What Were You Taught About Death Growing Up?

What Were You Taught About Death Growing Up?

How our earliest experiences with death shape everything that comes after. There is a question I have asked many times, in many rooms, to people of all ages and backgrounds. Sometimes it comes up in the quiet, candlelit setting of a Death Cafe, a community gathering...
Why the Words We Use Around Suicide Matter

Why the Words We Use Around Suicide Matter

As a funeral director, I usually know how someone died before I ever sit with their family. But often, they don’t know that I know. I watch them wrestle with how to say it, how to explain it, how to make sense of what happened. Sometimes they whisper, “He committed...