Her perspective draws on history as well as personal experience. Death used to be communal, with home funerals, wakes in living rooms, neighbors showing up with food and support. That cultural container has thinned, and she works to restore it. “The more people who can be present, the better,” she says. Death should not be secretive. It should be witnessed. She views dying as transition, not privacy.
By George Cassidy Payne
Death is the one certainty we all share, yet in many cultures it remains wrapped in silence and superstition.
For Jessica Catlin, death is not a stage to be managed but an event, unpredictable, intimate, and absolute. “You’re alive, and then you’re not,” she says. “Sometimes it’s sudden. Sometimes it’s long. But it is an event.”
That understanding anchors her work as a non-medical guide who walks alongside individuals and families navigating terminal illness. She steps in with hospice as a support person, not to replace medical teams but to complement them. She meets people where they are, at crisis level, quickly approaching the end, or earlier when mortality has simply come into focus.
Through education, advanced care planning, and conversation, she works to reduce fear and protect autonomy so that people can show up to their own dying with intention.
Her philosophy is shaped by her own experiences. “People were telling me that there wasn’t a lot of me on my website, so I changed that,” she says. “I would not be here if it weren’t for my own experience with death.” She recalls her grandmother, who died at 54 from brain cancer. “She was open to talking about death, even her own. We would go to gravesites, have picnics, tell stories, and look at pictures of relatives to make it feel natural. She died at home, surrounded by family. I was maybe nine. I saw a lot of good things and a lot of bad things.”
That early experience left a lasting imprint, shaping both her curiosity and her vocation.
It eventually led her to volunteer in hospice, where she quickly noticed gaps in care, particularly around death literacy.
“No one had formal education about death,” she says. “Parents would ask, ‘Where do I start?’ You have to be intentional with your language. Don’t say ‘they got sick,’ or ‘going away,’ or ‘passing away.’ Don’t use terms that evoke fear. Painting in generalities just confuses children. Including kids in funerals is important. You don’t want their first experience with death to be in their 20’s, shocking and overwhelming. If they witness and participate in age-appropriate ways earlier, it becomes part of life rather than a trauma.”
With veterans, her work often begins in urgency. Trauma lives in the body. Identity can remain fused to service long after discharge. “They’re soldiering up,” she says, even at the end. She recalls a soldier who, in his final days, seemed to awaken as an individual separate from the uniform.
There can be a profound disconnect between the soldier who is dying and the human being who longs for closeness. She facilitates small ceremonies with fellow veterans, rituals that honor service while gently signaling that the watch has ended. When the armor softens, conversation flows: regrets, gratitude, apologies, acknowledgment. “We appreciate your sacrifice,” she tells them. “I’m sorry for what you carried alone.” Validation reshapes the deathbed, allowing a more family-centered and relational ending.
Her work also begins long before crisis.
Many people seek her guidance when mortality is simply on the radar, wanting to prepare wills, healthcare proxies, medical directives, dementia care directives, or psychological directives for mental health crises. People undergo surgeries without these conversations, families assume someone else has handled them, and fear accumulates in silence. “The work isn’t done by just tapping someone in,” she emphasizes. Preparing in advance offers clarity, agency, and peace of mind while reducing the burden on loved ones.
She sees American culture’s avoidance of death as deeply rooted. “We have a strong aversion to talking about it,” she says. “Superstition tells us that if you say it, it will come. We are an aging phobic culture, and so we are a death-phobic culture.” Yet when death exists loosely on the radar, life sharpens. Time becomes precious. Fears diminish.
Confronting mortality intentionally allows people to live more fully, to resolve relationships, and to leave guidance that benefits both themselves and their families.
She reflects on the power of literary insight in shaping this awareness. She recalls When Breath Becomes Air, written by neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi, confronting terminal illness. “It opened a whole new box for me,” she says. “How does a doctor’s relationship to death impact their work? He could only bring humanity to his patients after experiencing it himself. That was sobering.”
For Catlin, the lesson is mirrored in her own work: witnessing death, preparing families, and holding space for the unknown cannot be fully understood without confronting mortality directly.
Like the author Paul Kalanithi, she believes that engaging with death thoughtfully transforms both the way we live and the way we care for others.
She is increasingly exploring topics that are medically and ethically complex. “The quality of life? 30 rounds of chemo? You have a few months to live. Often, people aren’t even asked. There are so many spaces that need to be filled. I’m pivoting into these areas, including medical aid in dying now legal in New York State. These are touchy subjects, but I’m excited to explore them with people, demystifying it without taking out the mystery. I love being in that place.”
Her perspective draws on history as well as personal experience. Death used to be communal, with home funerals, wakes in living rooms, neighbors showing up with food and support. That cultural container has thinned, and she works to restore it. “The more people who can be present, the better,” she says. Death should not be secretive. It should be witnessed. She views dying as transition, not privacy.
Some of her most transformative work comes through rituals that many have never encountered, practices like Swedish Death Cleaning and living wakes.
“Living wakes, I love,” she says. “People in their seventies, eighties, and nineties, or with terminal illness, can gather, bring pictures and songs, and celebrate the person while they are still alive. Hearing the love, the gratitude, the stories, it’s incredibly fulfilling. It also benefits future grieving. They know they’ve said the things that matter. It can be a long weekend, on a lake, wherever you want.”
Swedish Death Cleaning, meanwhile, sparks curiosity in a more practical way. “It’s ingrained in the Swedish culture as intentional living,” she explains. “People reduce clutter, deciding what possessions have meaning and value. Less clutter lets more life in. Folks can gift their art collections, archive treasured items, and pass things along intentionally. The greatest gift you can give is to not let your space become a burden for the people you love.”
That transition can be remarkable. As people approach their final moments, they sometimes begin to see loved ones who have already passed, spouses, siblings, or children. The dying often take comfort in these visions, while families, alarmed, may misinterpret them as hallucinations.
“If I were outside of them,” she reflects, “I might be right there with them.” She notices an energetic shift in the room, something palpable, heavy yet powerful, which lifts once the person dies. She cannot fully explain it; she simply senses it.
Her curiosity underpins this work. It is the same curiosity that drives her to take adult ballet classes despite discomfort, to approach new experiences without judgment.
“I bring that curiosity into the death space,” she says. “I do not know about the afterlife. I do not know. I am very open to it.” That openness allows her to be present without assumptions, to honor whatever emerges at the threshold of life.
Equally central to her work is self-care. “I’ve had to radically re-examine my own self-care to pre-burnout,” she explains. “These are the areas I want to show up for people, I have to show up for others. I’ve had to examine how I decompress and recharge, integrating these into my days and weeks, not bumping myself down the list. Most assuredly, I will. Meditation, reading, gardening, things that fill me back up. For caregivers, I would say the same. It is the most invisible, hardest job out there, but also the most rewarding if you can take care of yourself, which often means asking for help. For me, that can be as simple as bringing my son somewhere he likes to play and spending a couple of hours sitting alone at a coffee shop.”
At its core, her work is both philosophical and practical.
Death is an event, a mirror, and a teacher. It clarifies what matters, exposes unfinished business, and calls for honesty and witness. By encouraging preparation, restoring communal presence, guiding language and inclusion, offering space for ritual and legacy, sustaining caregiver wellness, and holding space for the unknown, Jessica Catlin transforms death from a feared endpoint into an occasion for connection and life fully embraced.
Photo: Pixabay
Editor: Dana Gornall
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George’s essays have appeared in publications such as The Good Men Project, The Buffalo News, The Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, and many more. A poet at heart, his work often blends memoir, philosophy, and theological reflection, rooted in the belief that language can be both a balm and a spark.
Whether reflecting on the writings of Marcus Aurelius, the parables of Jesus, or the mindfulness of a Jain monk sweeping the ground before them, George writes to make space for wonder, doubt, and dialogue.
He joins The Tattooed Buddha as a regular columnist to explore themes of death, inner peace, activism, grief, and contemplative life in a world on fire—and to ask, again and again: How can we live as if everything we do matters?
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