#1315 Samantha Waite: Everything You've Ever Wanted to Know About Death

00:00 Ricardo Lopes: Hello everyone. Welcome to a new episode of The Dissenter. I'm your host, as always, Ricardo Lops, and today I'm joined by Samantha White. She's a psychotherapist and the founder of Taboo Education, an independent business based in Perth, Western Australia, dedicated to improving how medical professionals approach death, dying and end of life care. She also has a YouTube channel with the same name, Taboo Education, Let's Talk Deaf, and today we're going to talk about deaf and and deaf literacy. So Samantha, welcome to the show. It's a big pleasure to everyone. I really love your channel, so it's uh great to have you here.

00:38 Samantha Waite: Hi Ricardo, lovely to be here.

00:42 Ricardo Lopes: OK, great. So uh let me start with more of a personal question, I guess. What got you interested in topics related to death?

00:52 Samantha Waite: Uh, WELL, I've always been interested in what society deems as taboo and, and not to talk about and, and things like that. Um, I guess as a kid I wasn't allowed to ask anything about death. That was something that our family would, you know, never talk about that, that sort of stuff. Um, AND as I got older, I went into a different career, and then, you know, I started helping out with my aging grandmother who was obviously getting on in age and needed help, and I started seeing how frightened everyone around seemed to be about death, whether it be, you know, in the nursing staff. That were around families of other patients that were around, and that kind of annoyed me in a lot of ways, um, not their, not their feelings about it so much, but the fact that we should know this, and we did up to a, you know, up to a few decades ago, we were OK with it. Um, SO that's probably where that came from, it's more, I like to make other people feel uncomfortable while trying to get them back to comfort on a very, on various topics, so. That's sort of where that started out and then COVID came around and it was the perfect time to make a change while everyone was still thinking about it and it was very fresh in everyone's head.

01:58 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, I, I mean, I guess that's uh the bit about being interested in taboo topics. I share that with you because I've also explored all kinds of taboo topics on the show. I mean, of course, also many mainstream topics, but taboo topics is not uncommon here. So, um, what, what would you say deaf literacy is about? What does it encompass really?

02:24 Samantha Waite: Well, when you look up the definition as far as uh what most, uh organizations would put out there, it's about the education and the understanding of end of life options and what happens when dying and putting in sort of advanced care directives, these sorts of things. It's the education about end of life. I'd say it would go further and for my company, that's what we do, we do go further and to educate more about death, anxiety and existential dread. Which is something that human beings have and you either work through it or you don't, so, and it's the education of understanding around how that affects your day to day life, and for some people it really impacts them, it impacts the decisions that they, that they make and the conversations they have, um, so I'd say death literacy is really learning about, What death is, what it means socially, physiologically, medically, all that sort of, all the stuff to understand and become more accepting of that as a topic because human beings die, that's what we're built to do. If you're alive, you're gonna die, that's how it works. Um, SO to become accepting of, of that is probably what death literacy is about and knowing options and knowing how to understand it.

03:41 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, and I guess we're going to get, as we go through the topics here, we're going to get into uh why uh the different ways that death, anxiety and people not really knowing enough about death can affect their lives and the kinds of bad decisions that they can make because of that. But uh let me, let me start by asking you about uh. Deaf anxiety. I mean, what is deaf anxiety really and where does it stem from? I mean, is it really just something that we are naturally predisposed towards or, uh, do you think that it is in a way reinforced by the kinds of uh death avoiding cultures that we live in?

04:32 Samantha Waite: Yeah, I'd say it's both, it's, it's a natural part of being a human being because us like unlike other animals and and other living things, we know we have an expiry date, and that's hard for us to really reconcile with or for a lot of people. The difference being nowadays, and when you said about different cultures and different time periods, is that, we have changed a lot because we don't see it as much anymore. If you look at someone in a war-torn country that's seen death day after day, they would naturally have less, They will be more accepting of death as a concept rather than what we are over here, because it's sort of that hidden monster. You just, you just never see it. Um, I'm not sure what it was like over you, over Portugal way, but over here, um, our big cultural shift happened around the, um, the World Wars, right? They suddenly graves weren't being dug by families. Suddenly the wake wasn't happening at home. Hospitals started taking over, you know, medical, um, uh, challenges started to be taken over because, you know, they knew how to work with it now, thanks to the war, you know, war advances bring medical advances and. Um, AS they said in MAS and, um, so, and then the funeral home came along and they started taking care of that option as well. So most people have never seen a dead body and therefore, all these sort of myths come around in their mind, they start to, to, it gets out of control, that fear gets out of control. Um, SO that's what death anxiety is, it stems from something that is evolutional. It stems from something that is very real because we know about our own death, but it's much harder for us to sort of control if you never see it at all and your mind decides to fill in the blanks for you.

06:24 Ricardo Lopes: And please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that it's about people not seeing dead bodies and also people not being exposed to the dying process, right? I mean, they don't see people while they're in the process of. Dying really unless they are, I don't know, nurses, doctors, people working at hospices and places like that, right?

06:48 Samantha Waite: Yes, absolutely. People used to die at home surrounded by friends and families. Now they're surrounded by Machines and, you know, you see people that are coming into a hospice, families coming into hospice, and they, and they panic when they see someone who is actively in the active stages of dying because it doesn't look like what it looked like on TV where it looks so peaceful, you know, they just close their eyes and oh, I'm dead now. It's, it can look horrific, um, if you don't know what you're looking for, for hospice staff, they're looking at it going, well, this is what we see every day. For someone else, it's, it's not what it's like on the movies, it's not what it's like on TV, but it is natural, um, and that's very confronting for a lot of people, so not knowing that, Um, not knowing what that looks like, ah, it, you know, that can be the start of a nightmare if you, if you don't actually know what it's like, but, um, it is very real, and that, yeah, that, that sense really brings on the anxiety as, as well, if you don't know what to expect.

07:48 Ricardo Lopes: Uh, BUT since you are a psychotherapist, uh, I'm curious. Uh, OF course, I'm not sure if you have an answer to this or not, but, uh, do we know at all if there are people with certain, uh, psychological traits, personality traits, for example, who are more predisposed to suffering from deaf anxiety than others or not?

08:10 Samantha Waite: Not so much personality types, there are certain personality types that are less likely to, to deal with it. Someone with antisocial personality disorder, for instance, is less likely to have that anxiety, um, but it can be an underlying factor for a lot of mental health challenges, for instance, I know depression, OCD, anxiety, uh, a wide range of, Of diagnosis and and and illnesses have death anxiety underneath, but because, so many clinicians don't know what um death anxiety is and what to look for, They don't really get to the root of the issue and therefore can't really help someone move forward, um, but yeah, OCD panic, anyone that deals with panic as well, it's a huge, it's a huge problem for them and they're more likely to have it, but it's more so that's, it's more so that is the underlying issue that then comes out as depression or panic and, and things like that.

09:11 Ricardo Lopes: Mhm. So, in our cultures like yours in Australia, mine in Portugal, because when it comes to death, you can believe that it's uh it's pretty much the same. I mean, we, people here don't like dealing or seeing death happening, dead people, all of that, I mean it's. It's the same. So, what, uh, because we live in cultures like that, what would you say are perhaps the most common misconceptions people have about death and dying? I mean, in your process of educating people about these topics, uh, what are the most common misconceptions you've come across?

09:50 Samantha Waite: Um, THAT death is instant. There's, there's that, you're either alive or dead. There's actually a process. There are stages that, that you go through to, for stages of dying that you go through. What that looks like, um, a lot of people don't know about, you know, how the funeral industry works, about advanced care directives, how to write them, what to look for. Um, JUST the whole, whole range of things, it comes down to even basic things, insurance, like travel insurance. People don't know what to look for for repatriation, um, and they don't even think to, to do that, but that, you know, and that impacts a, a whole, whole range of things. Uh, AND I've completely forgotten the question, I'm sorry.

10:34 Ricardo Lopes: Uh, NO, I mean the question was about, uh, what do you think are the most common misconceptions people have about death and dying because they're not exposed, uh, to it.

10:46 Samantha Waite: Pretty much anything that, that people, a lot of people think dead bodies are, are dangerous, just inherently dangerous. You stop breathing, your heart stops, and suddenly your body's dangerous. It's, it's absolutely not true, unless you've died of Ebola. Um, IT'S really unlikely that, that the body is going to be a problem. If you leave the body out, you know, if you're in a, a war zone or something, you leave the body out and decompose, then it starts to become a public health issue. So there's that problem, there's the, Yeah, the, the stages of dying, just not knowing what to, what to look for, what to say, how to talk to people uh about it.

11:22 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, but do you think, even though of course it's natural for us to have a predisposition toward, uh, death, anxiety and fearing death, um, do you think that there's a, a in a more rational, from a more rational perspective, that people should fear death? I mean, do, do you think that there's good reason for people to fear death?

11:49 Samantha Waite: Uh, WELL, it's not really for me to say, is it? It's. Should people fear death? I would say no, I think it's, it's a natural thing that happens. I think our society is put on many conditions that would say that you need to fear it, um, and I mean this could be, there's so many problems with various worldviews that say that you should, um, That it is the worst thing, but I've seen plenty of people that are living with conditions, plenty of people who are injured, plenty of people with things that their quality of life is none, and death would be, uh, a better outcome for them, and yet their family keeps trying to bring them back, you know, CPR on a 90 year old who's already got cracked ribs, that's, you know, that's puncturing inside things, but keeping them alive is, is, is better than that. Um, SO, I mean if you've got, but also religion comes into play and religion is a, is a, You know, people, it's a very controversial topic for a lot of people, but it was built out of death anxiety, a way to explain what happens. And if, and it's been proven, there's a lot of studies out there that deeply, deeply religious people of any faith, that particularly one that has an afterlife, often die worse because they keep trying to keep them alive so much, and they are scared about, Dying and then having, um, a god or something, make a decision on where you go. Did you do good enough? So naturally they're scared to die because they're scared for the next outcome. Um, SO it's, it's, it's a whole, there's a lot of societal things that would make death scary, but then also people don't know what's next, you know, it depends on what you believe. If, if you believe there is nothing, Then, and you're rotting in the ground or whatever, well that's one thing, but if you think there's something else, well then you may be scared of it. I think most people are more scared of the actual dying than the death. I think that's, that seems to be what I've found. More people are scared of the, the act of dying or being in pain, of the lack of dignity, or that sort of thing seems to be what scares people the most.

14:02 Ricardo Lopes: But do you think that people are also scared of the idea of just not being there? I mean, the idea of nothingness, non-continuity, things like that, do you think that those kinds of things also scare people? Sure,

14:19 Samantha Waite: the. F can be huge for a lot of people, that the, you know, the fact that you don't, you're not there anymore, will people forget that you ever existed is huge for a lot of people, that's why a lot of people do sort of immortality projects and legacy building and stuff beforehand so their memory lives on. For them. Um, BUT also, I think people also went, think, well, what will happen to my family and, and stuff like that. So they're fearing death because of what will happen for other people, but that, that not knowing what, what comes next and being forgotten is huge for a lot of people. It's huge for certain personality types more than others, um, but yeah, that, that can be a huge, huge part of it.

15:05 Ricardo Lopes: So, uh, since you mentioned religion a minute ago, uh, does the way that, er, religious beliefs manifest, er, have anything to do with, uh, terror management theory, or not?

15:22 Samantha Waite: Yeah, that one would say, you know, terror management theory, uh, came from Ernest Becker and then got sort of evolved by, by more people. Um, AS a sort of method of escapism and through cultural beliefs, to try and manage the, the existential dread, the, the knowing that, that you will die and what people put in place and their worldviews that get put into place in order to make them feel like they matter. Um, SO yeah, religion is a big part and it's a, it's, it's a huge part of trying to get people to understand why, what meaning of life, effectively, you know, the meaning of life is to do good in this one, to get onto the, the next, um, and it's that a fear of dying, that fear of nothing, that maybe after that, they didn't like that idea, so they put something else in, in place, rather than accepting that nothing is OK. Um, NOW if that helps people, then that's, if that generally helps people as individuals, then that's fine, it's when it goes on to interfere with everyone else's beliefs that it, it, it becomes more of an issue and it starts to impart their death anxiety onto everyone else as well, um, not just the religious beliefs themselves.

16:39 Ricardo Lopes: Yes, and I think that we'll probably come back to this when we talk about things like medical assistance in dying, but I would imagine that some of those beliefs then people also try to impose even politically on others, right? They try to impose on others how they should deal with their own death or their process of dying,

17:03 Samantha Waite: correct? Oh yeah. Oh absolutely, there's a lot of that going on at the moment.

17:10 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, but I, I mean, uh, because I was asking you if people should really fear death. I mean, what do we know about how er the process of dying usually plays out? I mean, are most deaths peaceful or not?

17:29 Samantha Waite: Depends how you define peaceful. For the, if you're dying, say in hospice, you're dying after a long illness and you have pain medications and, and all that stuff, it can't be peaceful for the individual who is actually dying. It may not look peaceful for the family members around them, um, often they, they would describe it as anything but that, but for the, for the actual individual it seems to be OK. There's often this thought of, um, you know, dying peacefully in your sleep at night, you know, that's how I'd, I'd like to go. It's unlikely that that peacefulness that an ambulance crew would see next thing in the morning is actually how it happened, um, but there's a big difference between having a heart attack or an aneurysm or something like that, the, what happens to the body when it happens, so peaceful, If you're dying naturally, is debatable. um, THERE are certain more peaceful ways than others, but then you have something like voluntary assisted suicide, which by all accounts, even family members that are around, would say that was looked peaceful to them.

18:39 Ricardo Lopes: Right, but uh I, I mean, I'm not sure if, er, of course not everyone dies this way. I mean there are sudden deaths, for example, but er what people in hospice care, doctors, nurses call uh active dying, I mean that process when people get into it, uh, do they suffer usually or not? I mean, even sometimes those images. Videos that we can uh see on the internet specifically where people do those weird uh noises with their uh lungs. I mean that, that seems like they are grasping for air, but it's really not that, uh, I mean, is that, uh, is that, uh, difficult at all or, uh, do people experience suffering at all when they are going through that?

19:35 Samantha Waite: Uh, YEAH, so that would be the death rattle that people talk about. I was missing, um, so that's the, that's the term that they give. The, the stages of dying, there's 5 stages of dying, and the first few stages, it's usually around 72 hours that the 5 stages will take roughly speaking, um, and the first few, yeah, People, you know, their bodies can contort, which can be incredibly creepy to, to see, but also, you know, they're getting very, they often get very irritated if they've got sort of linen, something wrapped around them. Think of it like going back to infancy, where an infant will cry because they've got something wrapped around them that they, but they don't know what it is, they can't tell you, so your job as a family member is to, Is to work out what's wrong, it may be the light, it may be some, you know, something completely innocuous. Um, SO for those individuals, for that first part, yeah, there can be a lot of pain, that's why you go into hospice to manage that, but say you were dying at home in the same thing without those pain meds, the pain meds, the nausea meds, the anti-constipation, they are the three most common used meds, um, in hospice, and they are absolutely needed because those are the three things that, Um, caused the most, um, uncomfortable feelings for the person. One can't say whether it's, it's gonna be painful or not. We do know that if you are in the last stages of cancer, for instance, which is one of the most common, uh, conditions that we, people around the world will now die of, yeah, it's gonna be painful. That's why you've got the pain meds in there. Um, YOU know, people often talk about, you know, the good death back in the 1800s when it was called, and it wasn't. You know, it might be good as far as you weren't covered by machines, you had family around you, but these people were in a lot of pain back then. They were sick, they were nauseous, they, and there was nothing that could be done apart from pray, which, let's be honest, didn't really do all that much. So peaceful death and, and are they in pain? Absolutely. And that's why nowadays with modern medicine, we can help them through that. But sometimes, depending on what it is, particularly if someone, someone's got 80% burns or something like that, no amount of pain meds is going to, is going to take away everything from that. So, um, it really depends on the, on the condition. But the actual, the last stages of dying is, is pretty peaceful. I mean, it sounds, you've got fluid in the back of your lungs and, and so you're making gargling noise, but, It's for, by all accounts, you know, cos we're monitoring heart rates, if you're in hospice, you're monitoring heart rates, you're monitoring blood pressure, so you can see they're not stressed, um, it just happens that it doesn't really sound very pleasant when you're the family member, uh, sitting by their bedside.

22:32 Ricardo Lopes: So, uh, at those later stages, people are no longer conscious, right?

22:38 Samantha Waite: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The vast, the vast majority of the time they are, yep, they're out, they're unconscious, it's just the body doing the last bits of work to wind down, because that whole act of dying period, the, the five stages is simply your body winding down. It's certainly, sort of like going through an office building and turning off the lights as you go out for the night, you know, you're slowly winding down. So by the end of, by the end of it, those last things, it is pretty peaceful for the vast majority of people.

23:07 Ricardo Lopes: Right. So what does end of life care encompass? I mean, when you talk about end of life care, what kinds of things are you referring to exactly and uh why do you think that it is important to address that topic uh when talking about deaf literacy?

23:28 Samantha Waite: Um, IT'S important because a lot of people don't know it exists and don't know what it means. Um, A lot of people think hospice care and palliative care are the same thing. They're not. Palliative care is used a lot in hospice care. But just because you're being given palliative care for something else doesn't necessarily mean you're dying. Um, IT can, palliative care can be used in, it's often used in burn units, it's used in cancer units, uh, all that sort of stuff as well, even when you're not dying. So end of life care is, uh, your medical care, your spiritual care, your social, so and all, all, everything like that, and if for hospice care mainly, Um, it's, it's about all those things. It's about giving you the quality of the best quality of life that you can, for the, for the time that you have left. It's taking away the treatment part of it. So we're still giving you the meds to support you. We're still giving you the um sort of the pain meds and the anti-nausea, but we're taking away the treatment. We've, we've decided treatment is enough, and we're gonna stop that because a lot of treatment is, is very debilitating, can make you very, very sick. Um, SO we take it off that and then you live the next few months. Yes, you will die within those 3 months, but you will likely feel a lot better without, The treatment, so that's end of life, end of life care and there's specific training for that for, for most people, you can receive it in a facility, you can receive it at a hospital, you can receive it at home, um, and there's a lot more options when it comes to uh hospice care.

25:11 Ricardo Lopes: When it comes to end of life, does it complicate things if the person who's dying is doing everything to try to deny it? I mean that they're just in denial. Oh, I'm not going to die, I'm not going to die, I'm going to get. Better, whatever, I mean things like that, does that complicate the process?

25:35 Samantha Waite: Oh, absolutely, um, you would rarely get someone that's in death denial, to go to hospice, um, because if you don't believe you're dying, you're not going to say yes to somewhere where you go to die, obviously, um, Yes, people in death denial are usually very independent types of people, usually very stubborn types of people. Um, WE commonly see it a lot in farmers over here. I'm sure you probably do over, over, over your way as well. Um, THAT kind of personality type, that strong independent personality type is usually going to deny it all the. Way up to the end, and I've seen people who deny it all the way up to the end, and it's, it's incredible. It's hard to really wrap your mind around that someone can feel everything going on in their body. They, they feel them going downhill, and they, and they can't accept it or even acknowledge it. I mean, we're, we're not necessarily asking for acceptance that they're dying, but, You know, asking for them to acknowledge that it's, it's happening, and the pro the big, the big, big problem is when you have, the patient that is actively dying, or, you know, has 6 months to live, and, They don't believe it, and they refuse to believe it, no matter how many facts you give, and you can't have those conversations with their family, as well, the family may have acknowledged it, but they can't then have those closure conversations with the dying person, they can't have the conversations about what do you want, you know, as far as advanced care planning, they can't have the conversations about the will. There's, there's so, So much things, it hurts the family much more than the dying individual because the dying individual will be dead. By the end of this, it does hurt them as far as the treatment or as far as what care they receive, because if they still want to actively undergo treatment, they're obviously gonna be in a lot more pain, a lot more discomfort than what they were if they were on palliative care, so it hurts them then, but it's the long-term, Uh, issues that it causes their family, that's probably it that's the most ongoing thing, and that's the hardest thing to deal with, because, you know, they're looking at if, you know, I'm, I'm the psych, right, and they're telling us, you know, get dad to understand so I can have these conversations, um, and, and you can't, and if someone is in that much of denial, eventually you just have to go, This is, this is where we're at, we have to accept that. You can write letters to your dad, in this case, um, and leave them with, with him and maybe he will read them. Um, AND so, and then it becomes a different sort of grief, it really complicates the family's grief and ability to go through that, and then the practicalities around it, it, yeah, it can be a very, very long, uh, period of grief after that.

28:29 Ricardo Lopes: Uh, ALSO, I think related to what you said, and this is of course extremely unfortunate, but there are some people, uh, that, uh, also because of their personality type, I mean they tend to be a little bit more manipulative and things like that and because they are in depth. They also put their own family members through much more complications than they could have been put through because I mean they they sort of force their family members if they need to take care of them even though. Death for them is inevitable and if they don't do that or if they're really tired of doing it, then they blame them, oh, it's your fault that I'm like this, you don't want to take care of me, things like that, so that, that kind of thing can also happen.

29:27 Samantha Waite: Right. Yeah, I mean, caregiving is such, such hard work and, You know, people, a lot of people that have never done any caregiving, have a lot of opinions about caregivers. Oh, they have a lot of opinions, oh, you should do that. Um, UNTIL you've actually done at least a solid month 24/7 of caregiving, um, I don't think your opinion is, uh, should really come into the conversation. Um, BUT yes, if you've got, say, a, a family member, we'll say a parent in this situation, particularly someone who comes with, say, narcissistic personality disorder, it can be a huge, uh, issue, uh, within the family, because obviously you don't want to take care of that person because they're abusing you. So, um, there, there's massive complications, family dynamics are a huge issue. And nowadays because a lot of us lived in individualistic societies, whereas they weren't as much back in the day, um, a lot of people just opt out, and one person is left dealing with, the, the dying individual, even whether they are a lovely person or not. Uh, ONE person, and it's, it's usually the daughter that gets, that gets stuck with it, and everyone else goes, and then they only turn up, you know, the week before someone dies and then demand that they be kept alive, no matter what, no matter that the daughter and the parent had actually discussed this sort of thing. Um, YEAH, there's a lot of, you could say that that's guilt, uh, I, Every time I've seen it, I, I don't believe that for a second. Um, I'd say it's more about, it's about control. There's a lot of control, um, family dynamics out there. Um, IT'S what, they don't want to be seen as the bad person that did nothing to help the carer, and the, and the conversation always comes out, particularly in, you know, we've seen it on social media at the moment, oh well, my parents shouldn't demand that I care for them and, and stuff like that. So there's, there's, there's a lot of, er, there's a lot of nuance in, in family dynamics, um, but the fact that it's always seems to get put on one child, and it's usually the daughter, um, is, is a big problem within many, many communities, um, that's not really understood and leads to a lot of family dynamics, particularly when the will comes out. Uh, AFTERWARDS that the, the other kids find out they're not in it, shockingly, um, yeah, things, things like this are, uh, you know, that part of death anxiety doesn't get talked about, uh, as much, no one wants to talk about you won't get the money, you won't get the inheritance if you don't help out, that's, you know, that's not seen as socially acceptable to talk about, but, uh, you know.

32:08 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, uh yeah, and I think it's very unfortunate because I mean, people could be helping a little bit in at least alleviating some of those family dynamics, but because even society at large, if they expect. PATIENTS are put on a particular person to take care of their dying relative and then suddenly the person is already so stressed, so tired, so overwhelmed that they do not do. Enough, uh, uh, according to other people's perspectives, then they're put even through, uh, more, uh, stigma and, and things like that, right, because, oh, now you're the bad person here because you, you no longer want to. Do your duty and take care of your dying mother, father, brother, whoever. Oh yeah,

33:03 Samantha Waite: it happens so much and you know, if you choose to put your, your family member in an aged care facility or any other sort of facility, The backlash that you often get from family, the backlash you get from your community can be huge, but it's the same as in the disability community. If you've got a severely disabled child that you can no longer care for or they've gotten too big and you can't care for them, and then you put them in a, in a facility, um, very similar, uh, outcomes there from the community who will describe you as the most evil person imaginable. Uh, AND again it goes back to, if you have not done a day of caring in your life, um, I don't really feel your opinion's all that valid, and, um, that's probably a controversial thing to say, but it's, it's the truth, it is extremely hard and we, I mean we've had cases over here, um, of murder suicides. Because of that, because there is no support from anyone else, and yet then they get seen as the bad person when they were doing what they felt was, Their only option, um, I don't think people have the, have the right to really criticize and have an opinion and call them evil when they did nothing to step up and help themselves.

34:24 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, and I mean the person who's the caregiver is going through many, many things at the same time. I mean they, they're losing their family member, they're feeling isolated because no one steps in to help, at least with some of uh with some of the load they're er they're getting. Ostracized by other people if other people think they're not doing enough, they are absolutely stressed, perhaps sleep deprived, tired, I mean it's sometimes it's really nasty,

34:59 Samantha Waite: right? Absolutely, the burnout and the compassion fatigue that you see in carers is extreme and there is no, there's no respite, there's, there's often nothing. And that and financially, um, it, it costs so, so, so much, caring costs so much, the ability, you know, all the, the equipment and the, the medical, uh, all the items that you, that you need, you're no longer working, so there's no income coming in, if that's a family that you've got coming in, so it goes on to another family member, which is probably, say their partner. Who then has to look after the family, so that creates relationship stress, then the, if you've got kids, then they're thinking, well, where's mum? Why isn't she here? I mean, I, I vividly remember this throughout my childhood when my mum was caring for my grandmother, and so we've got two, it was me and my brother going, Where's mum, I remember the arguments that mum and dad would have because she wasn't around, um, you know, and then that came back when it switched around and dad had to care for his parents, but it's, yeah, it's a huge, it's a huge thing. And because people nowadays don't live in the same homes, you know, you see other countries, a lot of Asian countries, for instance, have, uh, multi-generational family homes and, and dwellings. So it, it's sort of, you know, that comes with its own pros and cons for this situation as well.

36:26 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah. So, uh, let me ask you now about, uh, how death tends to be approached by medical professionals because unfortunately, this might also have some negative ramifications in terms of how end of life. Care is done and all of that and perhaps trying to overextend people's lives. So how do you look at how uh medical professionals tend to deal with uh death and death as a A result of whatever they're doing to a patient.

37:02 Samantha Waite: Yeah, there's a lot of studies, a lot of research that have gone into this, and it's the fact that the medical industry really advanced very quickly over a number of decades, and when you see what a medical professional, let's say a doctor in this specific instance, The, the training that they go through, it is all cure, cure, cure. It's all how to keep the patient alive, it's all, that's, that's your job, you know, a, a kid says, what does a doctor do, you know, you save people. So that's their mentality and certain, certain um specialities, uh, in medicine do better with their anxiety than others, uh, surgeons are seen to be some of the um, Have it the worst, you, you could say, and you know, no one must die, when it comes to me, and if someone does, they, you know, the whole identity is, is cracked, whereas other say emergency departments, not so much. Um, THE problem with, with doctors that can't accept death as an outcome, Um, is that the treatment options can be brutal and the manipulation that it takes can be brutal. Now we're not saying a surgeon that leaves a, leaves a clamp in a patient and then they die, of course that is a failure, um, that, that led to death, but, if you're a doctor that doesn't want your patient to die because you're worried about your professional reputation, or you can't handle it within yourself, a death yourselves, there, I wouldn't say they, they actively manipulate a patient, but a lot of them can sort of passively manipulate, they, they sort of really push, oh you know, you should really try this 10 there's not too many um bad outcomes for this, or have, have you tried this particular outcome, and even when a, a patient will say, I've had enough, I'm, I'm, I'm done, they will go, oh, well for your family you should try this, and, It leads to patients having treatments that have very little benefit, but have huge uh implications for them, um, and, you know, patients might not actually live longer than what they would have if they hadn't gone through treatment, but they lived that time in, in horrific pain and things like that. But then you've also got doctors say, You know, uh, CPR is one of the big ones, and a lot of people don't really understand what, what CPR looks like, and doctors will continue to perform it or be told to perform it. um, AND if you've got a fragile, particularly in the elderly or anyone with a fragile, uh, skeleton, that cracks ribs. You have to crack ribs to do CPR properly. You've gotta get to the heart, and how do you get through that? You've gotta get through the, you know, the ribs are there to protect it, so, um, Yeah, there's, there's so many treatment options that the doctors, and often doctors will try to do because they've been trained year after year, you know, you've got 1015 years of training, all about keeping someone alive and treating them and curing them and not. Not really much training at all. Um, SOME doctors have said, oh, we may have had a unit. Some have said we may have had a, you know, a lecture about it over 15 years of how to help a person die peacefully, um, and obviously that's, that's not going to be forgotten. There's a lot of stress and, and professional reputation at risk. Um, AND in certain countries, um, you know, certain countries love to sue. Um, AND so that's the other, that's the other issue that, that, uh, comes around for patients, doctors wanting to keep their patients alive no matter what.

40:47 Ricardo Lopes: Yes, I, I was actually going to ask you about that. I mean, do you think that this sort of attitudes that medical professions develop toward death as an outcome and really trying at all costs to keep patients alive even if they don't even have any real quality of life, they're, they're already extremely debilitated. I mean, do you think that Uh, it's sort of a combination of our natural tendency exacerbated by the sort of attitude culturally that we have toward death combined with the medical technology that nowadays we have at our disposal where people think, oh, OK, we, if we have means, technological means to keep the person alive, then we should do it or do. Do you think that there's also an element of the doctor being afraid of how he or she would be looked at by uh their colleagues, uh, other people from the broader community, the family members of the patient, and perhaps even a, a certain fear of being accused of neglect or something like that.

41:59 Samantha Waite: Um, YEAH, I think in er different countries, I'd say different medical communities fear different things in particular. Um, THERE was a study, it was back in early 2000s, so it's a bit old now, but there was a study that said that, uh, US, uh, doctors fear, um, being sued and, and being told that they were neglectful of medical neglect and stuff like that. Um, IN the UK it was more profession, uh, professional reputation. Um, THERE was a few others around the place, but so it seems to be very, uh, country specific in the way that their training and their, uh, their environment is, is set up, which I thought was really interesting, as well, um. Yep.

42:48 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, it's, it's complicated, I understand, but I mean. Yeah. Uh, SO, uh, I mean, what, why is it, uh, I, I, I, I mean, I know, I know that it still involves those kinds of things that we've just talked about, but why is it that even when the patient, uh, themselves say or express that they don't really Want to try anything new that they just want to uh live life as peacefully as possible and as quickly as possible because they just can't bear it anymore. Why is it that even in those sort of situations medical professionals still try to. Vince or force the patient into uh extending their life.

43:41 Samantha Waite: Yeah, for a lot of them, death anxiety is a part of their life as well, you know, they're still human beings living in our community, they're brought up in our culture as well, so death anxiety is, is big for them. And they've been told they need to cure, they've been told they need to treat, and they have no idea how to let someone go peacefully. Um, AND they, they seem to think that the patient is just giving up when they have so many other treatment options. And a lot of doctors, we saw, there was a, was it the UK? I say UK or Spain. Somewhere from there. There was a study out there that, A lot of doctors wanted to use the treatments that they hadn't been able to use yet so they could see how it would work. So they would get patients that had already said, no, I don't really want to, and they'd go, oh well there's this, there's this um particular trial going on, or just, just go see how that will, that will work. So they're no longer seeing them as a patient anymore, they're seeing them as a project. Um, AND that can get, and certain, certain specialities of medicine do that a lot more than, than others, um, as seeing a, a patient as a project and not actually, um, looking at them directly in the eye and seeing them as a human being, um, so that that detachment is, is very real as well.

45:06 Ricardo Lopes: But do you think that er in the context of er medical care or healthcare, death should be considered a failure?

45:17 Samantha Waite: Yeah, look, there's, there's different ways, it was from neglect, obviously, or mental, you know, of course that's a failure. No, I mean, no one's saying it's not, but death is the natural outcome of being alive. You will die eventually, that's just how this works. We're not made of Styrofoam, we're not gonna just continue existing. So how you can say that someone that's, you know, 90 years old, them dying is a failure, it's not, they've just come to the expiry of that life. That's, that was what's meant to happen, that is what's naturally meant to happen. Um, SO, Yeah, it's hard for people to, to sometimes wrap their mind around that. Again, it's such an abstract concept to a lot of people because again, they've never seen it and they're scared of it, and they've made up different things in their mind, but that is the natural part of it. And that's what makes, you know, for a lot of people, it makes life worth living. You get to do all this, all this stuff, um, otherwise you would have no goals. You would have nothing to move forward to if you just lived forever. Um, AND certainly there's, you know, there's people that love the idea of cryonics that can say, oh yeah, we'll, we'll pop back to life in 200 years' time and all will be fine, and I mean that's death anxiety in a tube right there, but hey, if you've got the money, go for it, why not? Um, WHO'S, who's telling you not, but, uh, yeah, that, that's kind of where it's at at the moment.

46:49 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, and, and I guess that there's also, um, I mean, or, or there should be a limit to uh how people should be trying to overextend their lives, I guess, because I, I mean, I, I don't think that it's, it will ever even be biologically possible for anyone to live forever. And even if at a certain point, I, I have no idea how people would be able to live forever. I mean, it also depends on what you mean by forever, right? Because if the physicists are right. Even if it's only in I don't know, 11 trillion or a quad trillion years in the future, there will be a time where the universe will no longer be able to sustain life. I mean, so, uh, why should even people uh uh try to aim at living forever? I mean, that's just not physically or biologically possible.

47:50 Samantha Waite: I think there's also the arrogance of being a human being that comes into that, that you have the right to live forever and take up space forever. Um, THAT'S part of being a human, that's, that's a human being thing, you don't see other animals that doing that as well. Um, PARTLY, yes, that arrogance, arrogance comes stems from insecurity, which would stem from their death anxiety as well, but it's the same thing that we see in, say, a lot of, Cemeteries, right? Um, SOME, in some countries, there's, in some countries it's, uh, you're there for 15 years, and for other countries, it is expected that you will be there forever. It is, you have expected that you will be able to take up that space forever, um. And that's, that's an, an interesting part of the human psyche really that I, that I find fascinating, is that, and that's that wanting to be remembered, that's the not wanting to be forgotten part, that part of the death anxiety that comes in there, and the reality is that's not possible. It's just not possible. We do have, I mean, some people will say that cemetery shouldn't exist at all. I say that's, that's not true. I don't think that's a good thing at all. But you, but the taking up forever of being in a grave is, is a different thing entirely.

49:06 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, yeah, uh, uh, uh, we're going to come back to that when later I ask you about death-related rituals and why they are so important to people in general, but, um, do you think that, uh, I, I think I've at least watched one video where you talked about, uh, um, I mean, positive, I, I mean, people being uh positively. Or toxically positive in in a way, so can some attitudes that people have toward life and death fall under that rubric of toxic positivity?

49:43 Samantha Waite: Oh yeah, so yeah, toxic positivity being the, um, you must always look on the, on the positive side. There's no, there's no room for anything negative to be said and, and things, and you know, words like, um, you know, any life is better than no life. Uh, KIND of thing, or you know, just look on the bright side, or, oh, everything happens for a reason, all these sort of bumper sticker sayings that, that, get, get put out there, uh, you know, they're in a better place, it's like well that's great, anywhere but here with me apparently is a better place you know. Um, SO toxic positivity, it really impacts, uh, people, like, even those with disabilities, you know, non-terminal disabilities, it impacts as well, um, but for the dying, if you are, if you have a family member that is, uh, unable to really shift that toxic positivity, and they are much, you must fight. Of course, my family member will fight, um, they will be fine, you know, they've, they've had a heart attack before, they'll be fine. Um, IT means that there's no room for an honest conversation about what's happening next. There's no room for that dying individual to express what they feel, what they need when they're just getting these bumper stickers coming back at them, like you don't, you must always smile, um, and that sort of thing. And it's, it's not a good way to go, it's not good for the person who's going to eventually be grieving, it's not good for the dying individual. Um, THEMSELVES, and you see it a lot, toxic positivity comes, you see a lot in social media when people document their experiences and going, oh, I'm feeling blessed about my current situation. I'm feel, it's a miracle that I'm still alive, all, all these sort of, Really over the top without looking at the negative, because you can be, you can be positive about your outlook, but there has to be room for the negative feeling and to be able to feel that negative, uh, feeling as, as well. But also, the toxic positivity, the big one is the, the medical TV shows that we see, these sort of outlier moments where someone has been in a coma for 20 odd years, which we, we did a video about how that's actually not a great thing, but anyway, there have been a, 20 odd years and then suddenly they woke up and they were completely fine and they went off to work the next week. It's absolute bullshit, because some of these outliers, um, they're called outliers for a reason, and the likelihood of that actually being your loved one that's in the bed, that's in the coma, that's been there for, you know, a week, and your doctors are saying, well, actually they're not in a coma, they are brain dead, which is a completely different thing. Um, BUT they still look to these outliers, and that's part of toxic positivity as well. You know, it's that keeping up of hope when the facts in front of you say something completely different and you refuse to believe them and refuse to say, well, you know, this, this could happen and, You leave your, your, your loved one that can't, has no chance of dying peacefully because you're in charge of them, which is why I tell everyone to write an advance care directive and lodge it, please, if you don't want to be in that situation.

52:55 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, and I, I also think, and please correct me if I'm wrong, that uh imposing toxic positivity on other people also sort of uh takes room from them to express um negative feelings and negative emotions, right? They, they, they might want to just naturally express, but because other people. Around them are just saying, oh no, you're going to get through this, you're going to survive this and that. I mean, uh uh maybe the person is just wanting, oh my God, just let me express sadness or grief or whatever kind of negative things that are going through my mind, just let me say goodbye to people around me, but they're, they're just not giving them. Yep.

53:46 Samantha Waite: Some people in that thing just want to vent, you know, they want to be able to say that they are scared because they're dying. Of course they are. Um, YOU know, they, they want to be able to say they're angry at this situation or they want to be able to, you know, say final goodbyes to other family members. And then you always have one family member that is that toxic positivity, one that is desperately trying to, Uh, control the situation for their own comfort level, um, it's a, it's a horrible thing for the individual to do because it's very self-serving. Um, IT'S not serving anyone else, definitely not serving the dying person, and they just want to vent, and they have, they have that right to vent. If there's any time to be selfish, it's when you're, you know, you're actively dying. So, um, yeah, it's, it's a hard thing to watch and it's a, but it's even harder to try and get people to turn that off, um, yeah.

54:40 Ricardo Lopes: So, uh, what do you think about how society tends to look at suicide, because I mean, to a certain extent, of course, I understand why people have negative views of it, also to discourage people from going through with it, but on the other hand, I, I mean, sometimes I get the sense that people moralize er people who commit suicide too much as if it's a moral failing on their part that they didn't want to be here anymore for whatever reason they might have,

55:21 Samantha Waite: right? Yeah, um. It's, it's a huge problem. I think people completely refuse to see the nuance and use critical thinking when it, when it comes to that, that topic. Um, I've always been a believer, if you have the right to live, you have the right to die. Um, AND that means, and I mean that whether you're healthy or, or not. Now, a lot of people get up in arms, but again, there's a lot of nuance in that, isn't there? Um, AND the The problem is, if someone does take their own life, um, there are so many things that happen around that, um, as well, that's why uh uh assisted dying became a, became a thing to offset the traumatic past that suicide would have. But if, for me, if you decide to take your own life because of that, and it's been a long-term factor, like if, if you've, if you've just had a relationship breakup, And you're in that instant, you're gonna be in grief because that's your relationship breakup. Well then probably not, but I think the long-term, people that have been suffering long-term, um, I don't think anyone really has the right to criticize what they're going through and what they can and cannot do with their own body, with their own life. If, if you have nothing else that you can control, you can control whether you live or die. Um, AND I don't think it's right people should even try to take that away from, from them when they can take everything else away from someone.

56:53 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, when it comes to the right to die, I think that people who, I mean, for religious reasons or even non-religious reasons just oppose that and oppose medical assistance in dying and whatever kind of way that people might end their. Lives prematurely. Let's, I mean, sometimes it's not even that prematurely if we're talking about people with terminal diseases and, and things like that, but uh I, I mean, I, I think that they also can might put people who don't want to be here anymore uh under a lot. Of stress and feeling like a caged in a sense because it's like oh I don't want to be here anymore, but whichever way I turn, someone is forcing me into going on living, right? I mean it can be, I imagine that it can be very. DAMNING and isolating for the person who's experiencing that.

58:00 Samantha Waite: The big one is people say, well, live for me, you know, if nothing else, live for me, why don't you want to live for me, that is an extremely manipulative way of, it, it, it's absolutely horrible way of doing it, um, and there's a, there's a part of psychology as well that if you, As a clinician or or someone else, say, OK, what is your, what is your method, or whatever, what's your plan? And they say I have this plan, and instead of jumping down their throat saying that's a horrible thing, or, you know, you shouldn't do that, why have you thought of these reasons to live, sometimes just having that plan in the back of their mind and knowing that they have an escape if they want, lets them live longer. There are plenty of people that, that know that, you know, I have this plan, I know it would work. And then they keep that in the back of the thing or they keep whatever it is in the back of the wardrobe or something like that, and they go on to live another 12 years, you know, 20 years or whatever, knowing that they have that out if they want it, and I think that's a, That's a big, big thing that a lot of people um don't really think about, it's that nuance, it's that fear, um, and it's the lack of understanding about how suicide, um, and suicidality works, um, in for a lot of people.

59:23 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, that that reminds me of a conversation I had last year with Doctor Philip Nitschke. He's actually from Australia as well, and uh I mean. Yeah, and, uh, at a certain point, we were talking about people getting access to medication for, I, I mean, it's basically a form of assisted suicide, but it's the person taking the medication home and then deciding whether or not they, they want to take it and when they want to take it and he told me that for For example, he himself has medication at home, uh, for that, and he's had it for the past 20 or 30 years, and he's still here. So I mean, sometimes it's just people having that escape door in a sense. I mean, if at any moment I can no longer bear existing, I know. That I can get out of here as soon as possible and with as little suffering as possible.

1:00:25 Samantha Waite: Yeah, cos most people that are, have suicidal, suicidal ideation, have it for a long, long time, sometimes lifelong. Most people that are suicide and don't do it impulsively, um, I think that's what a lot of, a lot of people who have never felt that way, I think, Kind of believe that it's an impulsive act, uh, it's really not, and that's why this having something, you know, locked away somewhere that you can get to down the track, it's a, it's a big thing, and it's, I know a lot of people that have, uh, Of all ages, of all health levels, um, that have exactly that, um, that have an out, so they know it's there, and it makes them feel a lot more secure in themselves and in their life, and it fills them a lot, it makes them feel safe, um, and I, so I think a lot of people who don't understand the nuance of it, who have never been there, or are extremely biased because of society or because of religion or or whatever else, um, They're actually pushing people closer to doing it then. If what you do if you actually have a conversation with someone, because back in the day, for most countries it was, it was a crime, to commit suicide, um, you know, that's why it's called committing suicide, like committing murder, um, And our society sort of shifted and became a, a health issue. We changed it, we, we decriminalized it and then became a health issue. And like so, so, so many, um, uh, issues and topics, people swung from this extreme to this extreme. They, and so many people can't. See the nuance and the middle part of this ground, so we're currently over here with the extreme of it being a health issue and, and, and stuff like that, and we need to sort of come back to seeing it in the normal, um, in the regular central part of it. I don't think it'll, it'll happen like a lot of topics. I, I think it'll just keep swinging between the two extremes, but, um, that would be very helpful for a lot of people.

1:02:28 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, I, I mean people are so averse to people committing suicide that then they even put people who committed suicide in the 6th or 7th circle of hell. I mean people in the in the circle of hell of people who were violent in the end, in that case violent. TO themselves, so I mean it seems that some people, at least the religious ones even want to think that if someone commits suicide, they will be punished in the afterlife because, because that's just not something that you can do with your own life.

1:03:04 Samantha Waite: Yeah, we'll try and keep people alive through fear, um, and I mean that shows an extreme lack of critical thinking, extreme lack of understanding of psychology, um, as it is, that just doesn't work, um.

1:03:17 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah. Uh, BY the way, when it comes to medically, medical assistance in dying, I think that one of the, of course, uh, the entirety of the topic is very controversial usually, but, uh, what is your take on extending it to people who suffer from psychiatric conditions?

1:03:40 Samantha Waite: Yeah, uh, it's a complex, uh, it's a very complex thing to do. Do I think that they should? Yes. Do I think doing so is an extreme risk on your system? Yes. We've seen with Canada recently, it's gotten, uh, things have not gone well. Um, THEIR system was so young for their first, for the terminal illness part, and then the court system said, no, you have to add on the second tier. Um, AND they weren't ready for it. It was such a young system, it just, it, it sort of got out of control and there was no safeguards. The mechanism, the safeguards weren't great, the mechanisms weren't great. There was no sort of review system in place. Um, BUT then you have other countries, Netherlands and, and such that have absolutely have it for, for, uh, very, Mental illnesses, various non-terminal, uh, things, even dementia, that they, that they have it before, and they have a lot of safeguards in place, and it is working fine. You know, it's not like their entire, everyone in their country who has a mental illness is heading off to the clinics. You know, I think that's what a lot of people outside these countries seem to think will, will happen. People just up and go. Um, I think it's, I think it's a good thing, because I don't think, people who have never dealt with, say, schizophrenia or something like that. Uh, AGAIN, Don't have a real say on that. This is the same, you know, there's so many diagnoses that are so heavily stigmatized, you wouldn't want to be in the same room with someone, but now you're telling that person that they can't alleviate their own suffering because they tell me, trust me, it's gonna be worse for them to have that than for you being around them. And, and now you're saying that they can't, they can't do that. I think that's appalling, an appalling thought to have. Dementia is a, a big one that a lot of people are talking about, a lot of people over here in Australia are very much want dementia to be put on the list. Uh, THE big problem with that is, are they, do they have capacity at the time, and they, and they don't, because by the time they got to that point, they wouldn't have capacity to say yes. In the Netherlands, um, they did put that in, uh, saying that that was, uh, an OK thing to do, but they had to do it while they had capacity. Um, THEY had to say yes, and there was a, they tried to extend it a bit. Um, SAYING that if you, one, at the time you have dementia, you have that illness. If you have capacity, you can write it down saying that at this time where I no longer have it, I give my rights over to this person, um, and they will say yes. The amount of people that actually took that up, say the children of this person with dementia, the amount of people that took that up was very, very small. Because the idea of saying, hey, I'm gonna take mm to the clinic on Tuesday to effectively, you know, have her put down, it's sort of like, you know, that can't sit well in people's minds, so there wasn't an uptick, like, so many detractors thought there were. Um, I think, yeah, I think a lot of European countries are doing very well with it and provide great templates for what can be done, but then we have, like, yeah, Canada at the moment is a great template of how it should not be done.

1:06:56 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, you know, I think that sometimes people who oppose euthanasia in general also tend to resort to underhanded tactics like for example, slippery slope arguments. They, they abuse those kinds of arguments and also sometimes trying to associate people who are in favor of. Medical assistance in dying with, for example, Nazis and saying, oh, you see that, but, but, but they fail to make the distinction between involuntary euthanasia and voluntary euthanasia, right? And then it's like, oh, if you're in favor of euthanasia, then yeah, I put this stigma on. You that you're a Nazi or you're Nazi related or something like that, and for me it's just silly because it's like someone saying, oh, you should be careful about vegetarianism because Hitler was a vegetarian and I'm, I mean, really, is that the the the road you want to go on?

1:08:04 Samantha Waite: It's the slippery slope argument is a ridiculous. Seeing at the best of times. I mean, you can say, oh, I shouldn't drive a car because, you know, you might end up in a car crash. Ooh, slippery slope, oh, you know, you might, it, everything's slippery slope until, you know, they actually need it. And there's a lot of disability activist groups that are saying, oh no, they'll try and kill us all off. And again, the Nazis, I mean the Nazis did plenty, plenty of bad things obviously, but I mean, in this particular instance, it, they really screwed over a lot of countries, because that stigma is still there, um, and quite frankly, I don't think the people that go out and picket and say, you know, I'm disabled, you know, they, they want to get rid of me, if you are actually out there able to picket, we're not talking about you, um. Oddly enough, but yeah, it's a, it's a slippery slope. I mean the UK has been, uh, debating this for 90 years before the Nazis, uh, came about, and they had to change up their whole, uh, the wording because euthanasia as a word, suddenly wasn't a neutral anymore, so they had to, they had to change that up, and of course there's, there's, but there's also different ways that, um, These programs around the world have it over here in Australia, the majority is that you take the medication home with you, and you take it yourself, whereas in other countries it's a doctor will inject you, in other countries, so it makes people very fearful, because they don't know the process. A lot of people haven't looked into the process. There's a lot of steps you've gotta go through, a lot of hurdles you've gotta jump, um, to, to be on one of these programs.

1:09:48 Ricardo Lopes: Mhm. So why is it that er funerals and other kinds of death related rituals, er, why are they so important to people in general? I mean, beyond the fact that or beyond the simple act. Of burying someone to not, to avoid spreading disease, for example, what is it that, what are the social and psychological aspects that surround those kinds of rituals that make it so important for people to experience them?

1:10:22 Samantha Waite: Yeah, so, uh, funeral rituals are mourning rituals and mourning, Is sort of the activities that we go through to help process our grief, they give you, they give you a task to complete while your brain is elsewhere and unable to really think through because you're in grief, and then bereavement is the time that grief and mourning activities happen. So a funeral gives you that, well, it was meant to be a place where you could come and grieve and be supported. By people, um, and you were supposed to be able to cry out in public, and you were supposed to be able to, to feel things and feel supported by the community, and unfortunately, for, for a lot of countries who have lost a lot of their death literacy, have high levels of death anxiety, that's not happening anymore. We've moved to this celebration of life, which again is more of a, I put that more in the toxic positivity box as well, of, It's not a place to grieve anymore, people are expected to grieve at home and you come to this celebration of life which they're calling a funeral and there's not really any support there anymore because grief is the process of, Uh, getting used to a new normal, um, you're gonna go through feelings, and, and that's not really happening anymore, but that's what the funeral process originally was, was for and the purpose. Um, OBVIOUSLY there were religion, religious parts in there as well for some people, um, and that helped calm their minds as well, but, um, for us now, even if you are atheist, that having a funeral, uh, is still a meaningful, uh, thing to do for your own grief.

1:12:02 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah. So, uh, please correct me if I'm wrong, but I, I think that I read in your, uh, website, the website for tabuse education that you were a psychosexual therapist for a while. So, uh, do you find any connections between the sexual aspects of human life and death? And I think that there are perhaps two avenues that we can go, uh, that we Can go into when it comes to this question. I mean one of them is if uh psychologically there's any connections between uh the our sexuality and death and the other one is in terms of taboo topics whether taboo topics related to sexuality, uh, in, in some way share traits with taboo topics related to death.

1:12:58 Samantha Waite: Yeah, um, well, if we look at one way, um, you are at your most honest and your most vulnerable when you are dying or you're in the middle of a sexual activity. um, SO you are your most honest self. So as far as a clinician, if you're looking at either of those, you are getting the most honest person out of them of who they really, really are. Um, SO for me, that's where the, the interest is. You break down a lot of, a lot of walls real quickly when, when you're talking about what their sexual attraction is, or, or their, or dying in general. So that's, that's a really interesting one, but the more, probably more interesting one is that, um, yeah, because I, I was a psychosexual therapist, but I then specialized in kink fetish and paraphilia, um, which, You wouldn't think death and sex really, uh, come together all that much, they do, uh, necrophilia being the most obvious one that people know about, obviously the attraction to the dead body. So that's, that's one, but then there's also uh various uh fetishes that may go on to be paraphilias, uh, depending on if they act on it or not, whereas, um, uh, of being dead, of being murdered, um, murdering someone else, uh, that's not tend, tend to be the same one, but, um, yeah, there's a, there's a, there's a range of, of, of sexual, death for a lot of people can be quite sexually attractive in, in, Various ways, um, again, that romanticization that a lot of people have about death is, is part of that, um, but also, what happens during puberty and your sexual development as well impacts, uh, these things, but it can be very, very interesting and we try on our, on our channel to add that in as often as possible because people find it fascinating, so.

1:14:48 Ricardo Lopes: Yeah, no, it's, it's really fascinating. So, uh, one last uh topic I would like to ask you about, um, is that anxiety something that at least in certain cases, uh, could or should be treated in the context of psychotherapy?

1:15:07 Samantha Waite: Yeah, absolutely. If it is, it's like anything else, if it is impacting your functioning in any way, um, and there's 5 different ways, whether it be professional, your financial, your, all the different ways, if it is impacting your life, then you need to chat with someone professionally about it. You need to sort that issue out. Um, IF that anxiety is so, Mass that is taking over your life, or you don't know why you're making the decisions you are, why you feel anxious, because a lot of people don't know it is anxiety about death and dying themselves. They feel anxious, um, then absolutely, you reach out to someone, reach out to someone like me, we do educational consults rather than therapeutic ones now, but just to understand that, um, sort of things. But you can also help yourself out as well. There are plenty of ways. Um, TO, to help yourself cope with it as well, but I would strongly recommend, um, seeing a professional for

1:16:06 Ricardo Lopes: healthcare. Um, AND what do you think, or, or do you think that there are ways that we could try to, uh, combat death anxiety that stems from the fact that people in modern industrialized societies are much less exposed to people dying and to death. Cor corpses and all of that, I mean, do you think that there are ways we could, uh, sort of circumvent that in any way? I mean, I don't know. Should people just have, uh, excursions to auspices or what or see autopsies, or, I mean, what,

1:16:44 Samantha Waite: what can we

1:16:45 Ricardo Lopes: do

1:16:45 Samantha Waite: about that? Look, um, yeah, you. People always say, I, I always say, you know, exposure, and people automatically mean, oh, I'll go turn up to an autopsy or something. I'm like, no, that's not the way it works, the pathologist is not gonna be happy to see you, I guarantee that. Um, IT'S going to something like a death cafe, it's talking, it's going out and talking to things. It's going and taking walks around cemeteries on a regular basis, and just engaging with that. There are plenty of museums out there around the world, I mean I've, We've we've got a few videos on the massive list that I'm trying to tick off as I go around the world, um, of that are medical based or history based or something that that have to do with death, and go and interact and think about it. It's, it's bringing it back to normality, it's bringing it back to this is real, this exists, Um, and the more you think about it and think it through rather than imagining stuff to fill that void, um, the easier it's gonna get. So we're not gonna say, I'm not gonna say go on the internet and look up dead bodies or something like that, that's not a way to go, that's a whole different issue. Maybe once or twice, fine, you know, everyone should see what a real body looks like, not what's not on the medical show. Um, BUT yeah, things like walking through a cemetery would be the, the best thing that you could do, or going to a museum and seeing death there would probably be the easiest way that you can start doing that.

1:18:15 Ricardo Lopes: Uh, GREAT, so, uh, I will be sending you a link to add you as a collaborator on this video, and apart from your YouTube channel and your website, which I'm going also to link in the description, where else can people find you on the internet? Yeah,

1:18:33 Samantha Waite: we're on Facebook and Instagram as well, but you can find all that through our, our website or through our YouTube channel.

1:18:40 Ricardo Lopes: Oh, by the way, would you like to tell people about your book project in case they're interested in potentially supporting it?

1:18:48 Samantha Waite: We are, we're raising money currently to write a narrative nonfiction book about how death anxiety impacts your day to day life through the entire lifespan. We're looking at having Australian and British, specifically, uh, famous individuals, uh, tell their stories about death anxiety and death acceptance throughout their lifespan. So we're raising money cos that's gonna raise a lot of travel, uh, a lot of editing as well, and I will get you to put in the, the link to our fundraiser, uh, on there, otherwise you can find it on our website, or, uh, in our YouTube link as well. Anything is much appreciated, even a few bucks.

1:19:29 Ricardo Lopes: Oh, by the way, uh, uh, just before we started our interview, I went there and donated $25 so I encourage everyone, I encourage everyone to go there and do the same because I think it will be a, a fascinating book and uh I hope to have you back on the show when it's published.

1:19:49 Samantha Waite: Oh, that would be great. I can tell you all the behind the scenes secrets.

1:19:55 Ricardo Lopes: OK, so thank you so much for coming on the show.

1:19:58 Samantha Waite: Thank you, Ricardo. Thanks for having me.

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