Here is an article I wrote for those of us who assist departing souls in their final hour on earth:
Doula of Death & Dying
How to Be of Invaluable Aid to Someone Passing Over
“She had a good death,” Marci said of her mother’s passing. “All of the children were there when she closed her eyes, drew her last breath and passed over with us all holding hands.”
A good death. We’re hearing this report more and more, as death comes out of the closet of fear and people understand it as a natural part of life, a transition to ‘the other side’ to be accepted and supported. More families are gathering at a loved one’s final moment in the earth and people are feeling more peace and less grief, greater closure but also a heightened sense that the loved one doesn’t ‘die’, but passes into another form or dimension.
As we mature spiritually from apprehension of death to an enlightened appreciation of the continuity of life, times like these will occur more frequently, to the joy of the one passing on as well as of the ones left here. We now know that passing over is but one of many events in an infinite series of life transitions. We will be seeing more loved ones – as well as the wonderful volunteer hospice workers – present at the passing of a friend or relative.
But is this all we can do? Is gathering together at the time of passing the only gift we can give to the departing, to ourselves? The expressions of love, the reconciliations, the forgiveness, all are important steps in our spiritual maturity and vital to everyone’s peace of mind. But what if there were more we could do …
Listen to what Elizabeth, a gifted intuitive and healer, told me one day in August, 2009. We ran into each other at a mutual friend’s office where I was doing Trinfinity8 demonstrations. She said she hadn’t seen me around Virginia Beach for a while, and I told her I’d moved to New Jersey to help my elderly parents in their final life chapter.
Excited, she said she just had to tell me something I could soon use about her experiences with a departing relative. Elizabeth’s story opened my eyes to an amazing level of service we can perform at someone’s time of transition:
I was with my aunt when she passed. We were lying in her hospital bed together and her head was nestled on my shoulder. As we talked, her voice and breath became fainter as the minutes went by and her time was approaching. I gently encouraged her to accept what was happening, that it was good and natural.
As I felt her final moments drawing nearer, I explained that she might start to feel lighter and then find herself moving up and out of her head. I always believed in how our souls leave our bodies, but it wasn’t until I felt a pressure pass through my shoulder after her last breath that I knew it was true.
I kept talking to her, saying, “That’s right. You’re doing good.” Then I told her to go over to the upper corner of the room. When I felt she was there, I explained that she could now see her body and me in the bed and to follow my instructions.
I asked her to gather up all of her life energy from every cell in her body. I did this because I knew the staff would be coming for her soon and there was no way to know how quickly they would drain the blood and introduce preservatives into the body.
In a natural death, it can take a full 72 hours for the soul to completely retrieve all levels of life energy from the cells. Some religions and traditions insist on a fairly immediate treatment/disposal of the body [embalming, cremation, burial, etc.]. Other traditions acknowledge the necessity for the soul’s full withdrawal from the physical vehicle so that aspects of the individual don’t become trapped in the astral planes [purgatory, the ‘bardo’].
I said that I knew she would do a good job and encouraged her to be careful and thorough. After a while, when I sensed that she was finished, I asked her to do one more thing – to meet me at her house the next day because we had something to do there.
The following day, I went to her house and, feeling her there, I explained that now it was important for her to retrieve her life energy from any of her things – the furniture, the photos, sentimental mementos, jewelry, etc. – that she was attached to, fond of, had invested herself in; to go through everything in the house and get herself back.
As I felt her completing this part of her withdrawal from her earth life, I told her I loved her, hoped she would find much joy and beauty in the next part of her life, and said, See you later.
Elizabeth’s story transfixed me. It opened my eyes to the remarkable opportunity for those of us witnessing someone’s passing to be an invaluable aid to the wholeness and vitality of their life after ‘death’. While a Doula ushers new life into the earth plane, so we might at some point have the rare opportunity to act as Doula into the next life.
In the meanwhile, with my parents still here, it gave me a better appreciation of why they were hanging on to all their ‘stuff’. From time to time over the years, my sister and I had tried to encourage our parents to get rid of all the stuff stored in the attic and the basement. Did they really need our report cards from first grade, or the memos to salesmen from the 1950s? But now I understood that, since they had quite literally ‘invested’ their life energy into these things, throwing them away would be like throwing themselves away, bit by bit.
This is a good thing for feng shui practitioners and professional clutter-clearers to understand before they ask their clients to dispose of personal belongings: Most individuals need some form of retrieval ceremony to get their life energy back from objects before they can release those items without trauma or a sense of loss.
It’s also a good thing for all of us to realize when we get fired up to throw our own stuff out: It’s not only important to say good-bye, it’s also important to retrieve those bits of our own life energy, to replace the life that is ours where it belongs – within us.
A retrieval ceremony need not be elaborate, although in some cases, when people have invested themselves so deeply in an object(s), it is certainly more appropriate. For the most part, we can do it simply with our desire and intention to take our life energy back into our selves. I’ve done it and I have to say that you’ll really feel more energized, not to mention lighter and freer, once the outer spaces have been cleared and you are more open to just ‘breathe’. It’s a clean release, without feelings of loss or regret.
So now, rather than press my parents to get rid of all their old stuff, I am more than willing to wait for the time when I can help them retrieve the life energy they’ve poured into it all – into all their stuff and into the very physical body they lived in this time around, at a time when it’s right and easy and necessary … for their sakes.
And I pray that I can be as clear, present and loving as Elizabeth was with her aunt when it’s my parents’ time to pass over to their next phase of life.
Cheryl Salerno, CQTP, is a Metaphysician, Minister and Trinfinity8 Practitioner and Broker. Her popular FreeforHealers.com website links directly to her QuantumPlus.us main website, where science meets Spirit to ignite healing. Right now, Cheryl lives and works in Highland Park, N.J.
