Doula (/ˈduːlə/): companion, attendant, care

Death doulaship is a lifestyle of advocating for dignified-dying that depend on our dedication to live well together through mirroring neurons and mutual care. It is in cultivating agency and self-determination through every experience, into its fullness and completion. As aging bodies born into or stepping into worlds of disability, creativity and tending, we are growing consciousnesses that cycles through countless symbolic deaths and transform into people we didn’t know we would become. Death leaves us with legacy, undeniable impacts and clarity.

Growth is in fine-tuning the details of learning how to respond to one another and ourselves, while unlearning and letting go of outdated ways. Death arrives ever so slowly or spontaneously, in rest or crises, by nature and/or societal will.

Our relationship to dying, as in change, is an intimate one, stigmatized and misunderstood; vulnerable and usually unwanted. It requires much time, sacred attention and our willingness.

Disability justice and intimacy are essential to living a collectively affirming and dignified life together.

Certified with Elizabeth Kübler-Ross Foundation of Mexico, INELDA

We are all dying as much as we are living. End of life care (EOL) can begin at any time. It can look like:

• Process unresolved issues

• Facilitating life review process

• Decluttering emotionally/physically

• Creating remembrances

• Symbolic meaning-making and story telling

• Grief care for planting new seeds

• Dreamwork