Sacred Earth Funerals

18/07/2026

12/06/2026

Dying Matters cafe is back at the Library. Hope you can come.. 😊

13/11/2025

Come to our last Dying Matters Cafe of the year!

24/10/2025

How sad to think we live in a society where someone can die and never be missed. When loneliness is the quiet and relentless pandemic, and where we are often oblivious to the tragedies that occur right next door

She died alone — and for 42 years, the world simply went on without her.
In 1966, Hedviga Golik, a nurse from Zagreb, Croatia, made herself a cup of tea and sat down in her small apartment. No one knows exactly what happened next — only that she never got up again.
Decades passed. The world outside her door changed — new governments, new wars, new generations — but behind that locked door, time stood still.
No one reported her missing. Her neighbors assumed she had moved away. Her electricity bills were quietly covered by the building’s architect, who had set up an automatic payment that continued long after his own death. The lights in Hedviga’s apartment stayed on.
It wasn’t until 2008, during a building renovation, that workers forced the door open — and stepped into a time capsule.
Inside, everything was frozen in the 1960s. A black-and-white television. Mid-century furniture. A cup still resting beside an armchair. And in that chair sat Hedviga’s mummified remains, perfectly preserved by the sealed room and the dry air.
The discovery stunned Croatia — not just for the tragedy of it, but for what it revealed about modern life: how someone could vanish so completely that no one noticed for four decades.
Police identified her through documents and photographs left in the apartment. She had been around 42 years old when she died — a nurse, a friend, a person once part of a community that had simply moved on.
The scene became an eerie monument to isolation — a reminder that in cities full of people, solitude can still swallow a life whole. Journalists described her flat as a “tomb of time,” a perfect preservation of an era, and a haunting reflection on how easily the world forgets.
Hedviga Golik’s story isn’t just about death — it’s about disconnection.
She lived in the middle of a bustling city, surrounded by neighbors, yet vanished in silence.
For 42 years, her apartment remained her grave — and her ghost, a quiet echo of how the modern world can turn solitude into disappearance.
A cup of tea. A closed door.
And a life no one noticed had stopped.

14/10/2025

Welcome back to the warm days of Spring! Our next DMC is this Monday at the library, we would love to see you there 🤗

17/09/2025

The world came to know him as GREEN BOOTS🥾

This is Green Boots, who lay here for over twenty years as a marker for weary climbers pushing towards the summit of Mt Everest. His exact identity remains uncertain. What is certain is that he stopped here forever, in a shallow limestone cave at 8,500 meters, where he could go no further.
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It was only in the last few years that I realised just how many bodies will never be retrieved from the high slopes of Everest. Hundreds of adventurers have died on the mountain, and none will ever be retrieved from ‘The Dead Zone’. Climbers literally have to step over the dead at certain points along the climb, their frozen forms becoming part of the mountain itself. The bodies have now taken on the role of way markers, as solemn reminders of the fragility of life for weary climbers. I think that's confronting.
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Perhaps Green Boots was caught in a blizzard that roared down too suddenly. Perhaps the light faded faster than he could descend, and the cold closed in before help could come. We will never truly know his final hours.
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But for those who pass that alcove, there is no escaping the intimacy of his presence. Green Boots is more than a signpost on Mount Everest’s Northeast ridge route; he is a reminder that saying yes to the mountain means walking close to the veil and side by side with mortality itself.

15/09/2025

Why V.A.D?
I’m a strong advocate for people’s right to access VAD at end of life. When death is no longer avoidable, the choice is about how the end unfolds.
One way might mean days or weeks of decline, marked by pain, fear, and loss. The other allows a gentler close—on your terms, with comfort, dignity, and the chance to say goodbye.
VAD doesn’t remove the reality of death; it restores the meaning in how we meet it. It lets a person align their final moments with their deepest values, turning the end from something that happens to them into something completed by them—gently, lucidly, and with dignity.
But the most powerful reason for having VAD is this: 🌿🌿🌿it is the ultimate safeguard of human dignity when suffering becomes unbearable and death is inevitable. 🌿🌿🌿
No medical treatment, no amount of care, and no love from family can always prevent the brutal reality of some illnesses. - Mimi

13/09/2025

On Monday - Dying Matters Monthly Cafe, a date for your diary. Everyone is welcome 🥰

29/08/2025

As End of Life Doula, I have been a long time companion of the Elderly. I want to share one of the grief’s we don’t often think about, and rarely speak of. It’s an unseen grief and arrives slowly, without ceremony— and just settles into the corners of your days like dust.
It’s THE GRIEF OF GROWING OLD.🌅

You begin to notice the absences. Friends who once filled your life with laughter and shared history are now names etched in memories that flicker at the edges.

The phone rings less. The calendar shows more empty days than full ones. You start to count your connections not by who'll call next, but by who no longer can, or will.

Your body, once reliable, begins to resist. Tasks that were second nature— lifting groceries, climbing stairs, remembering names— become harder. So you adapt, simplify and make do. But there’s a quiet ache in watching your own abilities slip away, one unnoticed moment at a time.

And the hardest part is that it’s so difficult to talk about. People don’t always know how to respond. You don’t want to sound bitter. So you smile. You say you’re fine. But inside, there’s a loneliness that’s hard to name.

I remember doula companioning an older gentleman recently. He had once been a builder— strong, capable, always moving. But in those last years, he sat mostly quietly with his hands folded, eyes distant.

One afternoon, he said quietly: "I used to be someone people needed."

That sentence stayed with me. It wasn’t about ego. It was about purpose and belonging and being woven into the fabric of others’ lives.

This grief is real. It deserves to be named and held and honoured.
If you’re feeling this way, know that you’re not alone.
Reach out—to a doula, your children, a neighbour, a community group, a counsellor. Connection doesn’t have to vanish with age. It just takes more intention.

And if you’re younger, take a moment to check in with someone older. Ask them how they’re really doing. Listen to their story, maybe share a meal. These small gestures can mean more than you know.

Growing older isn’t a failure, just a transition. And like all transitions, it deserves space, compassion, and conversation.
Even in the quiet, you are seen.🍃🌸

19/07/2025

Just to keep winter interesting, Dying Matters Cafe this month will be held at the Alstonville library!

Everyone is welcome, always. If you want to share or just be here, come. We love our community.