How do people react when you tell them what you do?
They’re shocked, normally, they’re like, “Woah, I’ve never heard of that before!”
It’s just an area we feel a bit unsafe with, isn’t it, because we’re not used to speaking
about it because we don’t look after our dying people in the community as we used to.
How do you describe what you do?
I actually tend to say I’m working with a family, supporting a family while someone’s dying.
We’re just a presence that’s constant and stable.
I help people to live until that very last moment.
And when all the world is falling around them, you’re just grounded and they know what
they’re going to get from you.
I absolutely love doula-ing, I think it’s what I was put on this Earth to do.
Accompanying someone who’s dying is probably the most intimate time you can spend with somebody.
How do you deal with the emotional impact of seeing people die?
Maybe the emotional impact comes once you go home.
For yourselves? Yes, definitely. So, you wouldn’t necessarily – well, you
hope you wouldn’t fall apart at that moment. No, not much help if you do that!
Eat cake. I definitely think as you get out the door
and you unzip your doula role, you’ve got to remember who you are. And so that might
be walking the dogs or painting or anything that just seems normal to yourself. And if
it’s particularly hard, I think I’d go home and give my children or my husband a
big cuddle and hold on tight for a while.
I go home, I sit in the car, I cry, I phone up a colleague, another doula or somebody
who’s in my personal circle and I deal with it – but I deal with it separately.
The emotional impact to me, sort of conjures something sort of scary or unboundaried,
whereas actually, if you’ve been with somebody up to the point of death, that can be quite an
amazing time as well, can’t it?
And it depends who’s there with you as well. If you’ve got family members and you’re
all together and there’s this deep connection – including the person who’s dying –
when they go, it’s very powerful.
Any last words that stayed with you?
My father, just before he died, sort of sat up in his bed and opened his eyes very wide
and said, “Where am I going?”
Dying is not like it is in the films. People do not come out with really clever, witty
comments. They’re more likely to die peacefully and just want to express love.
I think that’s the strongest one, "I love you." You can’t get any better than that, really, can you?
Is there a perfect way to die? Yeah, Hollywood. Holby City.
Some people want to die at home, some people want to die in hospital. Some people want
the people that they care about around them while other people do not –
they actively choose to be on their own.
You’re at peace with yourself. You’re at peace with your family.
I’d say when you’re asleep, actually. Would you?
Yeah. Oh no, I’d want to know what’s going on.
Would you? Yeah.
The perfect way to die is with dignity, with as little pain as possible.
If I had total control over the way I was going to die, I would be – on a warm day,
in my bed or curled up on a settee in the garden with my family around me, with a glass
of wine and Beethoven playing.
How can we make end-of-life care better?
Ooh!
I think one of the most important things we need to do is to train people to have conversations
about end-of-life care. I think it’s something like 70% of GPs felt that they were not equipped
to have end-of-life conversations and yet, they are supporting a whole community where
everybody is guaranteed to die.
How do you feel about your own mortality?
I’m alright about it, actually. I accept that I’m going to die one day.
I feel really fantastic about my own mortality.
So, no, I agree, I’m not scared of it but I’m not quite ready for it yet.
Oh no (laughs) got lots to do. Absolutely – lots of shopping.
One of my favourite sayings – I think it’s Goethe and I’ve probably misquoted this
– is this “There is nothing worth more than this day”, and that’s the way I live
my life. Like, today is the most special day that there is. So when I die, I die.