Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying

Episode Overview

*Content Note: This episode includes candid discussions about substance use, addiction, and suicide.  If this is a sensitive topic for you, please listen with care. 

What happens when a family feels like they are losing someone who is still here? In this personal episode, Christina sits down with her sister, Charlene Bargas, for an open conversation about substance use, family, grief, and what came after. Two sisters who lived through the same years in different ways make room for both perspectives. Together, they explore the words we use and the labels that can miss the person behind them, what changed and what didn’t, ambiguous loss, and how love, boundaries, and forgiveness can live side by side. Charlene also shares the life she is building today, from finishing the degrees she started to her hope of helping others find their way forward.

This episode also marks the start of a new tradition on the show: three questions Christina will ask every guest.

Episode Highlights

[00:45] Content warning

[00:57] Opening: why we’re sharing this conversation

[06:20] Two sisters, one history, two experiences

[09:51] What was happening beneath the surface

[13:28] What our family experienced

[15:57] The language we use matters

[35:47] What changed, and what didn’t

[47:32] What came next

[49:11] Who Charlene is today

[54:18] What Charlene wants people to understand

[59:37] Three questions I ask every guest

[01:02:33] Closing reflection and sign-off

Guest Bio

Charlene Bargas is a mother of four, writer, legal professional, and lifelong learner. She has spent more than two decades in the legal field, with additional experience in behavioral health, crisis response, and peer support. Charlene holds a Master of Nonprofit Leadership from the University of Denver and a Bachelor of Science from Metropolitan State University of Denver, focused on Holistic Approaches to Human Change. She is passionate about social enterprise, and her writing explores motherhood, family, identity, and what it means to understand our past without letting one chapter explain an entire person. She brings to this conversation not a finished story, but the full range of her own experience.

Connect with Charlene

Resources

If You or Someone You Love Is Struggling

Listener Challenge: Give It a Name

This week, think about someone you may be grieving while they are still here. A person, a relationship, or a version of someone you love. You don’t have to fix anything or reach out. Just give that feeling a name, and notice that love and grief can live in the same place.

Share This Episode

If you know someone who is loving a person through a hard season, please share this episode with them. You never know who needs to hear that they’re not alone.

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Join a Good Life Good Death Café — two live gatherings a month in Colorado, plus one virtual gathering monthly. Details at https://www.celebrationoflife-colorado.com/event-list

About the Podcast

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying is hosted by Christina Holohan, Certified Death Doula, Thanatologist, and founder of Celebration of Life, Colorado.

A Conversation with Eryn Elder, MA

Grief and Loss Coach, Author, and Founder of Roots and Wings Grief and Loss Coaching

Episode Overview

What if grief is not something to fix, finish, or leave behind, but something we learn to tend? In this episode, I sit down with Eryn Elder, grief and loss coach, author of Blooming Through Loss, and founder of Roots and Wings Grief and Loss Coaching in Longmont, Colorado. Eryn shares the personal experience that led her to this work, walks us through her BloomPath® framework, and explains how grief coaching differs from therapy and support groups. We also talk about the many kinds of loss that deserve to be named as grief, the healing power of community through the Longmont Grief Collective, and what it looks like to live wholeheartedly alongside loss, with room for love, meaning, and even joy.

Timestamped Highlights

Guest Bio

Eryn Elder, MA is a grief and loss coach, educator, author, and podcaster who helps people navigate the experiences that change them, especially the ones that cannot simply be fixed, solved, or left behind.

As the founder of Roots and Wings Grief and Loss Coaching, Eryn brings together twenty years of experience in coaching, education, leadership, and grief support. She is a Certified Grief and Loss Support Specialist, an ICF-trained coach and coach trainer, and holds a master's degree in education. She has coached hundreds of individuals and led a coaching program at a tier-one research university.

After the unexpected death of her first-born daughter, Evelyn, Eryn experienced firsthand how difficult it can be to find meaningful support after loss. That experience led her to understand grief not as something to overcome, but as something we can learn to tend, carry, and integrate into a life that still holds love, meaning, connection, and even joy. This perspective became the foundation for her BloomPath® framework.

Her work includes individual coaching, group facilitation, professional education, writing, and community-building through the Longmont Grief Collective. She is also a co-host of the Coaching as Benevolence podcast.

Book Details

Blooming Through Loss: Tending to Grief with the BloomPath®

Eryn's book invites readers to slow down, make sense of what they are experiencing, reconnect with what matters, and discover how to live wholeheartedly alongside what has changed.

Resources Mentioned

Listener Challenge

This week, name one loss in your life you have never given yourself permission to grieve. It may be a job, a friendship, a home, or a version of yourself. Give it five minutes of your attention. Write it down, speak it aloud, or simply sit with it. Grief that is named has room to be tended.

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Join a Good Life Good Death Café — two live gatherings a month in Colorado, plus one virtual gathering monthly. Details at celebrationoflife-colorado.com/events-list.

About the Podcast

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying is hosted by Christina Holohan, Celebration of Life Event Planner, Certified Death Doula, Thanatologist, and founder of Celebration of Life, Colorado.

Episode Overview

What happens when you walk into a Death Café? In this episode, Christina traces the model back to its origins with Jon Underwood and Sue Barsky Reid, breaks down what the research says about why these conversations matter, and introduces its lesser-known cousin — the Doulagivers-inspired Good Life Good Death Café, the model Christina trained in and now hosts herself. She walks through what to expect in each kind of room, and what it takes to start a Death Café of your own.

Episode Highlights

[00:46] Cold open: two flyers, two very different rooms

[01:16] The death-positive movement, and where these cafés fit in it

[02:21] What the research says about talking about death

[04:42] Death Café's origins: Jon Underwood, Sue Barsky Reid, and Bernard Crettaz

[06:08] Why Death Café is a trademarked name

[06:33] Good Life Good Death Café and the Doulagivers model

[08:19] Side by side: what to expect walking into each room

[09:25] Why both model’s matter

[10:36] How to start a Death Café of your own

[14:24] Listener challenge and sign-off

Resources Mentioned

Death Café Resources

Research Referenced

Doulagivers Institute

Listener Challenge: Find the Room for You

Look up whether there is a Death Café, or a community death conversation built on that same spirit, happening near you. You don’t have to attend — just find it, notice which kind of room you’re drawn to, and ask yourself why.

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Join a Good Life Good Death Café — two live gatherings a month in Colorado, plus one virtual gathering monthly. Details at celebrationoflife-colorado.com/events-list.

What happens if you can't speak for yourself? In this episode, Christina walks through what an advance care directive is the three documents Colorado law recognizes, and how they're different from a MOST form. She traces two of the most well-known end-of-life cases in American history, Terri Schiavo and Nancy Cruzan, to show what happens when a family is left to guess. And she shares a story that could belong to any of our families: a grandmother whose wishes were never written down, and the years of not knowing that followed. The episode closes with a ten-minute challenge anyone can do tonight.

Episode Highlights

[00:47] Cold open the three questions no one prepares you for

[02:22] What is an advance care directive, and Colorado's three legal documents

[05:30] The Terri Schiavo case

[08:28] The Nancy Cruzan case

[11:08] A grandmother's story the risk every ordinary family faces

[13:58] The conversation before the document

[15:55] Don't just fill it out tell someone

[18:37] The ten-minute conversation challenge

Resources Mentioned

Case Law Referenced

Story Referenced

Listener Challenge: The 10-Minute Conversation

Sit down with someone you trust and ask them one question: "If I couldn't speak for myself, what would you need to know about what matters most to me?" You don't have to solve your whole plan tonight you just have to start the conversation.

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Join a Good Death - Good Life Café two live gatherings a month in Colorado, plus one virtual gathering monthly. Details at celebrationoflife-colorado.com/events-list

Christina also works one-on-one with clients to complete their advance care directive walking through each document and the conversations behind it, so nothing gets left unsaid or unsigned

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying

Episode Overview

What does a death doula do and when does that work start? In this solo episode, I break down what a death doula (or end-of-life doula) is, why this kind of community support around dying is far older than the modern title suggests, and why so much of this work happens years before anyone is near a bedside. I walk through what hospice care does and doesn't cover, the most common misconceptions I hear, how to find and vet a doula, and what this looks like specifically here in Colorado, where the profession remains unlicensed and unregulated.

Timestamped Highlights

Resources Mentioned

Hospice & Advance Care Planning

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. (n.d.). Hospice. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.cms.gov/medicare/payment/fee-for-service-providers/hospice

National Institute on Aging. (n.d.). Advance care planning: Advance directives for health care. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/advance-care-planning/advance-care-planning-advance-directives-health-care

Doula Training Programs

Colorado Doula Directories

Good Death Good Life Cafe

Virtual gathering, first Wednesday of every month, 6:00–8:00 PM MST. Details and in-person events: celebrationoflife-colorado.com/events

Questions to Ask a Provider

Listener Challenge

This week, take one small step toward your own advance care directive. It doesn't have to be the whole document. Just write down one wish and tell one person what it is.

Contact

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

About the Podcast

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying is hosted by Christina Holohan, Certified End-of-Life Doula, Thanatologist, Event Producer and founder of Celebration of Life, Colorado.

Special Guest Episode

Where Grief Lives in the Body

A Conversation with Cathy Williams

Somatic Guide, Expressive Arts Therapist & Founder of Intuitive Self

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying

Episode Overview

Grief doesn't just live in our thoughts; it lives in our bodies. In this episode, I sit down with Cathy Williams, a somatic guide, expressive arts therapist, and founder of Intuitive Self, to talk about what it means to feel our feelings instead of just thinking our way through them. We explore Cathy's own path into body-based healing, how grief shows up physically before it ever shows up in words, and what it looks like to grieve a relationship or a version of a person when the loss isn't clean or simple. Cathy also shares pieces of her own healing journey and offers a few gentle, accessible practices anyone can try.

Timestamped Highlights

Guest Bio

Cathy Williams is an award-winning author, somatic guide, and expressive arts therapist with her business Intuitive Self, based in Melbourne, Australia. Cathy is known for her empowering, compassionate approach to supporting women in creatively rediscovering themselves, reconnecting with their bodies and intuition, and re-learning how to listen to, trust in, and follow their own intuitive knowing.

Cathy's work offers a unique approach to working with grief through the body, creating safety to feel our feelings. She supports community in creating space for curious dialogue with self, inspiring discovery that nurtures awareness, honors our experiences, and encourages expression.

Resources Mentioned

Cathy Williams / Intuitive Self: https://www.intuitiveself.com.au/

Body Wisdom: A Guide to Connecting with Your Intuitive Self — available via the Intuitive Self website

Body Wisdom Oracle Card deck — available via the Intuitive Self website

Instagram: @intuitiveself__

Listener Challenge

This week, notice one moment where grief, stress, or a big feeling shows up in your body before it shows up in your thoughts. A tight chest, clenched jaw, restless legs. Just notice it. You don't have to fix it, just get curious about it.

Contact

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

About the Podcast

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying is hosted by Christina Holohan, Certified Death Doula, Thanatologist, and founder of Celebration of Life, Colorado.

Grieving a Pet Is Real Grief: The Hidden Sorrow of Disenfranchised Grief

Episode Overview

In this deeply personal, solo episode, Christina sets the body-disposition series aside for a story much closer to home: pet grief. She shares the story of Floki, the bearded dragon who became her emotional support during one of the hardest stretches of her life, and of Vanilla, the dog who shaped over a decade of it. Along the way, she introduces the concept of disenfranchised grief, why pet loss is so often dismissed as "lesser," what not to say to someone grieving a pet, and how to actually show up for them. She closes with her now-full house of animals, a reflection on how pets show us their emotions if we pay attention, and a direct message: no one gets to decide how much your pet meant to you.

Timestamped Highlights

Resources Mentioned

Doka, K. J. (Ed.). (1989). Disenfranchised grief: Recognizing hidden sorrow. Lexington Books.

Listener Challenge

Think of one pet, yours or someone else's, whose loss never really got its due. Do something small on purpose to give that grief a place to exist: say their name out loud, reach out to someone who's grieving, or simply light a candle. It doesn't need to be a grand gesture. It just needs permission.

A Note on This Episode

This episode is more personal storytelling than our usual consumer-education format. If you're grieving a pet right now, present or past, please know your grief is valid, and support is available. See the resources above, including free local Colorado support groups.

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Subscribe & Follow

If this episode resonated with you, subscribe to Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted on Apple Podcasts so you never miss an episode, and leave a review to help others find the show. Have a topic you'd like covered? Reach out using the contact information above.

What Happens to the Body After Death? Part 5: Alternative Disposition Methods

Episode Overview

This episode continues the What Happens to the Body After Death series with a look at disposition methods beyond traditional burial and cremation. Christina walks through the mushroom burial suit and a related option, a coffin grown from mycelium, tree pod burial, reef burial, memorial spaceflight, and whole-body donation, including a look at Colorado's own State Anatomical Board program. Along the way, she flags which claims are backed by independent evidence and which are still unverified marketing language and closes with a few thoughts on how different faith traditions approach these choices.

Timestamped Highlights

Resources Mentioned

Listener Challenge

Pick one method from today's episode, just one, and spend ten minutes looking into whether it's available where you live. A lot of these options are closer than people assume.

Questions for Providers

Connect with Christina

Celebration of Life, Colorado

celebrationoflife-colorado.com

[email protected]

720-792-7774

Subscribe & Follow

If this episode resonated with you, subscribe to Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted on Apple Podcasts so you never miss an episode, and leave a review to help others find the show. Have a topic you'd like covered? Reach out using the contact information above.

What Happens to the Body After Death? Part 4: Terramation (Human Composting)

In this episode of Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted, Christina continues the series What Happens to the Body After Death with a look at human composting, also known as natural organic reduction (NOR) or terramation. Christina walks through how the process works, what families can and cannot include in the vessel with their loved one, and a surprising piece of history: decades before today's human composting facilities existed, a completely different (and ultimately unsuccessful) freeze-drying process called promession tried to solve the same problem. The episode also covers Colorado's specific legal history, current costs, provider eligibility limits, and how several faith traditions are responding to this still-evolving option.

Two corrections came up in researching this episode that are worth naming directly. First, some published research on Colorado's human composting law cites House Bill 20-1060 (2020) as the law that legalized the process here. That bill never passed; it was postponed indefinitely in a Senate committee. The law that legalized human composting in Colorado is Senate Bill 21-006, signed by Governor Polis on May 10, 2021. Second, SB21-006's effective date is sometimes reported as August 8, 2021. Based on the bill's own text and Colorado's constitutional rule (effective 90 days after the legislative session's final adjournment, which was June 8, 2021), the correct effective date falls in September 2021, not August.

Have one conversation, just one, with someone you love about what they'd want. Not the whole plan. Just the conversation.

Colorado General Assembly. Senate Bill 21-006: Human remains natural reduction soil. https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/sb21-006

Colorado General Assembly. House Bill 20-1060: Natural organic reduction human remains [failed]. http://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb20-1060

Office of Governor Jared Polis. (2021, May 10). Governor Polis signs bills into law. https://www.colorado.gov/governor/news/5136-governor-polis-signs-bills-law

Wikipedia contributors. (n.d.). Promession. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promession

Recompose. (2026). Who we are. https://recompose.life/who-we-are/

The Natural Funeral. (2026). Terramation (natural organic reduction). https://www.thenaturalfuneral.com/natural-organic-reduction-body-composting/

National Catholic Register / EWTN. (2023, March 23). US bishops: Human composting and alkaline hydrolysis disrespect the human body. https://www.ncregister.com/cna/us-bishops-human-composting-and-alkaline-hydrolysis-disrespect-the-human-body

Boston, R. (2022, October 12). Islamic official provides reminder of the ‘do no harm’ principle. Americans United for Separation of Church and State. https://www.au.org/the-latest/articles/composting-muslim-response/

Celebration of Life, Colorado

Website: celebrationoflife-colorado.com

Email: [email protected]

Phone: 720-792-7774

Ep 12 - Special Guest Episode

Exit Strategies: Living Lessons from Dying People A Conversation with Dr. Cynthia X. Pan

Hospice & Palliative Care Physician | Author | Medical Educator

Life, Death, Grief, Unscripted | Unfiltered Discussions on Living and Dying

In this special guest episode, host Christina, Certified Death Doula, Thanatologist, and Celebration of Life Event Planner, pauses the "What Happens to the Body After Death?" series to welcome a truly extraordinary guest. Dr. Cynthia X. Pan is a hospice and palliative care physician with decades of experience at the bedside of the dying, a medical educator, and the author of Exit Strategies: Living Lessons from Dying People (Rice Water Publishing, November 2024). This conversation is warm, honest, and deeply human, covering humor, fear, cultural perspectives on dying, the power of advance care planning, and the vital role of death doulas in end-of-life care. If you have ever wondered how to face the end of life with courage, clarity, and even laughter, this episode is for you.

Episode Highlights

1:00 - Christina’s recorded introduction to Dr. Pan and her book, Exit Strategies

6:00 - Dr. Pan is introduced within the interview

6:32 - Laughter in the face of death: Dr. Pan shares how humor breaks tension in hospital rooms and creates real connection between families

8:00 - A moving story about a patient's favorite song, played in her final moments before being disconnected from life support

9:00 - The "pain macarena", a patient's husband's unforgettable story that captures the unexpected lightness that can exist even in the darkest moments

10:00 - The art of difficult conversations: how Dr. Pan guides overwhelmed families through end-of-life discussions with compassion

11:00 -   Holding compassion while maintaining healthy boundaries and a non-judgmental presence

12:00 -   Why being present at end-of-life is a privilege, and the importance of embracing these sacred moments

13:00 - A story about a colleague who avoided difficult family conversations, and how Dr. Pan learned to train herself to be prepared for anything

15:00 - The intersection of clinical care and grief: where are the biggest gaps between a patient's medical reality and a family's holistic needs?

15:30 - Chinese proverbs, scripture, and the wisdom traditions that help patients and families find peace and make meaning

16:00 - Fear, the meaning of life, and what quality of life truly looks like at the end

17:00 - The importance of time, for healing, for forgiving, and for saying what needs to be said

18:00 - Rewriting the end: how creative approaches like "live funerals" shift the narrative from fear to profound connection

19:00 - A physician in China who staged his own funeral while still alive, and what he discovered in the reflection that followed

20:00 - Dr. Pan references the film Rental Family, a poignant and thought-provoking exploration of end-of-life connection (see Resources below)

22:00 - The role of the death doula: bridging the gap between doulas and palliative care teams for seamless, collaborative patient support

23:00 - Dr. Pan's desire to learn more about death doulas and explore cross-cultural collaboration, including language barriers and cultural considerations

24:00 - The advance care planning crisis: most of Dr. Pan's patients arrive without any plan in place, and why this is a profound disservice to patients and families

27:00 - How death doulas spend time with patients and what that presence means at the end of life

29:00 - When it is too late: patients without advance care plans who can no longer speak for themselves

30:30 - The Caregiver's Compass: the most important guidance Dr. Pan offers families navigating the end-of-life journey

32:00 -   Fear lives in our heads, and how we hold ourselves back from living fully

33:00 -   Dr. Pan's ABCs of survival: A, accept what you cannot change, B, Breathe, C, connect; stay connected through community and collaboration

36:00 - Dr. Pan shares how The Art of Living helped her recover from COVID and reconnect with herself

37:00 -   Where to find Dr. Pan, her book, website, and social media

38:00 - Christina’s closing outro

About Dr. Cynthia X. Pan

Dr. Cynthia X. Pan is a Harvard and Weill Cornell-trained hospice and palliative care physician with more than 30 years of experience caring for terminally ill patients. She is Chief of the Division of Geriatrics and Palliative Care Medicine and Professor of Clinical Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College, and the founding director of NewYork-Presbyterian Queens' palliative care program — which has helped thousands of seriously ill patients and their families.

As a Chinese American physician born in Taiwan and raised in Latin America, Dr. Pan brings a rich multicultural perspective to end-of-life care. She holds fellowships in both the American College of Physicians (FACP) and the American Geriatrics Society (AGSF), sits on the Board of Directors of the Chinese American Medical Society, and is a passionate advocate for culturally humble, patient-centered care.

Her personal experience with COVID-19 gave her a profound new understanding of serious illness from the patient's perspective — one that deeply informs her work and her writing.

Education & Training:

Selected Awards & Recognition:

About the Book

Exit Strategies: Living Lessons from Dying People by Dr. Cynthia X. Pan

Publisher: Rice Water Publishing

Publication Date: November 13, 2024

Format & Pricing: Paperback $18.99 | eBook $9.99 | Hardcover $26.99 | Audiobook available

Pages: 313

End of life still has life in it. Part practical guide, part heartwarming collection of stories, Exit Strategies equips readers with the lessons and tools to face end-of-life decisions with confidence, compassion, and even laughter. Dr. Pan covers everything from advance directives and difficult family conversations to live funerals, cultural customs, music, food, and what it means to leave a lasting legacy.

Available from: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Chapters, Indigo, BAM!, IndieBound

Resources Mentioned in This Episode

Dr. Cynthia X. Pan

The Art of Living

Dr. Pan referenced The Art of Living as a resource that supported her recovery and well-being during and after COVID. Founded by Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, The Art of Living is a global organization offering evidence-based programs in meditation, breathwork, and wellness.

Rental Family (Film)

Dr. Pan referenced this film during our conversation about live funerals and the human need for connection at the end of life. A touching and thought-provoking watch for anyone exploring end-of-life themes.

Advance Care Planning Resources

Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment — cdphe.colorado.gov/advance-care-planning — the state's official advance care planning resource

Your Listener Challenge

Dr. Pan's message is clear: these conversations cannot wait. This week, we invite you to sit quietly with one of the questions below and write your answer down. You do not need to share it with anyone. This is for you.

Start with just one. That is enough to begin.

Questions to Ask Your Healthcare Provider

Inspired by this conversation, here are some important questions to bring to your next medical appointment or family discussion:

Work With Christina

Christina Holohan is a Certified Death Doula, Thanatologist, and Celebration of Life Event Planner serving the Denver metro area and beyond. Whether you are planning a meaningful farewell, navigating end-of-life decisions, or simply want guidance on how to approach these conversations, Christina is here to help.

Subscribe & Connect

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