The (pictures) story of dying - hospice work and spirituality

  • Monika Müller
Keywords: Pictures of a dying, despair, defeat and inner journey to Self, Hospice Work and its spiritual background

Abstract

The (Picture)-Story of a Dying – Hospice Work and Spirituality. During his last weeks a deathly sick patient documents in pictures an amazing inner development. The author of this article, a leading staff member of Hospice Movement encouraged him to do so and accompanied him during these weeks. She comments the pictures and reports on hospice work and its special spiritual background: The spirit of mystery, the necessity to let the deathly sick person search and find an answer of his own to questions like “why I, and why just now?”, encounters of physicians and others with the deathly sick, problems of the support persons, defeat and growth, and the spirit of holding and letting go; in short, the journey to one’s self and to a Self that encompasses much more than the own person.

Author Biography

Monika Müller

MA. Studied philosophy, education and literature, academic year and hospice practice in London. Additional training in Gestalt therapy (FPI) Clinical Supervisor (Jerusalem University), Bibliodrama (Mainz University), Thanatology (FPI), NLP (USA). Lecturer, head of a family education centre, since 1992 head of the NRW contact point for hospice work, chair of the Federal Working Group Hospice and the Institute of Mourning, member of the advisory board of the Hospice Newspaper and the magazine of the German Society for Palliative Medicine, lecturer at the chair for palliative medicine, lecturer at national and international congresses, advisor to the Federal Government and the NRW State Government on questions of palliative medicine and hospice work. Author: The Way of Mourning, Herder; Spirituality in Dying Care. Federal Cross of Merit.

Published
2005-08-03
Issue
Vol. 11 No. 2 (2005): Issue 2/2005
Section
Artikel