April 19, 2020 Collab Salon: Reflections on practice with people who are suffering

As a counsellor working for hospice I meet with people who are suffering, sometimes with unsolvable problems, as they live with serious illness and the knowledge of their approaching death.  What can these experiences offer to those of us facing suffering in many different contexts during this time of Covid-19 pandemic? Given the current context, this Collab is still evolving. I hope to share some of my reflections on practices that ease suffering. These include thoughts on how we create space for stories of suffering, how we respond to big stories day to day and questioning practices that can be significant in restoring a sense of meaning and agency. I look forward to hearing how you might apply such practices to your own context for work. To facilitate the discussion I will be providing a collaborative document to illustrate some of the narrative practices we will be reflecting on.

References:

Wachholtz, A., Fitch, C., Makowski, S. & Tjia, J. (2016). A comprehensive approach to the patient at end of life: Assessment of multidimensional suffering. South Medical Journal, 109, 200-206. doi: 10.14423/SMJ.0000000000000439

Mehta A. & Chan, L. (2008). Understanding the concept of total pain. Journal of Hospice and Palliative Nursing, 10, 26-32.

Learning Objectives:

1. 1. Participants will reflect on understandings of how they might create space for and engage with the stories of people who are suffering.
   2. Participants will examine and discuss questioning practices that may be helpful when meeting with people who are suffering. They will be able to apply these questioning practices to their own work context.
   3. Participants will reflect on and critique the discursive influences that interrupt practitioners being present in helpful ways for people who are suffering.

Please review this draft article,

• Blossoming in the Storm: An illustration of Narrative Therapy with Someone Approaching Death by Sasha Pilkington

For further Reading of Interest:

• Concepts within the Chinese Culture that Influence the Cancer Pain Experience

References:

Pilkington, S. (2014). Traveling on the journey to death: A story illustrating narrative practice for counselors. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 4, 79-93.

Pilkington, S. (2016). Insurance policies for miracle cures: A story illustrating narrative counseling practice with someone approaching death. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 2, 71-87.

Pilkington, S. (2017). Deconstructing denial: Stories of Narrative Therapy with people who are dying and their families, Journal of Narrative Family Therapy, 1, 54-75. www.journalnft.com

Pilkington, S. (2018a). A story illustrating Narrative Therapy in a cross-cultural conversation with someone approaching death. http://www.nzac.org.nz/journal/

Pilkington, S. (2018b). Narrative therapeutic letters: Gathering, recording and performing lost stories. Journal of Narrative Family Therapy, Special release, 20-48. www.journalnft.com

Wachholtz, A., Fitch, C., Makowski, S. & Tjia, J. (2016). A comprehensive approach to the patient at end of life: Assessment of multidimensional suffering. South Medical Journal, 109, 200-206. doi: 10.14423/SMJ.0000000000000439

Mehta A. & Chan, L. (2008). Understanding the concept of total pain. Journal of Hospice and Palliative Nursing, 10, 26-32.

If you are earning Continuing Education Credit, we are required to submit a separate evaluation for each Collab. Please fill in this evaluation form, and send it to Contact.

Please help us try out this new system.  In the spirit of experimentation, here are two versions (word and pdf). Can you let us know which works better for you?

• Evaluation (as pdf)
• Evaluation (as word doc)

Sasha McAllum Pilkington is a counsellor at Harbour Hospice in Auckland, New Zealand. She has practiced as a narrative therapist for many years in a variety of contexts. In 2008 she began working with families who were receiving care from hospice. Her work is focused on supporting people to approach death in ways that matter to them. Sasha has written a number of papers that focus on illustrating and discussing narrative therapy with people who are approaching the end of their lives (see Pilkington, 2014; 2016; 2017; 2018a). She has a passion for collaborative therapeutic documents (Pilkington, 2018b) and enjoys working alongside people she meets with to write collaborative stories.