Dr. Tamara Joy Rettino, DACM lives in Buffalo, NY with her partner and owns a bustling clinic called Acupunktrix where she is an acupuncturist, herbalist, and Threshold Guide supporting others through life's transitions and liminal spaces such as life-changing illness, gender transitions, birth and death (including home funerals). Tamara is a mother of four grown children and is currently writing a practical guide on death and dying for Llewellyn Publications, and has taught six-week courses on burial shrouds for Morbid Anatomy. In December of 2023, Tamara suffered a sudden stroke, brain hemorrhage, and massive seizure resulting in a shattered spine and broken shoulder. She faced death (not for the first time), and feels the experience has deeply enriched her facility for empathy and understanding of the needs of her patients and clients. In her free time, Tamara creates art, experiments with sound and music, and forages in the local woods.
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Register to join us live or receive a recording of our webinar on Thursday, April 11th at 8pm ET | 5pm PT – Communicating Your End-of-Life and (Home) Funeral Decisions with Adam Zuckerman of Buried in Work.
Join us to explore the significance of proactively making, communicating, and documenting these crucial decisions. In this webinar, we'll guide participants in navigating local regulations, effectively communicating their wishes to loved ones, and taking practical steps to prepare for their end of life and home funeral arrangements. About Adam: Adam Zuckerman is the Founder of Buried in Work, a one-stop shop that offers guidance, resources, and products to simplify the burden of estate planning and the tasks surrounding end-of-life activities and estate transition. Adam started Buried in Work after settling his father’s affairs following his passing. His experience includes working in clean energy, finance, non-profits, startups, and Fortune 500 companies. He is an Eisenhower Fellow and holds an MBA and JD from Washington University in St. Louis. Register to attend or receive a recording of this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Register to receive a recording of our webinar on Thursday, March 14th at 8pm ET | 5pm PT – Defending Community Deathcare in the Midwest with Lauren Richwine of Death Done Differently.
Join us for an update on the legal landscape of home funerals and community deathcare in the Midwest, learn how a federal lawsuit currently unfolding in the state of Indiana has the potential to affect the work for us all, and discover how you can be a more legally informed advocate in your own state. Recordings are sent out to all registrants within two weeks of the event. About Lauren: One of the earliest Death Doulas/Midwives to offer active support and in person mentorship in Northern Indiana, Lauren Richwine recieved her initial training with the Earth Traditions Program. She is a facilitator through the “Respecting Choices Advance Care Planning” Program with Parkview and is currently a member of the National Association of Certified Death Midwives (NACDM), the National End of Life Doula Alliance (NEDA), and the National Home Funeral Alliance (NHFA). In response to a cease and desist issued against her business by the Indiana State Board of Funeral and Cemetery Service in early 2023, Lauren has teamed up with the Institute for Justice to defend this important work. Together they have filed a federal lawsuit against the state of Indiana for infringing on her first amendment right to free speech. Register to receive a recording of this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Register to receive a recording of our webinar on Thursday, February 22nd at 8pm ET | 5pm PT - Home Funeral Photography with Shannon MacFarlane.
What can funeral photography add to your home funeral? Funeral photography isn’t morbid or weird - it is documenting an important event within a community. It can serve many purposes, including being able to share a home funeral with those who couldn’t attend, photographing people together who haven’t been in the same room since the last family wedding or funeral, and documenting family history. The most powerful reason is the value photography has during the grieving process. Shannon goes through life telling stories with cameras, painting memorial portraits, and wondering if she wasn’t really supposed to be a housecat. She’s known for an obnoxiously loud laugh, being a grief enthusiast, her preference for non-human animals, and excessive chocolate consumption which may or may not have contributed to kidney stones. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her grief-savvy young person, kitties, and German shepherd. Register to receive a recording of this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Register to receive a recording from our webinar on Wednesday, January 24th at 8pm ET | 5pm PT - Home Funerals: What You Need To Know To Be Prepared with MSgt. Glenda Villegas, USAF (Ret.).
From Glenda: "After retiring from the Air Force and losing my father, I decided I would serve my community through death care services. First, I learned and worked in pre-need cemetery sales, then on to Family Services, where I learned how to serve families at death. During these years, I learned the industry inside and out. Then, I wanted more. In 2020, I branched out by becoming a licensed funeral director in California, training under Eric Putt. This led to my desire to serve families through education on the law with the option of a home funeral experience. Today, I teach families how to care for their dead. I also work with death doulas and midwives to educate and better serve families who desire more. Filling the gap of misinformation with truth is my 2024 goal." Register to receive a recording of this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Receive a recording from our webinar on Monday, December 4th at 8pm ET | 5pm PT: Empowering Children in Home Funerals with Kailey Bradley, MA, LPCC-S, NCC, FT!
Children are often neglected from conversations surrounding illness, death, and bereavement. In this training, practical tools will be provided that invite, include, and empower children to be apart of home funerals, the dying process, and the grief process. Creative and compassionate interventions will be provided that center on the role children can play in honoring their loved ones. Kailey has a background in hospice work and feels that companioning and advocating for grievers is her life’s passion. She is a licensed professional counselor, nationally certified counselor, and Fellow in Thanatology. Currently, Kailey is an adjunct professor at Ashland Theological seminary where she teaches grief counseling courses and Marian University where she teaches courses on Childhood Bereavement and Pediatric Hospice Care. Kailey is also currently a doctoral student at Ohio University and co-owns Refuge Counseling, LLC a private practice specializing in the intersections of grief, sexuality, chronic illness and spirituality. Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Have you or anyone you know been the victim of funeral or cemetery fraud? As home funeral guides or funeral consumer advocates, perhaps people come to you with complaints about funeral homes in your area and you're not always sure where to direct them.
In the past few years we have heard complaints of funeral homes fraudulently selling services they don't provide (the most recent high-profile example being the Return to Nature funeral home in Colorado), refusing to return ashes of deceased family members, or selling plots that don't exist. While these are thankfully rare cases, they do happen, and as advocates for your clients or community, you should know what to do when these complaints come up. It turns out that violations of The Funeral Rule, as well as any other fraud complaints can be directed to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) via their Sentinel platform. The filing process is actually quick and easy! In partnership with the FTC and the Funeral Consumers' Alliance (FCA), are hosting a virtual training on November 29 at 5pm PT/8pm ET, where we will teach you how to make a Sentinel report so that you can file these complaints with the FTC yourself or help others to do it. Register to immediately receive a downloading of the recording from this 90-minute event. Donations welcome but not required. |
Receive a recording from our webinar on Tuesday, November 21st at 8pm ET | 5pm PT for Secular Ceremonies, Universal Rituals, & Home Funerals with Megan Sheldon, the co-founder of Be Ceremonial!
In this webinar, we will explore what makes a ritual meaningful and how we can structure a ceremony that helps us move through a time of transition or moment of change. With a focus on end-of-life experiences, we will share ritual ideas for living funerals, sitting vigil, home funerals, celebrations of life and death anniversaries. We will also discuss the role of ritual in our own self-care, including how we acknowledge the grief we carry and the other emotions that can often surround death and dying. You will leave feeling more confident to create your own rituals and ceremonies, for yourself and for others. Megan Sheldon is the co-founder of Be Ceremonial, a guided ritual app that empowers you to create your own daily rituals and lifecycle ceremonies. Megan is also a cultural mythologist, humanist celebrant, and end-of-life doula in North Vancouver, BC. Megan designed this app with her husband Johan after their own experiences of loss. They were searching for secular rituals to support their grief journey and decided to share all of the knowledge and wisdom they've gathered over the past decade. Be Ceremonial focuses on rituals and ceremonies that surround grief, loss and the end-of-life, including home funerals. Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
In this webinar, Adrian Allotey will reflect on end-of-life care from the perspective of hospice and EOL doulas, using her client Susan’s story as a framework. Adrian is an End-of-Life Doula and Owner of You Are Not Alone Elder Care, LLC in Colonia, New Jersey. Adrian specializes in elder and end of life care, support, companionship, and education. Adrian writes:
“I made it my life’s mission to promote the final years as a sacred, beautiful, honorable stage of life. I became a hospice volunteer and a certified end-of-life doula, a person who assists in the dying process, much like a birth doula does with the birthing process. Working with elderly patients has been life affirming so much so that I left a career of 20+ years. Along with my team, we serve as non-medical elderly companions who specialize in physical, emotional and spiritual care. We meet our clients on their terms, see them as whole, and build relationships with them and their loved ones. Our self-care regimen, personal growth and intuition allow us to mindfully hold space and provide comfort for elderly people and their family in a non-judgmental, loving manner. Our motto ‘heart to your heart’ is evident in the holistic elder companionship we provide.” Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
In this webinar, green burial advocate Elizabeth Fournier will talk about backyard burial in the United States. A backyard burial includes burying a person on residential property, or land that is privately owned. Most bodies are buried in established, endorsed cemeteries, but burial on private property may be possible. Laws vary not only state to state but county to county in the US; it’s most accepted and typical in rural settings.
If you are considering a backyard burial, think carefully about what it may mean for the property itself and the person who owns it (which may be yourself). All other issues aside, burying someone on private land impacts the future sale of that property. In addition, however remote the concern may be, you should consider how you’d feel, and what you would do, if your deceased loved one resided on property that you no longer owned. Elizabeth Fournier began her career in 1990 in Portland, OR, where she was employed as the live-in night keeper, sleeping in a trailer in a Portland cemetery. Thirty-three years later, she is a one-woman funeral service in the rural town of Boring, Oregon. Elizabeth owns and operates Cornerstone Funeral Services where she is affectionately known as “The Green Reaper” for her green burial advocacy. She is also the Manager of Historic Columbian Cemetery, Portland's newest green burial choice, and author of The Green Burial Guidebook: Everything You Need to Plan an Affordable, Environmentally Friendly Burial. She serves on the Advisory Board of the Global Green Burial Alliance, gave a TEDx talk called, "Going Green: The Last Act of Environmental Volunteerism," and People Magazine honored her work by writing, “Elizabeth Fournier is doing her part to change the way Americans bury their dead.” Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
In this webinar, palliative care chaplain William Dixon will draw on thirty years of healthcare experience and his doctoral research to explore the concept of good dying from an African American perspective. William will discuss how anti-black systemic racism and African American religious cultures impact individual views of death/dying, and offer thoughts on how to support African American patients at end-of-life.
William Dixon is currently a Palliative Care Chaplain at Inova Fairfax Hospital in the Washington, DC metro area. He is co-author of the chapter on Cultural Humility in the Oxford Medicine Textbook of Palliative Care Communication (2015). William earned his Doctor of Ministry in Pastoral Care from United Theological Seminary in 2008 and is now pursuing a Master of Legal Studies with emphasis in bioethics. He is a Board Certified Chaplain who brings over thirty years of experience in healthcare and ministry, with a speciality in palliative care chaplaincy. Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
In this webinar, we will look at the ways the legal system, healthcare, and culture intersect when caring for LGBTQIA2S+ individuals. We will cover basic definitions, next of kin structure, who gets a say in your services, and take a look at some cases of trans and non-binary decedents. We will also talk about ways to be a good ally and create a welcoming and inclusive environment in your death practices.
Jordan L. Rose (she/her) is a licensed funeral director and embalmer and end-of-life doula living in Chicago, IL. She is on a mission to put the rights of individuals at the end of their lives back into their hands. She is vocal about creating inclusive death practices that hold up marginalized voices. When she's not talking about death and dying, she's playing Dungeons and Dragons or redecorating her apartment...again. She can be reached by email. Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
This presentation focuses on the experiences of people with disabilities as they grieve. Many people with disabilities experience disenfranchised grief, which means they do not receive the same level of support as people without disabilities. Although grief is highly individual, some people with disabilities who are grieving may have needs unique to this population. This presentation will cover person-centered and identity-first approaches to engaging people with disabilities; how people with disabilities may experience cyclical grief in regards to their experience of disability; and tips for companioning disabled people on their grief journeys.
Marc Markell is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Special Education at St. Cloud State University. Marc offers his perspective as a member of the disabled community with many years of experience working with disabled folks and grief. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota and Educational Psychology. He is a certified Professional Development Specialist through the University of Kansas Center for Research on Learning. He is a certified Thanatologist through the Association of Death Educators and Counseling, and certified in Death and Grief Studies from Colorado State University through the Center for Loss and Life Transition. Register to immediately receive a download of the recording from this 90-minute event for a sliding scale donation (starting at $10). |
Toula is a Certified End-of-Life Doula that specializes in perinatal and pediatric palliative care, end-of-life, and after death care support. She was called to this work in 2016 after her daughter Angelica’s anticipated passing from a life limiting condition at nearly seven years old. Her work and service to others is rooted in advocacy that parallels activism through Community Death Care Education.
The collective goal of Infant and Child Deathcare advocacy is to raise awareness of connection, understanding, and options for children and their circles of care. Taking into consideration the unique needs of this population means normalizing and validating experiences that others may have difficulty connecting with. This presentation will introduce Infant & Child Deathcare Advocacy, community connections, and family stories. This webinar is now available for free viewing on YouTube! |
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