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April 2022

APRIL 2022
NEWS BRIEFS MEDIA INELDA UPDATE PRACTICE CORNER EVENTS
Willows Rest Green Burial, Niagara Falls
GREEN LEAVES: DEATH PRACTICES TO ENRICH THE EARTH
by Lara Stewart-Panko
Since INELDA last published an article on green burial, the movement has gained momentum.  Creating new burial sites and using commercially facilitated human composting have become options. Before we explore these ways of honoring both people and planet, let us take a moment to acknowledge the multitude of civilizations who continue to apply their longstanding practices of returning bodies to the earth, including many people of the Jewish and Muslim faiths. Let us remember that what many people in North America, some parts of Europe, and other heavily colonized regions have come to think of as “normal” or “standard” death care (embalming, funerals, and burials involving environmentally harmful materials, etc.) is a relatively recent way of relating to the dead.
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Trainer Profile
Trainer Shelby Kirillin: Highly Experienced and Always Learning
by Garrett Drew Ellis
Compassion, empathy, kindness, and benevolence are the necessary underlying characteristics of a good end-of-life doula. When you couple that with intellect, business savvy, education, and a commitment to not only the end-of-life field but to the empowerment and education of other doulas, you get Shelby Kirillin, who epitomizes what it means to companion the dying.
INELDA Trainer Shelby Kirillin
INELDA has been blessed to have had Shelby as a trainer and consultant for several years. Recently, she has been integral in the education and support of our newer trainers. Her private practice demonstrates how doulas can teach and work in both the corporate and private sectors.
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 Care Partners Classes - APRIL
 

UPCOMING EVENTS
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aPRIL
Care Partners Classes Care Partners Class April Training Begins

Training registration is open for the Care Partners Class that begins April 19. This four-session, 12-hour class will explore mortality and teach participants how to be a compassionate and knowledgeable guide to friends and loved ones when they enter the dying process.

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APRIL
Peer Mentoring - PRIDE Peer Mentoring & Support Group – PRIDE

Third Thursday of every month, 7:00–8:30 p.m. (ET). This is a space for members who are INELDA-trained LGBTQIA2S+ doulas to hear each other, support each other, encourage each other, and learn from each other in a safe space. Log in through your member account.

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APRIL
Training Scholarship Applications Training Scholarship Applications Close for June Trainings

Scholarship applications for our 2022 June EOLD trainings and Care Partners Class are due by this day.

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APRIL
End-of-Life Doula Training Registration End-of-Life Doula Training Registrations Open for June

Training registrations open for our 2022 June training. Doula training is for those who intend to serve the dying as part of a hospice program, in a hospital or care facility, through a community program, in a doula collective, or independently.

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aPrIL
Monthly Member Webinar “Movie Night” Featuring PROGNOSIS: notes on living

Wednesday, 7:00–8:30 p.m. (ET). We’re hosting a member “Movie Night,” featuring the film PROGNOSIS: notes on living. Sign up to receive an advanced link to watch the film and then join us for an evening with filmmakers Kate Stilley Steiner and Nancy Otto, the widow of co-director Debra “Chas” Chasnoff, featured in this documentary. The evening will feature a Q&A session and clips from the film.

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mAy
Training Scholarship Applications Training Scholarship Applications Open for July

Scholarship applications open for our July end-of-life trainings. View our website to apply.

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May
End-of-Life Doula Training Registration End-of-Life Doula Training Registrations Open for July

Training registrations open for our 2022 July training. Doula training is for those who intend to serve the dying as part of a hospice program, in a hospital or care facility, through a community program, in a doula collective, or independently.

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may
Peer Mentoring - INELDA Doulas Peer Mentoring & Support Group – INELDA Doulas

First Wednesday of every month, 7:00–8:30 p.m. (ET). We will discuss creative ways to find and work with clients and other topics relevant to the group. Log in through your member account.

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may
BIPOC Mentoring & Support Group Peer Mentoring & Support Group – BIPOC

Second Monday of every month, 7:00–8:30 p.m. (ET). This is a space for members who are INELDA-trained BIPOC doulas to connect with a diverse doula body, collaborate, and share ideas, experiences, and feelings from culturally specific perspectives. Log in through your member account.

ongoing End-of-Life Doula Training Registration End-of-Life Doula Training Registration Open for Spring 2022

Registration is open for our 2022 May and June trainings. Doula training is for those who intend to serve the dying as part of a hospice program, in a hospital or care facility, through a community program, in a doula collective, or independently.

ongoing Grief and Loss Counseling Support Services Grief and Loss Counseling and Support Services

INELDA offers one-on-one counseling and emotional support to our trained members, Care Partners Class graduates, and current EOL doula students. The 45-minute sessions will be held online via Zoom. Please contact us at [email protected] to schedule an intake call and appointment.

 

MEDIA OF THE MONTH
Writer Jessica Strawser
The Next Thing You Know
by Jessica Strawser
Jessica Strawser’s new novel, The Next Thing You Know, features an end-of-life doula as its main protagonist. For this book, released March 23 and selected as People magazine’s best new novel, Jessica dove into end-of-life doula research and drew on her findings. The fictional story follows doula Nova Huston and her client Mason Shaylor. In this excerpt from the first chapter, Mason makes his first visit to an end-of-life doula, meeting one of Nova’s colleagues.

The Next Thing You Know Book Cover by Jessica Strawser

Excerpt: Mason had already promised himself he wouldn’t make any decisions today. 

 

He scuffed his Vans on the side porch of the old house, facing the office entrance, and told himself again: He was here only for the free consult.  He didn’t need this.  He’d been the one to make the call, and at any point he could unmake it.

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A CLINICAL TRANSPLANT COORDINATOR’S Lessons on organ donation
by Loren Talbot
With over 100,000 people nationally waiting for an organ transplant, INELDA is highlighting April’s National Donate Life Month by demystifying the process of organ and tissue donation and transplantation.

 

I had the pleasure of sitting down with Victoria Burns, CPTC, CT, RN clinical transplant coordinator, and University of Vermont-trained end-of-life doula who shared how her employer of 14 years—Gift of Life Donor Program in Philadelphia—has coordinated more than 55,000 organ transplants and more than 2 million tissue transplants since 1974.

Gift of Life Donor Program
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INELDA UPDATE
SAGECare TRAINS INELDA TEAM
At the end of March, INELDA leadership and staff members trained with SAGECare, a training and consulting division of SAGE (Services & Advocacy for LGBTQ+ Elders). SAGE is the country’s largest and oldest organization dedicated to improving the lives of LGBTQIA2S+ older adults. The training focuses on transforming, expanding, and elevating organizational awareness and education of LGBTQIA2S+ matters with a deep focus on history and interpersonal communication. READ MORE SAGECare LGBTQ Platinum Certification
CONGRATULATIONS, GARRETT!
Trainer Garrett Drew Ellis was awarded a grant to write and film the legacy stories of Black and Brown seniors at their end of life in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Your INELDA community supports your work and this exciting new project.
LEARNING AND TOPICS OF INTEREST SURVEY EXTENDED
Thanks to those of you who have completed the survey already! We want and need to hear from our community to help us continue cultivating learning experiences that meet your needs. Thanks to previous feedback from you, we learned there was a growing demand for end-of-life care information from people who are not seeking a doula’s path, leading us to develop our Care Partners Class. We will continue to  introduce new learning experiences to support doulas and non-doulas alike. What do you think?
Please help us by COMPLETING THIS SURVEY before April 31, 2022.
INELDA IN THE NEWS
INELDA’s director of program development, Dr. Jamie Eaddy Chism, appeared in USA Today this week in a piece about how societal views on death are shifting. READ FULL ARTICLE
INELDA WELCOMES
Mina Devadas as a new board member. Mina has been an end-of-life doula and hospice volunteer since 2017, receiving her initial training in one of INELDA’s earliest cohorts. In these roles, Mina has served clients and patients in private homes, hospitals, rehabilitation centers, assisted living and nursing settings, and acute hospice facilities. READ FULL BIO

 

Yvette Pacheco as our coordinator of operations and finance. Yvette was born and raised in the Bronx, New York, is a graduate of City University of New York (CUNY) John Jay College of Criminal Justice and CUNY School of Law. Her career includes working at the district attorney’s office, in the housing industry in both the nonprofit and local government levels, and at a mediation organization in Hawaii. READ FULL BIO

INELDA’S April WEBINAR
Monthly Member Webinar
“Movie Night” featuring PROGNOSIS: notes on living
Wednesday, April 27th, 7:00-8:30 p.m. (ET)
 We’re hosting a member “Movie Night” in April, featuring the film PROGNOSIS: notes on living.
With the help of her wife, Nancy, and their LGBTQIA2S+ family, Chas traces a journey through the twists and turns of living with cancer. What emerges is a raw, intimate portrait of shifting relationships and identities—a story about holding onto people we love as we prepare to let them go.

Sign up to receive an advanced link to watch the film and then join us for an evening with award-winning filmmaker and PROGNOSIS co-director and producer Kate Stilley Steiner, and producer Nancy Otto, the widow of co-director Debra “Chas” Chasnoff, featured in this documentary. The evening will feature a Q&A session and clips from the film.

Academy Award winner Debra Chasnoff’s final film, #PrognosisMovie is a collaborative filmmaking effort by GroundSpark and Citizen Film from producers Nancy Otto, Carrie Lozano, Lidia Szajko, and Joan Lefkowitz, and co-director and producer Kate Stilley Steiner, with foundation support from the Koret Foundation and Fleishhacker Foundation. READ MORE 

Webinar Speaker - Nancy Otto & Kate Stilly Steiner
Note: The movie link provided at signup will be to view this film prior to the discussion. Please join us on the 27th to discuss this powerful film!
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PRACTICE CORNER
TOOLBOX TIPS
Tool Box I had a client I was caring for over an extended period who was afraid to die and resistant to conversations about her end of life. While I was sitting vigil in the hospital, she would scream out for help and her eyes would be full of terror.
While I was using meditative music, aromatherapy massage, essential oils to support fear and anxiety, guiding family to encourage and comfort her—nothing was bringing her peace. Finally, I climbed into bed with her and just held her for hours, while we played a chant recommended by a fellow doula playing quietly in the background. I spoke in whispers, encouraging words of letting go. I figured when it comes to being scared or anxious, we have one basic human need…to be held. So that is where my intuition took me. My sweet lady journeyed home two hours after I left her, with her husband and two daughters by her side. No more fear. No more pain.
—Tracy Walsh Merriman
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SHARING SOURCES
Brain Donor Project
When Gene Armentrout died after suffering from Lewy Body Dementia (LBD), his family knew of his wishes to donate his body for anatomical study. They quickly learned how valuable his brain would be for researchers studying LBD and successfully navigated the process of brain donation.
The NeuroBioBank of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) had recently been formed and was in need of brains for research—but there was no partner organization that served as the conduit to help connect willing donors. Gene’s family recognized this essential need and formed the Brain Donor Project in 2016.
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ASK INELDA

Ask Inelda Image - Eucalyptus Branch
How do you reconcile conflicting wishes of family members and wishes of the dying person? How does this fit into an advance care directive and the legal documents that might exist associated with the care of this dying person, especially when the individual may not be able to communicate verbally anymore? —February training participant
Trainer Valoria Walker: First, depending on what state you live in, an advance directive is a legal document, and sometimes it is not, so know your state’s rules about advance directives. In the state of Maryland, if you do not have an advance directive and are not able to speak for yourself or do not have the cognitive capacity to express your choices for life-sustaining treatments, the order of decision is court-ordered guardian, spouse/partner, adult children, parents, adult siblings, then other relatives or friends. READ MORE
Please submit questions to [email protected]
Self-Care - Dealing with Burnout in Acts of Service
Self-Care Prescription

Dealing With Burnout in Acts of Service

We all play our part…and act…and burn out…and are helped or help ourselves to stand up again.

The steps we have sought…should become something more than corrective medicine, as useful as that is. They should embody health itself. We can do more than simply struggle to stay afloat; we can discover a more reliable source of continuous buoyancy. We can do more than cope. We can see now that burnout need not always be an enemy. If not a best friend, it can at least be a catalyst, even a guide, for the inner work, the work on ourselves, which is the foundation of all true service, and the only way, finally, to maintain energy and inspiration. If we can view the places where we encounter fatigue and doubt as clues and signposts for that inner work, our journey will not only go more lightly but go further, deeper. We will not simply survive. We will grow.

Ram Dass, born April 6, 1931

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News Briefs
Financial Challenges for Hospice Care
The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), which advises Congress, has recommended a 20% cut in the annual per-patient payment limit for hospice providers. If a hospice’s annual Medicare payments divided by the number of patients exceeds the cap amount, the hospice must repay the excess payments.

 

Currently the limit is set at $31,000. According to MedPAC, in 2018, 16% of hospices exceeded the limit. If the cut is approved by Congress, MedPAC estimates that 28% of hospices would exceed the allowed limit. READ MORE

 Elderly Man in a Hospital Bed
Calcium in the Brain May Provide Answers to Alzheimer’s
For quite some time, scientists have believed that calcium within the neurons of the brain plays a role in the brain’s ability to adapt to its environment, known as “plasticity,” and its ability to hold on to memories. While most research around calcium and plasticity has focused on calcium’s movement through synapses, a recent study by researchers at Columbia University’s Zuckerman Institute focused on the role of calcium reserves within the hippocampus, which is the first area of the brain affected by Alzheimer’s disease, according to Dr. Franck Polleux, one of the principal researchers in the study. READ MORE
Happy Couple on a Road Trip
The World Happiness Report Highlights Benevolence
The 2022 World Happiness Report, released in March, marks the 10th year of this effort to examine happiness across the globe. Happiness has a big impact on people’s sense of well-being and their long-term health. The report ranked countries on the overall happiness of its citizens based on individual responses to a simple survey question about overall well-being that is further explained by measures such as GDP, life expectancy, corruption, and freedom.  READ MORE
The Final Word
My Life Was the Size of My Life
by Jane Hirshfield

My life was the size of my life.
Its rooms were room-sized,
its soul was the size of a soul.
In its background, mitochondria hummed,
above it sun, clouds, snow,
the transit of stars and planets.
It rode elevators, bullet trains,
various airplanes, a donkey.
It wore socks, shirts, its own ears and nose.
It ate, it slept, it opened
and closed its hands, its windows.
Others, I know, had lives larger.
Others, I know, had lives shorter.
The depth of lives, too, is different.
There were times my life and I made jokes together.
There were times we made bread.
Once, I grew moody and distant.
I told my life I would like some time,
I would like to try seeing others.
In a week, my empty suitcase and I returned.
I was hungry, then, and my life,
my life, too, was hungry, we could not keep
our hands off      our clothes on

our tongues from

 
Open Book
 

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© INELDA 2021 International End of Life Doula Association is a
501(c)(3) tax-exempt nonprofit organization
Tax ID#: 47-3023741

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