Advice for Future Corpses (and Those Who Love Them): A Practical Perspective on Death and Dying

In a world where the global anti-aging industry will top $400 billion in 2018, it Is astonishing to me how little public discourse there is about the biggest psychological challenge facing every one of us. I’m a 70 year old psychologist, and In the privacy of my office or in the intimate conversations with friends who are passing 40, 50, 60, 70…I hear the almost universal fears of aging and death, often in a throwaway joke meant to hide the underlying unease. Everyone worries when they lose their keys that it might be incipient dementia. The relentless and futile battles against gravity are fought on a daily basis with skin creams, leg lifts, and desperate hope. We care for our ailing and dying parents but pray that our own end will be easier, later, less messy, less complicated by family dynamics and medical contradictions. And yet, here is an absolutely beautiful book about the realities of what will happen to each and every one of us, and as of the time of my writing this the book has been out for months and has gotten only 9 reviews. It does seem that the one cultural note we play to handle mortality is denial. I’ve been searching for years for a book that tells the truth without sugar coating or delicacy but with great compassion and respect, without religious dogma or false hopes, but with a loving acceptance of our mortal natures. For me, personally, and for many I know, there is no peace at all in endlessly chasing youth and lying awake at night terrified of the inevitable losses of beauty, mobility, independence, relationships, etc. But I have derived considerable comfort from Tisdale’s stark invitation to experience our common humanity in all its astonishing and mysterious complexity. I will recommend this book to all who are brave enough to open their eyes and wise enough to know that it’s a powerful answer to fear.

“I want this book to make you think about a few things you don’t really want to think about,” writes Sallie Tisdale in her new work, “Advice for Future Corpses” and although this is the most uninviting of sentences, by the time you get to it, on page 15, too late, you’re already sucked in — and thank heavens. Surprising, sad, funny, comforting, discomforting, spiritual, practical, up-to-the-minute and ancient-wisdomy all at once, this book’s clear, easy prose leads the mind gently to places it will be required to visit now and again in the course of a life well (or ill-) lived. As the big demographic clot of Baby Boomers approaches the finish line Tisdale’s information, expertise and guidance is especially invaluable and this is a book I am very happy to have read and know I will be thinking about and returning to over and over in years to come (if I can get it back after loaning it out). Timely and important.

So far this book has been read by my terminally ill mother and four friends over forty-- everyone got something different out of the book, and everyone has bought their own copy to pass on. We all hope that people learn what to say and what NOT TO EVER SAY to someone who is seriously ill much less knows that their illness is likely to cause their death-- and this book can help, but so can common sense, which is what this book has in abundance.

Best book of it's type out there, at least for me. The disclaimer I will add is, some people may not appreciate or be much comforted by her perspective, remember going in that she is a Buddhist and thus there is going to be a focus on the acceptance and even embrace of impermanence. Also appreciated her critique and deconstruction of what may or may not be deemed a "good death" - for example, that going with a professional setting may actually be the "better" death for some, and admitting that some laypeople/family members might not be quite as up to certain challenges. An aside I'll add is, this book did more than any in helping me with my fear of flying! I'd pair it with How to Die: An Ancient Guide to the End of Life (Seneca's writings on death).

Comprehensive, nonjudgmental review of dying for both those that are dying and those who care about them. Excellent review of resources as well as organizational tools. Friendly conversational narrative

I heard about this book from someone who works in palliative care. I am a psychotherapist but have always been on the phobic side when it comes to death and dying, particularly my own. Sallie Tisdale is brilliant in her decision to go through different aspecta for the dying human being as well as for the witnesses or companions. There is nothing trite about this book, no set steps and if anything, Tisdale winds up joining us in all the possibilities--in authentic fear and longing, in messiness and even humor. She joins us or she kind of welcomes the reader to join her there. Amazingly to me, Tisdale is a Buddhist who never claims any immunity from her own moods and unrealistic wishes; she is a witness also to her own humanness all the way through. She doesn't make death go away, duh!, but she makes it easier to think and talk about. This is not a book to read only once and it makes the most enlightened of us (or so we thought) reconsider our own burial plans as well. Yes, not convenient, but excellent and I think, necessary.

You don't have to know anyone that is dying (though we all are in process), nor do you have to have a terminal diagnosis to enjoy and find benefit from this well written, informative book. I am in a book group and this is an excellent book to use to begin to explore one's emotions about death and dying. Even after working in hospice and being in the health care field for over 30 years, I found a lot of benefit from this book. As such, I find myself paying even closer attention to my feelings and words around the living and the dying. Blessings to Sallie Tisdale for a wonderfully useful book.

Let’s talk about death; let’s talk it to death. That is the underlying purpose of this book, and the author Sallie Tisdale, has done a remarkable job transforming a much-shunned subject into a likeable inquiry so much so that half-way through the book the reader might start to rue the book approaching to the end. ST is a Zen Buddhist but she is not spreading the tenets of Buddhism, only those aspects that help her come to face death and ponder about it with equanimity and stare at it with dignity. It is true, she says, that everything about this book is theory for she has not yet died. Tracing humanity’s experience and fear of death, and the ubiquitous death rituals in every culture, ST explains why death transfixes us so. From the point of view of the dying, these are all efforts in futility. The person about to die has no concern (or shouldn’t have) for what happens to hi for the ‘him’ in him is gone. He leaves behind a corpse where ‘he’ once lived. Even monuments of remembrance are forgotten after three or four generations. ST recalls the oft-quoted wisdom of Epicurus, exhorting us not to fear death – ‘for where death is, we are not, where we are, death is not’. Death is a fact that we all have to face and we can hardly have a say in it. ST says, ‘We can plan for many elements of dying. We can write a will, decide what music we want to hear and how to dispose of our bodies. But even if I choose assistance in dying and drink the medication with my own hands, I haven’t chosen to die. Death is choosing me.’ She warns against the hubris in many escapist theories – including one that goes by the name of ‘terror management theory’. Another helpful segment of the book deals with the idea of the ‘good death’. Here she manages our expectations very well. ‘We are animals, our bodies fail, and we cannot stop dying.’ Death is an event, but dying goes on a bit longer, and in the chapter, ‘Last Months’, ST discusses the state of dying towards the end. ‘Dying is psychological work, emotional work, spiritual work. The simplest things take time; everything once taken for granted changes, and a person either gets sad or gets mad or settles into a new kind of peace.’ ST discusses hospice care and people at death’s door. There is a lot to know about hospices and the kind of care required and expected. Not everyone who is faced with the choice of sending a dying relative to a hospice or to be kept at home know what the patient (the dying) needs. ST then brings us to the point specifically – all too often our loved one is dying and we want him to live. ST reminds us that it is not about what we want. It is what the dying wants and needs. We may have to change the current terminology to change our attitudes. We are not ‘pulling the plug’ when we take a dying person off life support. We are releasing him from ‘excessive technology and invasive treatments. When we allow death to happen, we are not killing people, we are caring for them. We are loving them’. The opposite is nothing but foolish, selfish acts to satisfy our needs rather than that of the dying person, and it invariably proves not only futile, but prolongs the suffering of the patient. The appendices are useful. The first is ‘Preparing a Death Plan’, helping us plan ahead in the event of a quick and sudden death. The second deals with ‘Advance Directives. The third deals with organ donations. The fourth with assisted death. Give them some urgent and thorough consideration.

As expected

A wonderful read for anyone who will die one day. The contents is practical and warmly written. It should be required reading.

I recently lost my spouse to cancer. I was her primary caregiver and was alongside her through the dying process at a hospice facility. I read a lot of books on death and dying to prepare myself While there are parts of the book that seem to be the author’s exploratory thinking, there are none better when describing the process of dying and how to behave and the grief afterwards. None. Her description of grief is i tense and poetic and spot on. Her discussion of the dying process illuminates. This book is a must read for those chapters alone

This is a really useful guide that answers all your questions about death and dying. Wonderful guide for the care provider.