— Is it possible that you could have prevented your father's death if you had saved him? In spite of the fact that this was what he wanted, wasn't that difficult? ”
When we die, how do we want others to remember us? In our final days, how do we want to be treated?
Death is nothing new to Yvonne Caputo. In her early thirties, she was able to name seventeen family members and friends who had passed away. Claude and his son Jimmy, both dead by suicide, her cousin Alan, murdered in Central Park, and her brother Mark, killed in a car accident, were among those who died. Each of these deaths left her with many questions, the most important of which was: Why don’t we talk about the end of life before the end of life?
While working in a retirement community, Yvonne learned about the Five Wishes®, a legal document that expresses a person’s end-of-life wishes beyond an advance directive. She decided to broach this difficult subject with her dad. What would the outcome of discussing such a dark subject be?
Yvonne Caputo’s first book, Flying with Dad, was about her father’s experiences in World War II. But this wasn’t what readers focused their questions on. Instead, they asked her about how she and her dad talked about what he wanted for his end-of-life experiences, how she walked him through his Five Wishes document and how, when the day came, she stopped the paramedics from reviving him.
In Dying with Dad, Yvonne shares the joy she felt when her father died on his terms. And the reason she knew what those terms were was because they had had a heart-to-heart conversation about it before it was too late.
Dying with Dad inspires us to think about meaningful discussions for when we or our loved ones are aging or preparing for death. Discussions about death and grief, but also about crossing the finish line joyfully and triumphantly.
You can have the conversations that matter, before it’s too late.
Valeria interviews Yvonne Caputo — She is the author of Flying with Dad: A Daughter. A Father. And the Hidden Gifts in His Stories from WWII and Dying with Dad: Tough Talks for Easier Endings.
Yvonne Caputo is also a psychotherapist, corporate trainer, a consultant, and she has been a teacher and the head of a human resource department in a retirement community. She has a master’s degree in education and clinical psychology.
To learn more about Yvonne Caputo and her work, please visit: https://ingeniumbooks.com/yvonne-caputo/
— This podcast is a quest for well-being, a quest for a meaningful life through the exploration of fundamental truths, enlightening ideas, insights on physical, mental, and spiritual health. The inspiration is Love. The aspiration is to awaken new ways of thinking that can lead us to a new way of being, being well.
