Christine Davies | From Sitting With My Sorrow in My Childhood Illness and Multiple Miscarriages To Finding My Calling

In today's episode, Rev. Christine Davies, a hospital chaplaincy leader, shares the path that led her into spiritual care and offers invaluable insights on navigating grief. A deep church involvement from childhood shaped her life path, a calling toward medicine influenced by her nurse mother, and personal health crises that highlighted the importance of compassionate bedside manners.

Christine emphasizes chaplains' unique role in healthcare—focusing on emotional and spiritual support rather than just logistical aspects like social workers. She underscores the necessity of open conversations about end-of-life issues, informed by her own experiences with pregnancy loss and grief. These discussions are crucial for making advanced care plans that respect patients' wishes.

Key takeaways from Christine’s insights include:

1. Personalized Spiritual Support:
   • Individualized guidance is essential during times of grief.
   • Chaplains fill critical gaps in patient care through collaboration with medical teams.
2. Navigating Grief:
   • Intrapsychic loss involves not only mourning what was lost but also shattered plans.
   • Acknowledging each person's unique experience is vital for healing.
3. End-of-Life Conversations:
   • Open dialogue about death prepares families emotionally.
   • Advanced care planning ensures patients' wishes are respected.
4. Holistic Healing Practices:
   • Integrative modalities like Reiki can complement traditional counseling to address energetic aspects of grief.
5. Caregiver Self-Care:
   • Setting boundaries and seeking personal wellness resources is crucial for caregivers’ well-being.
6. Advocacy for Holistic Healthcare:
   • There’s a need to integrate holistic practices within the healthcare system despite systemic challenges.

Christine's work highlights how embracing emotional expression and physical activities can aid in grieving processes while advocating for more comprehensive patient-centered care approaches within healthcare settings.

Her story inspires us to live meaningfully, engage openly in conversations about mortality, seek supportive communities during grief journeys, and advocate relentlessly for holistic patient care that honors every aspect of the human experience—emotional, spiritual, and physical.

RESOURCES:

• SDI.org
• Do Grief Differently
• Enneagram
• Reiki
• Biofield Tuning
• Book,

Transcript

Victoria Volk: Hello. Hello. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of grieving voices. Today, my guest is Reverend Christine Vaughan Davies. She runs the hospital chappellancy department at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. She is an ordained presbyterian minister, seminary professor and trained spiritual director. Christine shares stories from her chaplency work to normalize grief and help people live more fully in the moment while educating about grief, loss, and advanced care planning. She lives to their family on a small farm in New Jersey, spending her time chasing chickens and show furring her children to their activities. Thank you so much for your time and being my guest today, and And for the work that you're doing because it's not easy working in end of life and in the grief space too. And so I have questions around, well, let's start there. And we kinda spoke briefly before we started recording, but for a lot of helpers, often it's their own experience that bring them into the professions of helping others. And so what has been your experience that led to you becoming ordained? And doing this work in grief and loss in advanced care planning.

Christine Davies: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me and for creating this space for us to make this a part of everyday conversation. I began as a my journey to become a hospital chaplain and maybe I should have backtracked because not everyone knows what that is, but I work in a hospital and essentially I'm an extra layer of emotional and spiritual support for patients families, as well as the staff that work within the hospital. But how I got into this was I grew up in the church, my family, and I went to the local Presbyterian Church. I really took to it. I was very much in it. And did youth group and bell choir and all of that and was a pretty precocious kid and was convinced from a young age of god's presence in my life as well as the fact that god wanted me to help the most people possible. Sometimes in religious circles we talk about calling, and that was my sense of calling her vocation. And I thought the best way to do that would be through medicine. My mother was a nurse, so I think she maybe egged that dream on a little bit. And I had actually volunteered and worked for a number of years as an emergency medical technician, so riding in the backs of ambulances with people when they were going through major medical crises. And it was in that work where I recognized as as much as I could do minor repair of wounds and administering oxygen and ensuring safe transport to the hospital, what really spoke to me was being able to hold people's hands while they were scared. You know, and trying to provide just a little bit of comfort to them when they didn't know what was going on and they were oftentimes questioning. Right? Why is this happening to me? And so it was through that and then my own experiences of being a patient. I was in and out of hospitals for quite some time, including one that I used to work in later on, trying to figure out what was going on with me medically. And eventually, I was diagnosed with generalized epilepsy. Which I'm fortunate is under control now, but I was having a lot of seizures and also had a lot of frustration at the bedside manner of some of the healthcare providers who were caring for me. And no one seemed to get how this was impacting me from a holistic perspective. And I was around the same time that the church, my family, was attending, had a new associate pastor, who just took me out in between my hospitalizations, took me out for dinner, and talked to me about what it was like and cared for me in that way. And I found more renewal through that conversation than I did in any of the medications.

Victoria Volk: Now don't get me wrong.

Christine Davies: I still take all my medications. I'm a big fan of medication, but It was recognizing that there's multiple ways to go about healing, and that was really the first time I encountered past oral care or spiritual care, which is what I now provide to patients and also teach Clarity how to provide.

Victoria Volk: A lot of people might think that, well, are you a licensed social worker? Because often that is kind of left to the social worker in a hospital setting. And so, like, what is your scope of practice in that way versus a social worker?

Christine Davies: So I'm unique in that I was also a licensed social worker who took me a little while to figure out my exact journey. And I also went to social work school and got my MSW. But where I, you know, as a chaplain, chaplains are really looking at you know, more of the spiritual bent. So for instance, when I worked as a cognitive behavioral therapist before this, we would talk about all sorts of things as now as a chaplain and spiritual director. I'm really focused on that, particularly In the hospital, oftentimes, we'll fill kind of a larger role just because the social workers are having to do a lot more of the logistical work. So things like you know, discharge planning, dealing with insurances, things of that nature. It's funny I was walking behind a surgeon a couple weeks ago and he was with a resident and he was passing the chapel and I was a few steps behind them. So he didn't see me and he says, oh, yeah, the chaplains are great here. They're like the closest thing we have to a therapist. So make sure you call them for all your patients. And so there is an element of that where we are trying to fill the gap for patients in that way, but we also work very closely with social workers. We work closely with the medical team to really provide that interdisciplinary care.

Victoria Volk: What were the lessons that you received growing up about end of life and death and dying and the beliefs that you had and how have those changed or shifted as you found your path in this work.

Christine Davies: Yeah. So I didn't grow up hearing a lot about end of life. Or death and dying apart from, you know, when we had relatives that I wasn't particularly close to die. And I think that's part of what got me into this because why aren't we talking about this more? This should be something that we're really looking at even from a young age. Like my kids know much more about death than I ever did at that age growing up. And even though I was in the church, It was something where there was a funeral, it was sad, but then the expectation was, okay, we keep moving. Whereas when I was going through some of my own experiences, particularly around pregnancy loss, I recognized no one is talking about this in the way that I think that they could. And when I've been working with bereavement groups, a lot of what I'm hearing from that bereaved individuals is society wants me to move on and there's no moving on or I'm not ready, you know, I I can't just I like to say we move through it, we don't move on from it. So I think trying to dispel some of the myths that are out there about grief has been important to me. And then I do a lot of advanced care planning in my job as a job on at the hospital. So helping people to think about their death, to name a healthcare Oxy for someone in case you can't provide what you'd want medically for your treatment. If you can't give voice to it, how do you tell someone else what it is that you'd want in advance of that? But people don't like to have those conversations be and I've been accused by many people, including my own family of being morbid for this reason because we just, you know, push death to the wayside and we don't like to think about it.

Victoria Volk: What were some of the things that you experienced as a patient and as a child during that time that you could give some parents insight into in how to support their child who might be in the medical system and have that be having that experience that you had? Like, what would be some advice that you would give?

Christine Davies: Yeah. So one of the things that I see and I just talked about this in the hospital where I had been a patient for a number of years was recognizing the individual, not just coming in and saying, you know, especially in a teaching hospital where there's lots of doctors coming in at any one time and saying, oh, in this bed, we have and reading off the medical record number, or the diagnosis rather than saying, oh, this is Christine. You know, Christine, what's going on for you today? And just ignoring me completely or talking to and I was a I was a teenager when I was going through a lot of that you know, so I was sometimes there by myself. My parents couldn't be there all the time, and not engaging me at all. And I think we're shifting away from that in healthcare majorly to patient centered care and family centered care. Where we are giving voice to the patient's experience, to the family's experience. One of the things I tell a lot of patients that I work with and people that I work with in my spiritual direction practice is that you know your body better than anyone. Because part of my experience was, you know, nobody was seeing my seizures. I was just coming out of it postdictal, which is kind of the period after a seizure where you're not really making sense and I'd be on the floor and I didn't know why. But nobody had seen them. And so it took a while to figure out what was going on. But I knew this isn't right. Thankfully, my mother also realized that wasn't right, but I had a lot of people say, no, no, no, you need a therapist. It's in your head. You know, it's a lot of dismissing what was going on for me, which I think is especially true of women as well as people of color, that their pain or their symptoms aren't taken seriously by our healthcare field. And I work in healthcare and still I see this. And sort of really encouraging people to, you know, know themselves, know their body, and advocate for what they're needing.

Victoria Volk: You had mentioned seven ectopic pregnancies?

Christine Davies: Oh, I had one ectopic pregnancy and then overall I've had about seven miscarriages.

Victoria Volk: How has that shifted your perspective of grief and how have you navigated that?

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Yeah. It was really difficult for me in in each one of them in different ways. I had some before I had my children and then in between pregnancies. I think it shifted by first what I would call intrapsychic loss, which is what I talk a lot about, which is not just the loss of the baby or the pregnancy, but it's also this idea that this is not how I was planning for my life to go or even for some people, they encounter that when there's been a major trauma in their life And it's almost like the piercing of the veil of I didn't even know that this could happen to me. Now, I did have a a semblance of this could happen to me having worked in healthcare. But really, a lot of it had to be an internal experience. And that's something that I hold up to other people to recognize, like, you know, plenty of women go through this, you know, to so many, and it's not talked about nearly enough. It's talked about more now that when I was going through and I didn't even know what ectopic pregnancy was and this was before Google was as, you know, prolific as it is now. But really trying to normalize it for individuals and talk about it so that women as well as, you know, their partners don't have to grieve in isolation around it. A lot of what I do now in the hospital is provide comfort to parents who are going through the same thing, who the technical term is a fetal demise, but someone who has given birth to a baby who may not have taken a breath in this world or may have taken a breath that was their first breath and their last breath in the same day. And it is completely devastating, of course, for the family, but having gone through similar scenarios myself I try to actually do them when the calls come into my office. We do have a staff of people, so others often do them, but if I'm able to just because I know what it is to go through that. And sometimes, people who have not grieved in certain ways can meanwhile, but not realize the impact of their words or their presence. So for instance, when I was going through that period, I had very well meeting friends say things to me like, well, at least you know you can get pregnant or everything. Christine, you should know you're a minister. Everything happens for a reason. Mhmm. And I get us on a soapbox about some of these religious platitudes. That we kind of throw out there, but we don't always understand the spiritual harm that they can do. And so, you know, part of my mission and how I have found purpose through my pain is helping others to to not have to endure that. And it can spin people into a whole spiritual cycle of distress. I mean, grief alone can do that, but then when you have other people trying to care from you. But not not being as supportive as they can. So that's a little bit of how my story has impacted me. It certainly made the work harder. In a lot of ways, I think about times I was with patients before, I had my losses and times after. Much harder now, but I think I'm more effective as a result of it.

Victoria Volk: Yeah, to share, piggyback what you had said, I feel like those platitudes can be spiritually stunning for us. Mhmm. And then it's like, well, God need another angel, you know, that kind of remark and it's like, no. They should be here with me. And, well, I guess I need to blame God then because you know, I that's I had a lot of trauma and grief in my childhood and I blame God for a very long time. 

Christine Davies: Yeah. If you're following that, you know, logic of and I like to call it toxic spirituality. Right? Always putting a positive spin on things. If you're following that logic to that end point that God did this to you in some sort of cosmic test or whatever, of course, I'm gonna think that God is a real jerk.
And that's gonna impact my relationship with God. One of the things I see a lot of in the hospital is anger at God. Oftentimes, with good reason, if this is the logic or the theology that people are following, and then a lot of our religious institutions don't allow a space for that anger. A lot of patients that say to me, like, I'm really angry at God for, you know, doing this, but they are worried that even voicing it aloud is blasphemy. And so they're like, I can't talk to my clergy about it, which I think is why we sometimes get it as this anonymous spiritual person within the hospital.

Victoria Volk: Alright? Because you have no skin in their game.

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: What is the advice then that you give to people if they find themselves in that situation? And how have you how did you personally navigate those relationships with those people? That would say those types of things.

Christine Davies: Yeah. I think I was fortunate and I had other people that weren't saying those things to me. And so I just knew, okay, I have to lean on them a little bit more. And then I had people who actually, after the fact, it when they endured their own loss later on, came back to me and said, I realized that I set this in the moments. Mhmm. And it wouldn't be helpful now. And so that's why I like to tell people about it. So they don't have to go through the experience of it to know the implications of it. But what I do encourage people to do is to really lean into their emotions, whatever they happen to be, Whether that's anger, sometimes it's relief. I see a lot of families that have relief when a loved one dies and or pregnancies lost or other things and people feel guilty about that. So I think it needs to be all all sad all the time. But lifting that up is a valid emotional experience. And I would say find people who will be supportive of you, whether that are those are grief groups, whether that is working with a therapist or a spiritual director or if you have friends or family that have been through it in similar ways. Sometimes it's a little too hard if people have been through it for them to be able to be with you, but there's a fantastic quote that I use a lot to inform my work, which is the cry of the soul can only be heard by one whose soul has already cried.

Victoria Volk: That's good.

Christine Davies: And I think that speaks a lot to you know, how we can be tender with others when we know that tender place of grief for ourselves.

Victoria Volk: That speaks to what I say in my podcast quite often is that someone can someone can only sit with you in the depths of your grief to the depths that they've, like, allowed themselves to feel their own. That's Mhmm. Way more eloquently beautiful.

Christine Davies: I don't know who said it, actually. Maybe your listeners can find it out. I have tried to, you know, big I heard it somewhere. I've tried, but I'm I'm not the most technologically savvy person, but I've not been able to figure it out. But yeah, and that's a lot of how our educational system in chapel and see actually works is people come in having, you know, gone to seminary and, you know, know all of these weighty theological understandings. But a lot of what we have to do in our training is around the emotional pieces, particularly as it relates to that counter transparency. Empathy. Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: Absolutely. Come naturally to everything.

Christine Davies: Now it's hard one.

Victoria Volk: Yeah. What has your grief taught you?

Christine Davies: Yeah. So there's this concept in Christianity, although other spirituality sometimes draw from it as well, called the dark night of the soul, And it is this concept in kind of mysticism where there is great darkness is really referring to. It's not so much the night, but the obscurity. The not knowing why things are happening. If people believe in God, they may feel abandoned by God or that they can't feel God's presence. And it's really when everything we thought we knew kind of changes. And feels like the rug has been pulled out of us from a spiritual perspective. And the amazing thing about these dark nights of the soul is that often they result in transformation, in a new dawn of a new understanding of ourselves, of our sense of spirituality, or how we connect with universe, or others. And most people said, you know, it was terrible to go through. I don't want to go through that ever again. And yet, I have a changed meaning perspective as a result. Now that takes a lot of time. Right? You know, just wake up one morning and it's like, oh, everything's hunky dory now. But I do believe that a lot of my own grief and loss, a lot of the grief and loss that I've sat with for other people, it also helps me to not take things for granted, knowing that this life is not, you know, tomorrow is not promised. There's lots of, you know, meditations around, you know, engaging our liminality. As a spiritual practice. And, you know, using that as a framework for how do I live into my life, you know, knowing we're here for just, you know, a speck of time when looking at the entirety. Of the world. So again, some people that wouldn't be as a positive spin on it, but to me, it really does motivate me in how to live my daily life.

Victoria Volk: And that brings up a question of how you live your daily life. Now, But as you were going through it, you're having to not only manage your own emotions, but also the emotions of your existing children as you were experiencing child loss yourself, the motions of your spouse? Yes?

Christine Davies: Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: Can you speak to that a little bit? Like her Mhmm. How how it is to hold your own grief, but then also have a family that's gonna be there, you

Christine Davies: know, too. Well, and to be clear, when a lot of my losses were before I had my first child, and then the other losses came before my first child was even aware, like, he was maybe two or three. So he didn't really know anything that was going on. But I will speak to it from the perspective of, you know, and I and many people I talked to that go through pregnancy loss have this experience where it is such a painful experience physically And so in addition to emotionally and spiritually, but so I remember, like, you know, lying on the couch and not being able to to do much. You know, with my two year old who wanted to jump all over me because I was in such pain. And, you know, so that's certainly a piece where I was trying to balance all of it. And then I think with my spouse, I would probably handle it differently today than I did then. You know, for me, I don't think I saw the impact that it was having on him and his own helplessness. And so that's, you know, that informs my work today because I am always checking, you know, with the partners, whether it's husband, whether it's a wife, whether it's the the grandparents that are there, Now, sometimes I'll take them outside of the room and say, you know, how are you doing? Knowing that, you know, a lot of the focus is going to be on the mother with good reason.
But that there's grief that's not really talked about there for others. Howard Bauchner: What

Victoria Volk: do you recommend to people who So let's say, I'm, you know, in the hospital and I have this experience and a terrible experience and I you come to me and I'm a very appreciative of you and your time and your gifts that you're sharing, and then but then I have to go home. Uh-huh. So how how does that how do you what do you have to say to people who First of all, may not even have the experience that you provide Mhmm. In their local hospital

Christine Davies: Right.

Victoria Volk: But then also moving forward resources tools or what do you recommend or how can people begin healing on their own. Mhmm. And can they on their own?

Christine Davies: Mhmm. I think that's one of the things that makes grief so difficult for us to have these huge conversations around because everyone's experience is gonna be different. Right? So my first miscarriage, so much different than my last. At that, you know, on my seventh, I was like, okay, this is old hat. Like, I know I know what we're doing here. But for some people, all seven are going to be difficult. Or for some people, you know, that might be, you know, I was with a woman the other day, and I said, oh, you have a cancer diagnosis, you know. How are you coping with that? Is it a new cancer diagnosis? She goes, oh, honey. She's like, I lost I lost my son. I lost my husband. This is nothing. Right? So so much of how we are approaching grief and loss in our life stems from all that we have experienced up until that point. You know, you mentioned childhood trauma and abuse earlier. In some ways, I think that has a huge impact onto how we grieve and to the resilience that we're bringing into this work. So all that to say it is gonna look a little different for everyone in terms of recommendations that I would give. And a lot of times when I'm dealing with people in the hospital, they are more in kind of crisis mode even if they're saying goodbye to someone in the ICU, and they know that their loved one was going to die, you know, for a period of weeks. It's still right when it happens. So many of my families are saying, like, it just feels like a bad dream. You know? And certainly, people that are dying due to a car accident or very sudden, violent death is people can't even, you know, I have to walk them to the door. Like, they don't even know where they are because it is so overwhelming in that time.
So The first piece of advice I would give is give yourself space to know that this is going to be difficult. Right? I was talking with someone who said, yeah, I really shouldn't have gone back to work three days after this happened. Because they just felt like that was the message that they were getting was if they had to move on. I would recommend community in some form or fashion. You know, I mentioned I used to run bereavement groups. One of the benefits of COVID is now there's so many of these groups meeting online. Many that didn't go back to in person. I mean, I like in person groups as well, but I think that helps people who, you know, may not have a local group or maybe too hard, you know, to get out to a group in person. And even, you know, people speak ill of social media on lots of different levels, but it there has been such community building around that. I know there's there's Facebook groups for everything under the sun and that helps people to have a sense of community and really normalizing. What they're going through in a powerful way. And for people that are wanting to explore more of the spiritual themes of what's going on for them, you know, if they have a faith background or religion that they have a community that they can be a part of. Certainly, that would be a place where I would encourage them to reach out or even if they're thinking about joining one. Most people don't. I see a lot of people that are more, you know, spiritual, not religious. And that's where I would say engaging someone who can walk that path with you might be helpful like a spiritual director. So that's a training that I wound up doing because I missed people stories when they left the hospital. I was there for that crisis, but I wanted to walk with people longer. And so, spiritual directors international or s d I dot org has a whole directory of spiritual directors that you can Some are online only, some are in person. You can filter by any religious denomination or meet with people that are of had not a religious affiliation whatsoever. And that is usually a helpful resource for people because it's so individualized. As much as I love faith communities and congregations. Sometimes it can be hard to really sit with what is going on for your own particular spiritual self in this moment, especially in the mid of grief or like I talked about before that dark night of the soul. So this can really give you that individualized focus.

Victoria Volk: What does your healing look like? You know, when we say you have to do the work? Mhmm. And the for me, the word was the grief recovery method, which I walk people through in my program do grief differently, which is a twelve week one to one program, and then I also do groups as well. Mhmm. What did it look like for you?

Christine Davies: Oh, what it's still going on? It's always We're always in it. Right.

Speaker 2: And sometimes, you know, I sent to my therapist not so long.

Christine Davies: I was like, I thought I was over this by now. Like, how many years has this been? And I'm like, no. No. No. Like, Our stuff is always our stuff, and it's always gonna move with us and and shape us. A couple of things that stood out for me. I mean, one was getting to lament to god and and engage in that anger. You know, I remember it was during that time I discovered the there's a lot of cursing songs in the bible, so those were very helpful to me at that particular juncture. I I engaged some therapists, some that were fantastic, some that were not so good. Same thing with support groups. And so that's the other piece of advice I give to people, like, you know, reach out to others, and if it's not a fit, it's not a fit, just keep reaching out, which can be hard to do when you're in the throes of grief. But, yes, talking to people who understood it. For me, some of it was also writing about it, and so I do write a lot. I have a newsletter on my website and I've written about in detail about some of my pregnancy loss as well as more general stories from the hospital. So for me that was helpful to really articulate it for myself and the blessings of it. It took me a while. I couldn't write it about it for a while at first, but I went back to it later. And then the other piece of advice that I get people that helped me as well and I'm continuing to see how this unfolds my own life is that there's a physicality to grief and loss. It does reside. In our body. And, you know, I I love all the research that's out there now about trauma in the body and just how true I'm finding that. And so for me, it's about how do I engage with that for myself. So whether it's you know, through massage or I I know you're a rate key practitioner. That's something I picked up a little while ago and loved or, you know, using yoga or just being in my body and healing from that perspective. It can't just all be, you know, this talk therapy. That has been true in my own life, and I suspect it may be the case for others as well.

Victoria Volk: I'm a certified bio field tuning practitioner, which is using tuning forks. And field extends file.

Christine Davies: No. I've not done that yet. Oh.

Speaker 2: We'll talk after this.

Christine Davies: I

Victoria Volk: actually prefer that to rate you. Actually, I I incorporate elements of both in my Okay. In my practice with clients, but it, you know, our energy field extends five to six feet out and our energy field informs the body and our body informs our energy field. And so it really is what you're feeling in here is what you are putting out energetically. It really is a reflection of what you're feeling in here. And so it's like, when I see people, like, just in church, for example, I can always tell who is got a lot of maybe anxious energy, tense, stress because people will do this. Mhmm. Mhmm. Mhmm. Was just putting their arms up here shouldn't change their shoulder dropping, but it's still just just like this.

Christine Davies: I think that's all of us in some ways. Like, we're all whole Yeah. So much. And just not even breathing, you know, fully with our diaphragm. So it's just Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: You know, bringing attention to that. Right? And why am I why am I feeling in holding this here? And so that's what I help people work through and what's beautiful about biofuel tuning is that you don't have to talk about it. The work happens as I'm working through your energy field, but it's just been a beautiful thing to be able to add that into my grief work with clients and then also it's often how people come into grief work because they realize they have a lot of stuff they are holding on to and feeling

Christine Davies: like mhmm. Oh, I think that's a beautiful practice and such a gift to give people.

Victoria Volk: Is it becoming more common to do you find in the hospital that you're working in that they are starting to offer more of these other modalities while people maybe are in intensive care or, you know, because you have you can't just offer someone energy healing without their permission.

Christine Davies: So Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: Not that caveat, but

Christine Davies: I wish. Not that I've seen I wish it would impact some hospitals maybe, but I'm always writing alouds for. We need a whole integrated, you know, spirituality department that is, you know, bringing in other things And actually, I wind up getting my my rate key achievements because during COVID, we were using oh, we our oncology floors would use volunteers for to come in and do rate key. But then during COVID, the volunteers couldn't come in. And one day, I had a nurse on the phone calling our office. Do you know anyone that can do this? Like, one of my one of my patients is desperate for it. Oh, okay. No, I have to go, you know, get that, at least for an emergency basis. I don't do it ongoing for for patients, but now I think that is something that, you know, again, I work in healthcare.
It pays my bills, but I do think that we sometimes miss out on the opportunities for holistic healing. Again, there are some hospitals out there doing a great job of it. And some of the realities within our healthcare system in the United States anyway is the ways in which it becomes about what a billable practice is and not, and insurance. And even Chaplin's, we're not a billable practice. So there's some hospitals that don't have chaplains, even though one could argue that they are required to buy different commissions that accredit hospitals, but it's really up to interpretation. You know, sometimes people are just calling local ministers to come in and do something versus individuals who are trained and have a department for that. So I think we have a long way to go, but my hope is that we will go more in that direction.

Victoria Volk: What did your rate key attunement in your training open up for you in terms of understanding that But, yeah, there might be a little bit of a blurred line between spirituality and energetics of grief and and all of that because, you know, some people might, especially who are in certain, maybe religious affiliations might look at it, like, it's some sort of voodoo

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Witcher. So, yes. Yeah. And I don't talk a whole lot about it just because I know that that is the case. And and I am pretty if if your listeners have been told been able to tell thus far, I'm pretty progressive as far as the president ministers go, and that is something that has been such a helpful practice for for myself. And so I don't I don't widely offer it to others. But the way that I understand it from that perspective is, you know, this is about and sometimes I'll do some interpretation. But, like, for me, this is about the holy spirit. Or this is about me getting more in touch with, you know, godsend dwelling inside me is how I I like to envision it. And it's funny because a lot of what Ricky had helped me to do was to become a better meditator. You know, I try doing meditation for so long, and then Ricky as well as learning more about some of the Christian meditation practices that are out there. And so that helped me. I'm like, even if I get no physical benefits from it whatsoever, I knew I was getting that emotional and spiritual benefit just because I was caring for myself. I was, you know, slowing myself down and being more attuned to god's presence in my life. But I will say, yes, there are a lot of people out there. I get accused of, you know, witchcraft or pulling in things like the enneagram to my teaching and and I understand. Otheragram too. And other modalities. Because to me, I'm like, why are we not using these tools that are out here? And it's it's a better intention. What is our intention in using them? Is it to for me, it's to become more attuned. To god in my life and and how I'm caring for others. So I don't know that I answered your question. I got a little bit of a a a a sidetrack with it, but

Victoria Volk: no. It it did. Because that I'd asked how did what did it unlock for you?

Christine Davies: Mhmm. We

Victoria Volk: just helped you more of self acceptance of Absolutely. Mhmm. Yeah. Of my son, he was he's been pretty skeptical for he was for quite a while about what I do and with the tuning forks and just he didn't quite understand it. And I said, Jim, you know what, though? I have a prayer.

Christine Davies: I don't have I

Victoria Volk: do it's it's like a prayer Mhmm. For me. I don't know. Yeah. They have a different way they do it, but I said, I have a specific prayer, you know, because he his concern was, well, who knows what you're inviting in? Mhmm. Oh, I know what I'm inviting in because I'm bringing that intention and I'm calling it out. I'm calling it in, you know, with my intention and with my prayer. And so I had to make that clarification. And then he was like, oh, okay. That makes sense.

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Yeah. I use that prayer as well. And one of the one of my teachers for Ricky actually learned years ago from a Catholic nun in a church because that used to be I know I was shocked when she told me that because it used to be, I think a little bit more acceptance in in certain circles.

Victoria Volk: Yeah, I would say. And I think it is becoming more I think as we're moving towards more holistic, it's becoming more common and more understanding about it, really. You know, people more curiosity. You know Mhmm. People following their curiosity and just learning being open. That's what I would just encourage people to do is don't poo poo it or naysayer just because you have a lack of understanding about it or maybe question your understanding. Is this? Mhmm. Correct, you know, because we can have these beliefs that were passed down to us as children. That's maybe not true, you know.

Christine Davies: Right. And it's another area, and this is a lot of what I work with with my spiritual directives. There's all sorts of spiritual practices out there. You know, for some people, journaling is something that really helps to connect with, you know, God for them. For others, it may be meditating. Right? Maybe walking in nature. You know, everyone has different ways that they're approaching this. And, you know, sometimes I like to say, like, we almost need a smorgasbord. I mean, like, okay. What works for one person may not work for another one? Or for seasons in life as well. There may be a season where something, you know, that works for you for so long is no longer, you know, helping you in that way. And so being, as you said, being open to other practices or or trying things on and seeing if they can help you connect with yourself, with others into the divine.

Victoria Volk: One of the questions I ask is on my form and is what gives you hope for the future? And doing the work that you do and your personal experience, what does give you hope for the future? Oh, I would love to know what I said

Christine Davies: a while ago. But today, we did. No. No. No. No. You can tell me later. We'll see if it matches up. But what gives me hope today for the future is really, you know, and and and part of what keeps me in the work that I do is seeing people's resilience. In the face of deep suffering, you know, seeing people continue to move move through life. And sometimes with that changed meaning perspective that I talked about before, and just the depth of caring that people can then do for others. That's a lot of what gives me hope. It's close.

Speaker 2: Look, I can't remember what I had for practice up. Yeah. I don't know how you can answer a question

Christine Davies: a little while ago, but Mhmm. How

Victoria Volk: is your past experiences and and just in the in the work that you do? What you see? How is it maybe changed how you how is it influenced? How you parent? And maybe what you give more attention to in your parenting? And how you maybe talk about deaf and dying and you know, I'm I imagine that you're open and transparent. Like, you talk about death and dying in your house maybe regularly or maybe not. I don't know. Like, how has that informed? You're working informed, how your parents, and all of that?

Christine Davies: Yeah. I would say, even from, like, an emotional containment part, trying to emphasize, you know, what are you feeling and that feelings are are valid. And I think that's different than the way a lot of us grew up. You know, being told, oh, you know, I'm allowed to cry or, you know, just a a different generation. Like, my kids learn about feelings in the health class now. I'm like, oh, that's fantastic and minor in elementary school. And so even learning to say, and I have two ways, so even learning to say, you know, it's okay to be angry. It's not okay to slam the door or it's not okay to, you know, throw things all over the house when you're angry. But what are some practices we can do? When you're angry.
The other day I was teaching my eight year old how to do some angry yoga moves to to help him kind of settle back into himself when he was feeling out of sorts because he was mad, probably something that his brother did. So, trying to really help them to self soothe and to nurture that for themselves. And, yes, we do talk about death. I also live on a farm, so that helps because we had a lot of chickens that have been, you know, attacked by box and hawks and and things like that. And, you know, from an early age, my kids understood.
You know, this is just a part of life. This is part of the life cycle. I do remember when my older son first found out about death, I think probably due to one of our jigs dying early beyond. You know, I was explaining this happens for, you know, for everyone. And he says, you mean, you're gonna die one day. And I said, you know, yes. I am. I hope it's not gonna be for a while, but I am gonna die. And if it when I do, like, you're gonna have other people around. And then he's and then and he's like he seemed okay with that. And then he said, wait, do you mean, I'm gonna die one day? And I said, yes. And that's when, you know, he, you know, went into this, you know, really a new understanding and that where, like, the crying began, not when something was gonna happen to me, but recognizing his own mortality. Mhmm. And those are hard moments to endure, and I do this professionally. So I can understand my parents don't wanna talk about it ever. Then I think we're not preparing our kids enough to have this as part of a reality. You know, I've worked with people and clergy who have a lot of denial. About death even though that's their profession. And to me, that just makes the grieving even harder when it does come because not not just are you grieving that person, but you're grieving the fact that you never thought this would happen. Versus being open and talking about it more, I do think helps prepare us a little bit more for when it does happen.

Victoria Volk: We bring up a good point and that I can't even tell you. I couldn't even tell you what experience or pinpoint a time when my kids learned of their own mortality. I could not even tell you because I wasn't doing this work then, you know, but I wouldn't I wouldn't even know. I wouldn't even know when that is and that makes me sad because, you know, that's an opportunity that's a teachable moment, that is an opportunity. And so that's a very good point in how how it can really shift a perspective for a child when you are have that awareness of what they're saying and really and what they're feeling and then how to talk through it. But if that child is having that experience and they're not vocalizing it or asking And it's all an inner process. You have no idea. Like Mhmm. And they come up with their own beliefs about

Christine Davies: Right. They feel like that. Wow. Absolutely. Yeah. And and and look, especially for your listeners, it is so hard. We're all doing the best that we can. In in the present moment. And and as I said, it's hard for me and I do this work. Right? And so there's times where and my kids will say, like, mom, when I die, are you gonna cry?

Speaker 2: Or and what what are they gonna say

Christine Davies: in my funeral? Like, they will sometimes I

Speaker 2: really don't wanna be having this conversation, especially as we're driving to soccer practice,

Christine Davies: you know. And I've had a rough day. But to me, the importance is that we, you know, we are talking about it, and they and to them, they're asking things that are going to be deeply emotional for me to answer, but they don't have the same emotions attached to it. To them, it's just like a matter of fact and how they're thinking through things, which is, you know, developmentally appropriate. And so it is giving them space. The other recommendation that I usually give to people when they're asking, how do you talk to kids about this? Is is to answer their questions, see what questions they have because sometimes the questions that they have are not the things that we would think, you know, to answer. So for instance, a friend of mine had their mother died and their dot and their daughter asked, they said, well, you know, what's gonna happen to and she thought she was gonna say, like, the body or something like that. It was like this one tea cup that was in, you know, the grandmother's China cabinet that she wanted. Like, that was it was so specific, you know, and things that people don't even think that their kids are focused on, but that's what they're focused on. And so, yeah, to answer their questions. And then also, don't give them more information than they need sometimes. And you know your children best or your grandchildren or, you know, the children in your life wherever your listeners find themselves. And so some kids are going to be able to handle things that others aren't. I get asked a lot in the hospital, should I bring, you know, my child in to, you know, say goodbye to their loved one who's in the ICU. Again, it's gonna different for every kid based on developmentally what you think that they could handle. My kids tend to be a little bit immature in some ways, and so I might not do that for them in some ways, but others, you know, that may be completely appropriate And then to avoid using euphemisms, I think, is also really important because, you know, people tell me that they remember hearing when they're a kid that you go to sleep and you don't wake up. And then they're afraid to go to sleep because they think that's going to happen to them. And so really trying to say death, not lost, like we didn't, you know, we lost something like we lost a mitten. It's not the same thing. And so trying to be both clear, but also appropriate to their age level.

Victoria Volk: But also, I think it's important to not make an assumption that you know their understanding, their level of understanding.

Christine Davies: Right. Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: That could be very easy to Yep.

Christine Davies: Yeah. That's why it's good to ask them first. You know, what do you you know, do you think about this? And and they may surprise you with their answers and and how profoundly they can be? You

Victoria Volk: know, it's like when my dad died, I even heard people say, I I hear it. It's like clear as day, someone said, well, she's too little. She doesn't understand what's going on anyway, and it's like, I'm eight years old. If you can't hear her eight years old, you can't Uh-huh. Wouldn't have known if your dad died. Mhmm. You know what I mean? So, like, just the nigh don't be naive as an adult to think that just because you have all this life behind you that this child does not understand simply even what death is, you know.

Christine Davies: Yeah. And I think that's what makes it doubly hard for parents because we're holding our own grief Yes. About the death. And then trying to comfort our children in it as well. So it is an impossible task.

Victoria Volk: And that's why I asked like Mhmm. How what that was for you and what that looked like because I think that is something but a lot of people don't talk about either. Mhmm. Holding holding it in Nasdaq's, generally, that does the emotional stuff does fall on us, you know, so we're Mhmm. Carrying our stuff and then we're caring everybody's stuff.

Christine Davies: Right. Yeah. In just a in a day to day, even when there's not a crisis or not a, you know, a fresh loss going on, you know, encouraging, you know, people to care for themselves is especially when they're in a caregiving role either professionally and or personally in their lives because many of us that goes to the wayside and really trying to, you know, emphasize how much that's needed.

Victoria Volk: So how do you decompress and care for yourself, you know, at the end of the day, and just in the work that you're doing, and being a mom, and spouse, and, like, what does that look like for you? And overall, just to help her.

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Well, I'll say I keep a number of people on my payroll, so that is very helpful to me. From my own therapist, my own spiritual director, my own massage therapist, all of my, you know, doctors as well. And I am people in my office are funny because they're like, oh, you always do all of your medical appointments. I said, absolutely, I do. Like, I am there all the time because I wanna make sure I am taking care of my health. To me, that is important because of so much of what I see. But then I have people that I can turn to who know this work. And so a lot of chaplains will have or chaplains educators will have kind of a peer group that they meet with, both for consultation about difficult cases and scenarios, but then also for that support. So I have that for for chaplains. I have another one for other spiritual directors, and those have been a lifeline for me. And then I have friends who don't do anything related to the whatsoever. And we could talk about, you know, various other things. So I think having that balance. For me, one of the things that's important is spending time in nature. So, you know, I live on this thirty four acre, hobby farm, and there's always something to be done. It's mostly weeding or, you know, you know, repairing fences and things of this nature. But I find something when I'm just doing it with my hands and complete completely takes me out of my element. And I have to drive a way to a ways to get to where I live. I live a little further out from the hospital. But I actually really appreciate that time because that's kind of my buffer. So sometimes I'm listening to a podcast like this, sometimes I'm listening to books, sometimes music, and sometimes nothing, sometimes I'm just quiet. In those moments depending on the day that I'm about to have or the day that I've had that helps me to transition. And then the other piece of advice that I have for others that I've tried to do for my own life is to be fully off you know, to go off duty so to speak. Sometimes I'll even say that to my kids. I'll say mom's off duty ask dad, you know, he's in charge for a little while. I need a little bit of time. But especially people who are working as caregivers, there can be this or just have an inclination of a caregiving mentality. You know, there can be these times where it seeps into other aspects of our life. You know, we're at the grocery store and all of a sudden, like, helping someone there, you know, out to groceries and hearing their life story, you know, if you're the type of person where people share things all the time, you know, like you're at church and you you can sense people's energies and what do you do with that? And so really trying to be purposeful about like, okay, I am not on duty here. I am not on payroll, trusting that someone else will, you know, come along and help that individual. And and sometimes I will be the one to step forward and and help, but recognizing I only have a limited amount of energy sometimes my family doesn't get the fullness of my energy because I, you know, let it go so much at at work. So really trying to create boundaries around that for myself and keep my own my own well filled.

Victoria Volk: Well, thank you for sharing all of that because it sounds like that was a great advice for how to fill your own cup, especially as a helper, is, yeah, go off duty.

Christine Davies: Much easier said than done.

Victoria Volk: Yeah. That's very true. Is there is there anything that you would like to share that you feel like you didn't get a chance to? And I feel like I could we didn't even really get into the end of life stuff. Okay. Let me just ask this. What would be the what would you like people to take away from your work and what you've seen about end of life. Mhmm.

Christine Davies: I think the acknowledging of the reality of it to me is is one of the major takeaways. And my guess is your audience doesn't need to be reminded because they know this already. But, you know, just knowing, as I said before, we're not promised tomorrow, and so living today in a way that is going to honor really the the precious gravity of our time and what you would want to say to those, you know, that you love or how you would like to act knowing that they may not always be there and you won't always be here and letting that be a guiding force.

Victoria Volk: What I've learned in my training and through this work and conversations is that I think we lose a lot of time giving energy to the denial of what is happening Mhmm. In reality, what is happening because and even as a caregiver too, you can get just sucked into, you know, especially if you're in charge of the bills and the estate stuff, and you're you're the one that's appointed to be responsible for all of that. It really doesn't give you an opportunity to process really with that.

Christine Davies: Oh my goodness. The the burden of all the logistical nature. I'm brief. Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: Yeah. And then you don't really it doesn't really hit you until after it's all said and done. And then here, you look back and it's like all this time that you didn't use to have those conversations and say what you need to say and, you know, just honor the loved one that you are caring for. Right? Because it's all every conversation surround often surrounds the logistics of things rather than Mhmm. You know, what are you what are you things that, you know, you wish you would have done in your lifetime? Like, those really thoughtful questions that would give the person who is dying an opportunity to really share what has mattered to them in the meantime.

Christine Davies: Howard Bauchner: Yeah, in Chaplinci, we have an intervention that's called life review. And I often get to engage that with other people who know, you know, that their their death is more imminent. Getting to say, you know, what what are your major choice? What what do you regret? You know, what do you wish had had been different? And sometimes when the family is present, they're getting to hear that as well, or sometimes if the patient is unconscious and we're, you know, maybe in the ICU, that is where an encouraging family. Again, if they want, there's no right or wrong way to do it. To say goodbye to their loved one and they say, oh, they might not be able to hear me. So we don't know. And, you know, surrounding their bed and talking about what they've meant to them. I always go back to, do you know doctor Ira Biak? He's a palliative care physician. He wrote a book called the fourth, who's written lots of books, but one of them is called the fourth things that matter most. And he talks about the conversations that the dying need to have. With their loved ones, but I think it's also vice versa. And I think these conversations are the four phrases rather to say are things that we could say every day. And we often we don't. And they're in a certain order. I'll say them because they're brief. They are Please forgive me. I forgive you. Thank you, and I love you. And there's all sorts of ways we can say those phrases. But certainly wanting to encourage people to save them at end of life, but then looking at my life and saying, okay, where can I be saying this more fully today in my own life?

Victoria Volk: Sounds like

Christine Davies: You know what I'm talking about? Mhmm.

Victoria Volk: Yeah. I'm sorry. Please forgive me. And you I'm sorry. Please forgive me.
There's yeah. There's a few more in there.

Christine Davies: Yep.

Victoria Volk: Yeah. Pono. Pono. Pono. Really long word.
Yeah. That's beautiful. I'm glad we got that in there because I think it's an important aspect of what the work that you do. And also, for me, as an end of life too, I feel like I don't talk about that piece as much as I talk about the you know, the grief that people are left with after the fact. Right. You know, my dad had cancer and he was sick for I think they gave him I I think it was like four months or something. He lived sixteen months Stage four, and he died in a nursing home. And I don't know that that's how he would have chosen

Christine Davies: to

Victoria Volk: spend his end of days. I think that's really what's fueled my desire for end of life education. And Mhmm. Because I didn't even realize that, you know, what was possible at end of life. Like, you can choose who you want to see you and who you don't, and you can choose how you want your environment to be. And I think I would have, like, essential essential oils going and candles and, you know, my favorite music and Mhmm. Yeah. Just you can set the mood. I was like, yeah. Yeah. That's possible. Like, you can make it what you want it to be. I just didn't know that that was possible. And so, yeah, it's kinda hard in a hospital, but You know what? I'm sure accommodations can be made.

Christine Davies: Yeah. Maybe not the candles, but we have battery operated candles.

Victoria Volk: Now guys, yikes, the green ones

Christine Davies: now. Exactly. I have I have one over here. And yeah. And I think families are becoming more tuned to this, you know, what is going to help us honor our loved one.
But yet, when there's times that we can speak to that beforehand, when everyone is hale and healthy, before there's a crisis, that I think is the most important piece.

Victoria Volk: And you can even wash your loved one.

Christine Davies: Mhmm. You

Victoria Volk: know, and some people might no way. I want no part of it.

Christine Davies: And in some religions, that's, you know, that's part of the the practice. Absolutely.

Victoria Volk: Mhmm. I think it's like Western society. We've so we've gotten so far detached and removed from the dying process. We put it in somebody else's hands.

Christine Davies: It's technologicalized it. Absolutely. Mhmm. Mhmm. Versus when it used to be in the home.

Victoria Volk: Yes. I mean, they would take pictures as a family with the disease. Mhmm. Like, family portraits. Yeah. Wear black for, you know, for morning. And, yeah, I think we've we've just we've yeah, far removed ourselves from that experience. And I think and that stents are healing too, I think.

Christine Davies: Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. I I think it it can be a beautiful process when the family is there. And, you know, I've watched as, you know, a spousal crawling to bed, you know, with the patient, you know, in in their last few moments, or, you know, I've been there when they've had, you know, Leonard Skintered Place. Yeah. That was the, you know, that would be my choice, but, you know, really trying to even though we're in a medical eye setting and, you know, people that are home hospitals, that's going to look a lot different, but we try to make it, you know, as peaceful of a place that represents that person as possible.

Victoria Volk: Well, where can people find you if they'd like to read some of your writings and learn connect with you online? Where can people find you?

Christine Davies: Sure. So I do write a newsletter about twice a month long form newsletter on Substack, and that's journeying alongside. They can also find me on my website, which is my name, christine, then v davies, d a v I e s dot com. And on there, there's a link to my newsletter, all my social media, as well as more information if people wanted to do an individual spiritual direction session. Amazing.

Victoria Volk: I will put links to all of that in the show notes. And Thank you so much for sharing your personal story today and also the work that you do, which is so needed. And I appreciate appreciate you and your time today.

Christine Davies: Well, thank you so much for having me. My luck talking with you today.

Victoria Volk: And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life, much love.