How the death of Jane Kiley touches us all

Jane Kiley on horseback in 1993 on the Big Island of Hawaii

Jane Kiley died on December 28, 2014.  Chances are you may not have known her directly.  She was not famous.  But after this article, you would want that chance in life this woman to hold dear.  For many people presume the memories of our lives and passing is felt primarily by friends and family. But we are all like Jane and will be known by many people in generations yet to come. Jane's life is always with us, just like yours, for you are part of the journey everyone takes that she took just days ago.

While writers remind us no man is an island, the fact is that every life indeed touches others in very important ways.  Our lives are multiplied across a spectrum of individuals, more than those six degrees of separation we think are the limits of our connections.

Talk to your children about death

[caption id="attachment_6243" align="alignright" width="288"] Christian cross - a symbol use as a marker and memorial of those who died[/caption]

Carol Forsloff — Grandma died, and the funeral is Saturday.  How do you explain death and dying to a child?

During the time when American was a rural society, with many families living in close proximity to one another, folks were close enough to each other to share in the process of helping the dying, working with family members who needed assistance in the grieving process, and generally sharing the responsibilities of preparing the body for its final disposition.

We have all seen those old movies of the child at Granny's casket, that child putting a hand in to touch the body at the encouragement of some family member. We have also seen those same movies use the scene to underline the trauma someone can experience when death and dying are handled in ways that children might not understand.

So it's important to prepare a child for death and dying. And when is the right time?  The answer is as it is for many things, as the child is able to understand. That understanding, however, can at least be fostered very early in a child's life.

Children see nature, outside where animals and plants live and where there are many opportunities to visit living things. That life is part of the understanding that children need to have when it comes to dealing with death.

One of the barriers in talking to children about death is the fear adults have of the process and in dealing with the topic themselves.

So the process is early for the child and regularly for an adult, something that needs to be revisited perhaps many times during one's lifetime.

Many people speak of a life hereafter, of the continuation of life in some form, a heaven, the recreation of a soul, the gathering of loved ones in some heavenly kingdom on earth or in heaven. The visions of life after death are numerous, often individualized according to one's life experiences. Yet that full comprehension, knowing and conversation is often not part of what happens in daily life, but only when someone dies. That is too late to begin the process of helping young people learn about death.

As we face our own mortality, the first step in helping our children, we need to examine our fears and prejudices and at the same time reflect on what we already know about the process of dying. What we know is that life is continuous in some way. Plants live, offer seeds to the ground that regenerate and repopulate. The bones of animals become one with the soil. Then there is the pattern of how one life form interacts with one another, and how interdependent those life forms can be.

The process of dying continues to be a point of controversy among those who relate it in terms of their religion and those who explain it in terms of science.  And how people deal with dying varies according to one's culture.  Yet there is a consistency in all cultures that remains.  That consistency is the lack of preparation of the living to understand the process of dying.

Some who have actually watched people die have narrated the experience. And those who are scientists and have made observations of the dying process tell us certain things occur, with various body systems shutting down, not simultaneously, but in a certain order, with the ability to hear and feel among the last of those systems before the end of breath. So one can hold the loved one and speak to him or her, and the child may offer consolation and at the same time learn about death, so long as proper preparation and explanation is given and a level of maturity and understanding achieved. Grandma hears what people say almost until she draws her last breath.

Watching how these life forms are in our world is something simple, yet complex, but that allows the understanding of life on many levels. For the child it is seeing the flowers live, fold their petals, die, some reborn in the same pot, or seemingly reborn, seeds that have dropped on the ground, and the observation of new life developing. So as we speak of how babies are in their mothers' wombs, so it is with all living things, a life within that is a mystery in many ways, and a life that may come, in some form, after a person dies.  For when we explain the joy of new life to a young child, that new baby that has arrived in the family home, and those questions are posed about how babies are made, is a good time to talk about the continuity of life itself.  That continuity is at both ends, life's beginning and its end, both with the understanding there is some form of experience that occurs before birth and a process of dying as well.

For even doctors and other scientists agree that death is a process, and that process is something science is understanding in relative little bits for the vast information still yet to know. But there is a process and the preparation for it should be as thoughtfully considered as the preparation for that new baby. In that way the child sees the wholeness of life, is comforted in some way by it.

Granny isn't just asleep. Her life becomes part of something else, somewhere else, as part of the process of life that goes on. That truth is something for all of us to hold, as we face our own mortality and explain it to our children.

The more the dying are kept distant from the living the less the family understands about the process of dying and the lonelier it becomes. By acknowledging that process early enough, and preparing children, we begin to know how we feel, how our children feel and help the dying become part of the community of all of us, so that they continue to teach us about life as we prepare for our own death and those of our children.

Symbols of near-death experience: Have you seen the Light?

[caption id="attachment_14904" align="alignleft" width="300"] Near death[/caption]

Carol Forsloff - People reflect on the meaning of symbols in the progression of death, especially as they age, if they are interested in the spiritual aspects of life or if they have had a near-death experience.    Many traditions speak of the visions in traveling toward the Light, interpreted as the soul's journey after the soul has left the body.

The song The Water is Wide has its origins as a Scottish ballad written in the 1600's.   In its original form it focused on the passion and longing of lovers;  but over the centuries it has been performed in many venues, by many singers, each of whom has often presented a different lyrical version of this well-known and beloved song.  With the song there are symbols used to facilitate one's contemplation of life's transitions, in human love and experiences and that movement towards death discussed in literature.  It is the symbolism that often aids in bringing others to an understanding of the death experience.  These symbols can be pictures of past memories of a person's life or the artistic renderings of the light streaming from the heavens as the person moves within in the passage to the Creator.

Have you seen the light?  If you are, you are part of a large number of people who say they have had a near-death experience.  Many people speak of going through a tunnel, seeing a light they move towards and hearing the message in some form that says "It's not your time yet."  The Gallup organization found that 13 million Americans have reported to have had a near-death experience.  The phenomenon is also studied by scientists and theologians, many of whom agree there are convergent details across the centuries that man has exchanged about death that seem to render a pattern.  That pattern is continued in story form, in music and in art as a way to express the meaning of death and the religious belief that there is life after the soul leaves the body.

Symbolism, scientists remind us,  helps to transmit emotion, with death a most provocative issue in most of our lives.  Without it would there be more trust there is a God or less?  While many Christian people focus on the cross or the shadowy figure of a man they believe to be Jesus, for others occult symbols have replaced some of  the Christian symbols.  So as religious beliefs diverge in some of the specifics of life and death, it is the symbolism which continues to promote that eternal belief, that something magical, especially mystical, occurs during the process of dying and that helps retain folks' faith in the hereafter.