We Are All Terminal
When we think of someone on hospice, we might first imagine someone unconscious with days or hours to live. Although this is often part of the dying experience at some point, it’s also true that someone on hospice might be playing a game with their grandchild, cooking their favorite meal, or laughing with a friend. Hospice isn’t just about dying—it’s about improving quality of life, managing pain, and supporting people physically, emotionally, and spiritually through whatever time they have left. Compared to people who are not on hospice, those who receive hospice care actually live longer (and tend to feel more supported!). Logistically, when people have a terminal illness with an estimated 6 months or less to live they generally qualify for hospice care.
Maybe this information about what hospice is and how it works is generally well-understood by most people in 2026—but it wasn’t to certain members of my family last october when my grandma’s health started declining. I made this month’s zine because I wish that past me would have had a simple resource like this to pass along. There was so much confusion around hospice in my family: who would have to pay for it? What does it mean for her care? Why would a decision like that be helpful?
It feels important for me to name that even with a resource like this, the experience likely would have still been challenging. Simply having more information doesn’t mean that people will ask for the help they need. Having more information doesn’t mean that people will gain emotional maturity or communication skills. And ultimately, even if we were doing everything “right,” having more information doesn’t mean that the grief won’t sting. At a birth one time I heard a midwife say to the person in labor, “Just because it’s hard doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong” and I’ve thought about that a lot through this experience with my grandma, too. It is just painful, regardless how much you know or how prepared you are (and, yet, I am still gonna advocate for more info for more people—it doesn’t make it worse, at least!).
As you navigate whatever transitions, grief, life changes are coming your way this month, may you feel supported & seen!
If you’re needing an extra support person on your team right now to offer that kind of non-judgmental support & witnessing I’d love to be part of your team (either virtually & in-person in Madison, WI)!
Feel free to reach out anytime. Somatic support can look a lot of different ways, but it often all comes back to deepening our relationship with our bodies, sensations, emotions, and capacity to feel things & make choices that feel empowering in our lives. It’s really cool stuff (i’m biased of course, but it is really quite fascinating!).