Ask A Death Doula Podcast: What is a Shared Death Experience?

Ask A Death Doula

Big Ideas:

1.What is a Shared Death Experience [6:56] – A shared death experience occurs when somebody is dying and a caregiver, loved one, or a bystander feels like they shared in that person’s transition. In some cases, this person will observe the initial stages of the afterlife – where they see the dying person there or sense that it is where they are going. It is sharing the journey of the experience with the dying person. It is the movement from this human experience through the portal of death to another realm of existence and the observer feels like they shared in that journey.

2.There are 4 Types of Shared Death Experiences [8:49] – These are “modes of participation” for the experiencer. There are four ways a person can feel themselves in the shared death experience. The first and most common type is sensing. Sensing that a loved one or some person is transitioning. It can be bedside but is most commonly remote. You can be halfway around the world and have a sense that someone you love is dying. It is usually highly energetic and intuitive – a knowing that you feel in your gut. The second type is witnessing phenomena related to death or death itself. Witnessing the dying person in this stage of transition or elevated beings/heavenly realms in the form of luminous light, etc. The third mode of participation is accompanying. You can accompany or move along with the dying person on the pathway to the afterlife. The last and final mode is guiding. The experiencer reports that they were brought into the experience to guide the dying along their pathway.

3. Pre-Death Dreams, Visions, and Visitations [14:44] – Research provided by Dr. Christopher Kerr from the Buffalo inpatient Hospice says that 80% of his patients have a pre-death dream or vision. The term “dream” is used loosely – these usually come in the form of visitations from deceased loved ones that is observed by the caregiver (the patient is telling them they see the person or is having a conversation with them). At some point, the death of the person begins and the journey to transition starts. Often the messaging from these visitations to the dying person is to “get ready.” The shared death experience begins when that journey begins. The science of physics supports the fact that energy cannot be destroyed – it can only change forms.

4. The Benefits to the World of Bringing Back the Sacredness of End-of-Life Experiences [20:00] – Acknowledging death as a natural part of life can bring us closer together as communities and families. The awareness of death can allow us to communicate, connect, and express ourselves more effectively. It allows us to love each other with death as part of life instead of something we ignore. To gain the perspective of life being a gift, we must hold death in our minds. Death is as integral to life as birth is and we need to honor it is a society. The approach to death in modern society is not natural. It is a protracted, inefficient, and unhealthy response to the fear of death. Anything we can do to bring death and all its grandeur back into the fold of our conversations and everyday life, the better the benefits could be for all of us.

5. Death Changes Our Lives [24:30] – When I got into nursing, I realized how end of life was not going well for people. I transitioned into hospice care thinking it would be better – but it wasn’t. I thought to myself, “How in the world did something that is 100% guaranteed in our journey become so far removed and so feared?” It took a year and a half of my nursing career before I saw a beautiful death and I realized that if people knew how beautiful it could be that they would never be afraid – and that started my journey. We are all so much more similar than we think. It doesn’t matter where you live in the world, how much money you have, what color you are, or what religion you practice – we all die the same way. We all have the same humanity within us. If we just absorbed the fact that we are so much more similar than different and brought that awareness into the world today it would be a game changer. Death has taught me that time is our most valuable commodity, and that life is about connection, not the goals we pursue. Death is not a medical experience, it’s a human one. If we bring that perspective back into our society and take a holistic approach to it, we can really change the way end of life goes for everyone in the world.

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xoxoxo Suzanne