Some years ago I read the book Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. I often cringe when I remember the part where Gawande, who is a practicing MD, reports that during his entire tenure in medical school, he (and the other doctors around him) received little to no training in death and dying.This stands as true to my own experience.On multiple occasions, I have experienced death-illiterate doctors give dying patients false hope when it comes to how much time they have left. This sets the stage for shock and lack of preparedness on the part of the patient and their family, when the decline and death process happens much sooner than expected.The dying person and their loved ones would likely have chosen to spend their limited time differently if they had been told the truth.This experience, unfortunately, is as common as it is unconscionable.Yet doctors are a product of their culture, just like the rest of us, and the entire modern allopathic industry is organized around keeping people alive at all costs. True to form, in most of Western culture, the topic of death often invokes discomfort and avoidance. We’ve built walls around the subject, treating it as something to be feared rather than a natural part of life. |
Lee Warren
Death & Tantra Educator
End-of-Life Preparation Coach
Caregiver Support Ally