Can we learn to die well?

Death is still a taboo subject in the UK, something we largely struggle to talk about and process publicly. Hasina Zeman asks if there is a way we could collectively do it better

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The conversation around death is understandably a difficult one. Facing loss of life, whether it’s our own or that of someone we love, is not something any of us is eager to do. Sometimes it’s almost as if, if we say it out loud – we will somehow speak it into existence.

Denial of death is a deeply protective measure. It’s a mechanism we use to cope with the shock of grief. In my work as a funeral director, I often encounter bereaved families who want to see their loved one’s body prior to the funeral, just to make sure they are the one who is being buried or cremated – as though the possibility for error remains. It’s a request with which I sympathise profoundly.

Since the pandemic, I’ve continued to observe how we collectively focus on doing whatever it takes to wring the very most out of life – part of which seems embedded in ignoring our own mortality. Even in a year defined by so much loss, this refusal to look death in the eye lingers stubbornly in society’s psyche.