Planning ahead does not speed up the present. Quite the opposite, really: it ensures you and your loved ones are aware of your wishes, and that you are aware of theirs.
It can be hard to know where to begin, and so Gentle Dusk offers free resources you can download and get started with at home now. Below, you will also find information about organisations and services we trust, which may further support your needs.
We are also here to support you through our workshops, events and one-to-one services. Contact us today.
Future Planning
Sometimes called advance care planning, this is the process of documenting both your future health care wishes and ensuring you have put your financial affairs in order.
Some decisions might feel very big; for instance do you want to be resuscitated if you lose capacity? Other decisions might feel very small, like the favourite foods or music you want around you. All of them matter.
Gentle Dusk Advance Care Plan
The Gentle Dusk Advance Care Plan can help you prepare for the future. It gives you an opportunity to think about, talk about and write down your wishes and preferences for care in the future and at the end of your life.
Along with documenting important information about you, which you are encouraged to keep with you and share with anyone involved in your care for example, your GP and other health and social care staff as well as your family and/or those close to you.
It’s even more difficult if you’re faced with somebody that you love with a diagnosis. Then you have to start this conversation, you don’t have the language because you’ve never talked about it, you don’t have the familiarity, you don’t know how to open, the question.
Mireille Hayden
Founder and Director of Gentle Dusk
Lasting Powers of Attorney (LPA)
LPAs are legal documents that allow you to choose one or more people to help make decisions in your best interest, should you be unable to do so physically and/or lose mental capacity.
There are two types of LPA: one for your property and financial affairs and one for your health and welfare. Without an LPA in place, your carer – even if they are a spouse or close family member – may not have permission to make decisions in your best interests.
Gentle Dusk LPA Key Information
For more information from the UK government on how to make, register or end a lasting power of attorney, click here.
Will Planner
More than half of UK adults do not have a Will, a legal document which allows you to be the decision maker of what happens to your possessions and money. It also makes the process of sorting out your affairs a lot easier for those you have left behind.
You can write your own Will yourself or you can seek professional advice.
It’s even more difficult if you’re faced with somebody that you love with a diagnosis. Then you have to start this conversation, you don’t have the language because you’ve never talked about it, you don’t have the familiarity, you don’t know how to open, the question.
Mireille Hayden
Founder and Director of Gentle Dusk
Record your Funeral Wishes
Do you want to be buried or cremated? Do you want a funeral service? A religious or non-religious ceremony? A social gathering afterwards? If so, what form would you like it to take?
These are just some of the questions you might find you have answers to, or wish to record so that loved ones know what is important to you.
Organ Donation
Organ donation in England is an ‘opt out’ system. This means that all adults in England are considered to have agreed to be an organ donor when they die unless they have recorded their wish not to be on the NHS Organ Donor Register or are in one of the excluded groups.
Learn more about organ donation from the NHS here.
Learn more about donating your body after death in the UK here.
Bereavement Support
Gentle Dusk also offers training in bereavement, to find out more go to our Training page: Training – Gentle Dusk
Mireille Hayden, Founder and Director of Gentle Dusk interviewed best-selling author and psychotherapist Julia Samuel about how we can heal after loss. Julia’s shares knowledge and wisdom into the many strands of grief.
Best-selling author Julia Samuel MBE on coping with grief – YouTube
Facing loss can be a very painful experience. Whether you are supporting someone who is bereaved or have lost someone yourself, there is help available out there.
Reaching out for support is very important for you and those around you, for both physical and mental health, and wellbeing on this emotional journey. Understanding bereavement contributes to the healing process
We recommend contacting:
Gentle Dusk is facilitating a Bereavement Support Service called Walking with Grief. The sessions will include time to walk in the beautiful grounds of Bristol Memorial Woodlands at Alveston, near Thornbury. It will be chance to walk in silence, talk with others, with moments to pause and reflect, and the opportunity to share and honour with others the memories of the loved one who has died.
The next group of walks will commence in Spring 2023 – to find out more please contact https://www.memorialwoodlands.com/events-and-training
