, we made a cookbook of her recipes that all her children could have. “One woman I worked with was known in her family as this amazing cook. “Many of the people I’ve worked with have a fear that they’ll be forgotten, so something we often do is a legacy project, which is a way of helping friends and family remember them ,” she says. She’s also seen how important relationships become at the end of life. HOSPICE NURSE EXPLAINS PHENOMENA BEFORE DEATH PROFESSIONALGrudges are dismissed, replaced by forgiveness and peace.Īngela Shook works as a death doula, a trained professional who supports someone at the end of their life. Family members who haven’t talked in years may start communicating regularly. “Something I often see is that many people want to make amends and improve relationships that have been damaged,” he says. But something Lynn has noticed in his work is that dying patients often prioritize relationships in a way they didn’t earlier in their lives. Just as people live in different ways, people die in different ways. “As a doctor, you’re taught that death is the one thing to avoid." "When I first started, to be honest, I didn’t think there would be much for me to do," he says. Kerr's job only focused on one outcome-saving patient's lives-so he admits that he wasn't quite sure where he would fit into a health-care space where death was imminent. Kerr started working in hospice care-a type of health care focusing on managing a terminally ill patient's pain and symptoms, as well as their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life-to supplement his income as a doctor. Palliative care physician Christopher Kerr, MD, PhD, has gotten similar responses when he tells people about his occupation. “People ask me why I would want to spend my time doing something so sad, but I find it incredibly rewarding and meaningful,” Lynn says. When Daniel Lynn tells people he’s a hospice volunteer, he says they usually respond by asking him a question: Why? American culture tends to be put off by anything related to death it certainly isn’t a welcome topic at a party or around the dinner table.
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