Everyone will find themselves in a situation where the information in Joellyn's class will be of excellent use, even in improved personal self care. This class is a gift and an awakening to an aspect of healing that is of immeasurable value.
– Paula A.
From Joellyn...
Allow me to tell you a bit about myself and how I came to this path of service I call Death Midwifery...
One doesn't choose the path of Death Midwifery, it chooses you. Death and dying were the furthest things from my mind when I was younger. In the first half of my life, I was a professional actress/singer/dancer on Broadway. I also choreographed, directed and taught around the country. Eventually, I met up with a brilliant pianist and teamed with him for seven years, singing in night clubs and writing songs together.
Then AIDS struck. Not only did it take the lives of most of my friends, acquaintances and co-workers from theatre, it also took my beloved pianist. It took my life as I knew and lived it up to that point. I was devastated…lost and broken open.
The next sixteen years I spent working with hospices around the country as staff and also in volunteer positions. I companioned both of my parents’ end of life transitions. I massaged the feet of dying friends and comforted them as AIDS stole sight, their youth, their lives. Driven to learn everything I could about death. Needing to stare deeply into its mystery, to travel its landscape, to touch its heart.
These were years of great anguish, darkness, searching, questioning and deep study - "What is death? What is life? What are my beliefs about them? How do I live my life from now on? What now is my purpose?" These questions drove me to the brink of the abyss and back…and now, quite simply, I am reborn.
View Making of a Death Midwife Video
Read Death Midwifery Newspaper Article