Translator: Ana Cecelia Barajas Reviewer: Denise RQ
My in-laws had four children in five years.
So, as you can imagine,
their dinner table conversation was pretty lively.
As the kids got older, the conversation got rowdier,
and every so often,
someone would bring up something that was sexual or scatological;
to keep that kind of talk to a minimum,
the parents implemented what became known as "the Sarche family rule."
Any time someone would bring up a topic like that,
someone could invoke the Sarche family rule,
and that person had to explain, in detail, what they were talking about.
Because it was embarrassing to explain,
the kids stopped bringing up some things
that maybe shouldn't be talked about at the dinner table.
In the family that my husband and I have created,
we have two children who are three years apart,
and we also have the Sarche family rule, but ours is a little bit different.
We also have very lively dinner table conversation,
and every so often,
somebody brings up something that is scatological or sexual,
although, in our family, it's not usually one of the kids.
(Laughter)
It's usually me.
(Laughter)
Talking about things that make other people uncomfortable
is not embarrassing for me at all.
In fact, I live for it.
(Laughter)
I've always been really good at talking about hard stuff.
I was an AIDS educator in college, I was a peer counselor,
when my friends were worried about having an STD, or being pregnant,
I was the one they turned to for help.
When my lifelong friend Michelle was diagnosed with a glioblastoma,
a brain tumor, when we were 26,
I realized that my comfort in talking about hard stuff was pretty unusual.
At that time, a glioblastoma was always terminal,
but our friends couldn't acknowledge that with Michelle.
They would give her pep talks,
telling her that she was young, strong,
and promising she would beat the disease.
I handled it very differently.
I said, "I can go with you, into the hard stuff.
You don't have to tell me everything is going to be OK.
I don't have to tell you everything is going to be OK.
We both know it's not going to be OK."
When she died,
I was so grateful we had had those conversations.
They brought us much closer,
and they helped me to accept her death with way fewer regrets.
I really believe that my experience with Michelle brought me to my calling,
which is working in a mortuary,
helping people put their funeral plans in place
long before they are needed.
I didn't know anything about funerals,
I don't have a background in social work nor in psychology,
but when I heard about the job,
I knew it was exactly what I was supposed to be doing.
In doing my life's work,
I've become an evangelist to breaking down the taboos about death.
In our society, we aren't supposed to talk about death.
It's morbid, it's taboo, it's in bad taste.
Instead, we whisper someone passed away, or even just passed.
We say that they fought valiantly but ultimately succumbed to their disease.
Why are we so afraid to talk about the reality of our mortality?
It reminds me of how we used to approach sex.
A generation or two ago,
we would teach kids about their bodies using euphemisms
we would talk about their peepee, their weewee, their hoohah.
(Laughter)
The euphemisms made us feel a little more comfortable,
but ultimately,
they taught kids that their body parts were shameful and weird.
To help kids to feel in control of their body,
we now know we need to use anatomically-correct, real terms.
Similarly, I believe that the euphemisms for death do the same thing.
They reinforce the idea that we can't or shouldn't talk
about something that is so fundamental.
Each of us will experience the death of people we love,
and ultimately, the people we love will experience our death, too.
Shouldn't we be talking about this stuff and learning how to deal with it?
In Utah, there's an incredible bereavement support group for kids
called "The sharing place."
Did you know that 1 in 20 children will experience the death of a parent
before they turn 18?
In these groups,
the kids come together, and each time, they say, using direct terminology,
what happened to their parent.
"My mom's heart stopped, and she died."
"My dad had an illness called depression;
he shot himself in the head, and he died."
Talking helps us to process what happened.
It helps us to normalize our experience,
and feel part of a community, less isolated and alone.
It also gives those around us permission to share their experience as well.
Think about when you've had the death of a loved one.
Do you want to talk about that person and keep them close?
Do you want to share how it feels to be in the world without them?
Sometimes, we avoid talking about that stuff
because it makes others feel uncomfortable.
What about when you've had a friend who is bereaved?
Do you try to rescue them from their bad feelings
by saying things like,
"Oh, at least he died doing something he loved,"
"At least she lived a long life,"
or do you do something even worse and go away
because the whole thing feels too uncomfortable?
What I'm here trying to ask you is:
can you sit with that person, just quietly,
maybe with your hand on their shoulder,
saying, "I have no words, but I'm here with you."
Death is part of life, it's not a separate part.
I'm asking you to acknowledge that.
Talk to your kids about that,
allow them to go to funerals and visit cemeteries.
Use ritual to help with the grieving process when a pet dies.
Talk to your kids about what grief might look like.
It can look a lot of different ways,
and the problem is that, because we never talk about it,
all of us expect grief to look like
what we learned about in ninth grade Psychology class,
"I've got denial now, now I'm bargaining,
uh, oh, I'm angry, I must almost be done."
(Laughter)
What happens is
when we really experience grief and find out it's not a linear process,
and it doesn't end, when we experience that,
almost every one of us thinks that we're doing it wrong.
So I want you to start talking about it.
Many of us believe that if we bring up the name of someone who died,
the bereaved person is going to feel a lot worse.
We can't make them feel worse.
We also believe that if we talk about death, we'll make it happen.
I promise that's not the case.
We believe that using D words - die, dead, death -
that that's being too harsh.
But really, shouldn't we be using those correct terms?
Recently, I read a book
by Dr. Paul Kalanithi called, "When breath becomes air."
when he was a neurosurgeon who developed stage-four lung cancer.
In the book, he wrote about
his experience in dealing with patients who are dying,
also in dealing with his own dying process.
What he says is that by talking about and thinking about death,
we can more deeply experience life.
I don't know about you,
but when I know something has a due date, I put a lot more effort into it.
Maybe mortality is similar,
and making that recognition that we're mortal is similar.
If we recognize that our life is finite,
we can live more fully and more meaningfully.
We can talk about what makes our life worth living.
Be courageous
and have those conversations with the people you love.
Think about why your life is meaningful.
Talk to your family about why you want to be in the world with them,
and what it's going to feel like when you're not in the world with them.
Have these conversations, it's going to take practice,
and I know it's going to feel awkward,
but more talking equals less fear.
Haven't you found that when you're in the dark,
things are a lot scarier than when you turn on the lights,
and realize that you are stronger and braver than you thought?
Thank you.
(Applause)