Color in the Time of Dying

We greet Autumn with warm remembrances of cider, apples and bonfires. Landscapes show leaves of hardwood forests changing from summer green to magnificent color as the natural world settles in for the winter. As the month of October nears its end, we pause to think of this dying of the natural world as it reflects on our own eventual demise.

Halloween as celebrated in North America owes its heritage to the Scottish, Irish and other Celtic immigrants who settled in America. This holiday came from the celebration of Samhain (pronounced Saa-wehn). Samhain was a time of ancestral veneration, the ending of things and the beginning of winter. It was the celebration of the final harvest of the year.  As all things do, this celebration morphed and melded with the Catholic All Saints Day and All Souls Day and more recently, the Day of the Dead celebrations in Mexico. All of these celebrations, despite Halloween’s commercialization, turn our attention to harvest, death, dying and ancestral veneration. There is so much more than Halloween candy and costumes to this season and its full experience.

Consider that the living natural world is supported by the death of things. Without death, there cannot be continued life. Leaves are dropped, fertilizing the ground and allowing the mushrooms and ferns nutrition. Animals die and do the same, what is left of them fertilizes the ground. Without the soil, there is no food, no continuance of life. These deaths provide the means for life to rise again in the Spring nourished by the deaths that came in the seasons before it.

Now this is not necessarily a comfortable thing if you are the creature that is dying. For those of us who are sentient, there is some comfort in knowing a part of us will live on in our offspring. Epigenetic research brings some degree of comfort and peace, knowing that our genes (our essence) are shared with those we created throughout generations.

Recent research done by the University of Michigan on brain activity as we are dying may also bring some hope; especially so for those with terminal diagnoses and those in the autumn of their lives. Dr. Jimo Borjigin and her team found that as we are actively dying, there is a significant spike in brain activity. This spiking occurs in the temporoparietal junction (TPJ) of the brain, where the temporal and parietal lobes meet at the posterior end of the lateral sulcus (Sylvian fissure). The location is provided for my science nerd readers!

Other extensive research in this area has been done by physician Bruce Greyson, who compiled years of pioneering work in his book, “After.” He is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry and Neurobehavioral Sciences at the University of Virginia along with other honors. “After” is an amazing read.

The TPJ area conducts a variety of processes to include multi-sensory integration and social cognition, and is considered an area of agency and stimulus-driven attention functions. It is also associated with dreaming, hallucinations and closely connected with the brain activity of near-death experiences (NDEs). These NDEs are commonly seen as the “white light,” out of body experiences, the encountering of one’s beloved dead and the feelings of intense peace.

What does all this mean to mere mortals? It means that there is some brain function for a period of time following death. If the brain waves are spiking in an area of the brain known for sensory integration, the dying individual may be able to hear and sense those around them. Other studies have found brain activity to continue as long as seven minutes after the heart has ceased beating (https://www.frontiersin.org/news/2022/02/22/what-happens-in-our-brain-when-we-die/).

As an End-of-Life Doula, these findings could strongly impact how we function in the time immediately after death. What can we do in that time and space to support the newly dead? While research continues, we can utilize what we know and create an environment to support our loved ones and those we provide doula care to. 

As a trained doula and health care musician working with the harp,  I play  therapeutic music softly coupled with words of comfort and peace. At times I softly sing. I coach families supporting their loved ones to speak softly with loving supportive words. Gentle touch and family cleaning the body are other possibilities. The environment itself can be supportive by using things like aromatherapy and music the dying person loved. I suggest we rethink those final moments as not quite final and approach them as continued care of the dead.

I have one final story to share with you, that I feel may add credence to what our previously mentioned researchers found. When I was the Administrator (Executive Director) of a relatively large nursing home in Michigan, USA, I had a small harp that I would bring into the resident’s room if they were uncomfortable, suffering mental illness symptoms or dying, and play harp softly for them if they wished. A family asked me to do that for their loved one who was approaching death and somewhat restless and anxious.

The woman had been a smoker before her hospitalization and was angry that she could not smoke there and that the nursing home was also non-smoking. Sadly, in her final days she was prohibited from smoking, which she had always found quite pleasurable.

I went to her room and the family was present. She was of Irish heritage so I began to play Irish traditional music softly and slowly for her. She was restless as I began but calmed as the hour progressed. By the time I finished playing, she was peacefully resting. I went back down to my office and back to work.

About a half hour later, a smoke alarm went off upstairs in the vicinity of this resident’s room. I went upstairs at the speed to light to find the smoke detector in the dying woman’s room. She had passed away a few minutes before my arrival, and the family was smiling. They told me that no smoke had been in the room and they were convinced she lit a cigarette in the ethereal realm to celebrate her final liberation. I cannot say that I don’t agree with them.

If you have not compiled your own end of life wishes, consider including these moments after your heart has stopped in your planning also. It could help you find comfort in your transition.

In this sacred season of remembering those who went before us, those who we loved and those who haunt our memories, be mindful there is so much more than flesh and blood in this life. The realm of Spirit abides with us eternally.

As always, yours in well-being,

Sandra L. Place

Contact me at:

sandy@asandyplace.com