Episodes
July 15, 2015
Lasting Words
Faced with the ultimate challenge of life—confronting death—how do we want to be remembered? Are there stories we want to tell? Experiences we want to share? Illuminations about how we've felt about life and why? Maybe we wan...
July 8, 2015
Too Close to Me
A childhood filled with trauma and abuse impacts a person for a lifetime. But making sense of those experiences, moving towards wholeness, allows the adult survivor to create a meaningful, satisfying and relational adulthood....
July 1, 2015
A Song for Lost Angels
Kevin and Brian were in love and successful in their careers when they decided it was time for parenting. After a long search for a child, they were offered three; triplets who were at risk and without anyone to care for them...
June 24, 2015
Swimming With Maya
For many parents, the fear of losing a child is more vivd than losing their own lives. We can't imagine surviving it. And yet, parents do lose their children, to illness or accident, and are left to find a way back to their l...
June 17, 2015
The Way of Tenderness
Does our exploration of race, sexuality and gender hold a possibility of helping us to awaken? Zenju Manuel believes it does. Through a lifetime of deep questioning and knowing, culminating in her ordination as a zen priest, ...
June 10, 2015
Being the Grown Up
The end of a parent's life is often a steep reversal of roles for both parent and adult child. If the illness is fast moving, there's an avalanche of things to learn about how to care for a now dependent person who, if you ar...
June 3, 2015
Special Encore Presentation: Digging for the Light
What do we mean when we say we've had a run of bad luck? We mean that we have experienced loss after loss, until we're not even sure which heartache is sending us into the depths of despair. Like quicksand, it seems as if we'...
May 27, 2015
The Power of Two
Isabel and Anabel Stenzel, identical twins diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis as babies, faced a lifetime of ill health and the probability that they would die very young. They also faced numerous losses of friends who had the sa...
May 20, 2015
In My Humble Opinion
One of the most important things for us when we're ill, especially when we are dying, is the compassion and empathy of our doctors. But how do physicians retain these human qualities with each patient when they are bombarded ...
May 13, 2015
End of Life Wisdom
As a hospice social worker and as someone whose husband died of cancer, Marcy Bernstein has learned a lot about the end of life and what kind of support people need to support a good death. It is her calling to offer advice, ...
May 6, 2015
Knocking on Heaven's Door
Katy Butler was dedicated to supporting her parents at the end of their lives and acting as their part time caregiver and full time medical advocate. But the experience taught her just how hard it is to craft a good death in ...
April 29, 2015
Make a Joyful Noise
Out of the African-American experience in this country, spiritual and gospel music was born; moving and beautiful music celebrating spirit, faith and the capacity of human beings to overcome adversity. The Oakland Interfaith ...
April 22, 2015
Soul Care
How can taking care of a sick loved one teach us about taking care of ourselves? The stakes are high, and we can't afford to push ourselves beyond our own edges. If we do, we may not be able to help the person we love at all!...
April 15, 2015
Home at Clarehouse
At the end of life, we want to feel at home, even if we can't BE at home. After a career in nursing, working with very ill patients, Kelley Scott saw the need for a home place for dying people and set about to fill that need....
April 8, 2015
Daddy, This is It
Helping a parent face the end of their lives can be a sacred part of living. When the relationship has been special and close, we are giving back to a person has given us life and, sometimes, a great deal more. And when that ...
April 1, 2015
Loveland
When playwright and actor Ann Randolph faced difficulties and losses, she applied her art to them and created comedy. Being able to laugh at what we cry about is a soothing balm for our difficulties and griefs. Creating chara...
March 25, 2015
Return to Zero in Australia and Beyond
Kiley Krekorian Hanish and Ivy Margulies dreamed of supporting women who have lost babies, to grieve the loss and share the experience with other women. Kiley and her husband were the subject of the film Return to Zero with M...
March 18, 2015
Imperfect Endings
How do we face the end of a mother's life? This is usually a difficult and painful prospect. But what if your mother wants to end her life by her own volition. How can one accept that? After years of struggling with Parkinson...
March 11, 2015
The Next Happy
Sometimes it's time to let go of a dream. How do you know when to keep trying and when to grieve and create new dreams? And how do you let go of that dream that has compelled you for such a long time? What helps you to find w...
March 4, 2015
Grief One Day at a Time
How does a mother of a two year old, just beginning her marriage and her life as a mother, face the sudden loss of her 32 year old husband? Rachel Kodanaz had to discover how to do that when her husband died leaving his offic...
Feb. 25, 2015
Letting Them Go
We welcome back Melanie DeMore, consummate musician and death bed midwife. She lost her father and I lost my mother within a few weeks of each other in Fall, 2014, both from pancreatic cancer. Join us for an intimate conversa...
Feb. 18, 2015
Where the Dead Pause and the Japanese Say Goodbye
When Marie Mutsuki lost her American father and Japanese grandparents, she feared she would never find her happiness again. Motivated by a deep desire to have some joy to share with her young son, she travelled to Japan, the ...
Feb. 11, 2015
Wisdom for Your Life
Katrina Cavanough knew all her life that she saw beyond what others saw. But it took working as a social worker in a hospital to realize that she had the capacity to reach beyond our everyday world and speak with those that h...
Feb. 4, 2015
Digging for the Light
What do we mean when we say we've had a run of bad luck? We mean that we have experienced loss after loss, until we're not even sure which heartache is sending us into the depths of despair. Like quicksand, it seems as if we'...