Would you like to join us to talk about the difficult subject of death, which comedian Billy Connelly likens to the “the big bully at school”? It’s wonderful to be out chatting and meeting people again, since where I live in Sydney, Australia, we’ve got Covid-19 down to a minimum and people are free to […]
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Wouldn’t it be great if we had a groundswell of compassionate communities.
A report from the Australian charity Groundswell has just been released and it makes fascinating reading. Groundswell is committed to increasing death literacy and it’s best known project is Dying to Know Day. About itself, Groundswell explains: “An independent charity, we work at the intersection of health care, palliative care and community to develop solutions that […]
Dipping into the well.
A conversation with friends took me to a well the other day. We were walking in the Sydney sunshine along Bungaree’s Walkway at Middle Head, a natural pathway with extraordinary views around Sydney’s majestic harbour, when the conversation, idling unselfconsciously as they do, turned to grief. I was asked about my brother’s death and from there […]
Care in the carpark.
Jean Kittson’s latest role is caring for her parents in the challenging, frustrating time of COVID-19. My interview with Jean appears in this week’s editions of Mosman Daily, North Shore Times and The Daily Telegraph. Like so many of us today, Jean – well-known Australian commentator, actor, and comedian – is living the daily reality […]
What happens when nurses are afraid at their patients’ end of life?
When Dr Katrin Gerber shared her thoughts about the important topic of pain management at the end of life, it brought back many memories. My mother died in a nursing home in late 2011, and the haunting question lingered – did Mum get the pain relief she needed as she died? Doubts about this led […]