The Death Doula’s Guide by Francesca Arnoldy
Community doula Francesca Lynn Arnoldy offers readers a self-paced death doula workbook with “The Death Doula’s Guide to Living Fully and Dying Prepared: an Essential Workbook to Help You Reflect Back, Plan Ahead, and Find Peace on Your Journey”.
Written by Jade Adgate
One of the first death doula books that I ever bought was by Francesca Lynn Arnoldy, a slim little guide called Cultivating the Doula Heart. It found me at the exact time I needed it, as books often do, a gentle and encouraging introduction into the work of death midwives and doulas. In the six years since, I’ve often noticed how difficult it is to feel confident accompanying those who are approaching end of life. Mostly because I haven’t yet travelled this golden path myself but also because there are few professional leaders to look to as inspiration for my future craft. Arnoldy takes a mother’s voice and offers wisdom with a nurturing hand as she softly reminds us that all we really need to undertake this work is to cultivate the the D-O-U-L-A philosophy: “Dedication to presence, Open-mindedness, Understanding with compassion, Listening intently, Allaying distress”.
This same spirit guides her newest book, the self-help workbook The Death Doula’s Guide to Living Fully and Dying Prepared: an Essential Workbook to Help You Reflect Back, Plan Ahead, and Find Peace on Your Journey. In seven parts, Arnoldy invites her reader into a step-by-step guide for end-of-life: orient, prepare, pause and practice, process, projects, planning, and parting. Arnoldy’s guidebook is broad enough to easily apply to each of us, regardless of estimated expiration date, and detailed enough to be truly helpful in detangling the unique thread’s of life's inevitable complications.
In our conversation together, recorded for Episode 7 of the Exit Interview podcast, Arnoldy explained that this book is an attempt to map out her own personal death meditation practice, the art of death journaling. When I asked her the question, “What book would you take with you if running from a fire?”, she immediately named her death journal, explaining that years of reflections, wishes, fears, memories, experiences, hopes, goals, lists, and collections have been compiled into her own personal ‘memento mori’ book. As we dug into her workbook for compiling your own, it became clear to me how universally beneficial this practice of death journaling may be. For the death doula, an opportunity to transcribe the memories and experiences that shape this unique work. For the aspiring doula, places to document the whispers and shouts beckoning us in to discernment. For the mortal, a chance to articulate the values, memories, relationships, spaces, and experiences that bestow comfort. For the person grappling with a terminal diagnosis, the prompt to reflect and record a wish (and also the fears) for how the road ahead shall be travelled. For the caregiver, a map to unfolding in conversation these narratives in gentle conversation.
“My death journal allows me to prepare, in advance, reassurance and guidance to those who will miss me most. Selfishly, I hope it will also allow me to surrender into my time of dying with slightly less resistance, as I suspect worries about family will be my heaviest anchor to this lifetime. I anticipate feeling more ease knowing I have created a gift like no other - a treasure most mourners yearn for following a significant loss. And by writing this workbook, I aim to bring some of that ease to you and yours as well.”
It’s been six years now, that I’ve been building competency and compassion in the craft of doula work. Dozens of journals record the road that led to where I am. But I’m enchanted with the idea that Arnoldy illuminates, the personal practice of slowly compiling a grimoire of sorts: my vigil playlist, photos of those I’ve cared for in their last breaths, moments that shaped me, the essential oil blends that soothe me, the ceremonies that restore me, my parting letters to those I love. As I open the stiff pages of a new, uncreased book and consider Arnoldy’s invitation, I extend the same to you. There is no excuse or anxiety left unattended by Arnoldy’s grace-filled guide, she instills the same wisdom imparted to those she serves as doula to us as reader and these phrases bolster us as we crack our own new pages to begin. I’ll close with Arnoldy’s mantras, offered as whispered truths, carefully passed down from her to me and now me to you:
“Vessel of calm, well of trust.”
“Uncertainty can inspire fear or curiosity — my response is my choice.”
“My whole self serves me — my scars and my strength.”
“My truth is legitimate. My words are testimony.”
“I have all I need, in and around me.”
From this place, may we begin.
Jade recently interviewed Francesca Arnoldy for the Exit Interview Podcast. Please click here to listen. You can find out more about Francesca Lynn Arnoldy’s work at her website: https://francescalynnarnoldy.com. You can purchase this book and support Farewell Library by shopping our bookshop here.
