About Jane Duncan Rogers

“I don’t want to pay that amount of money for something I don’t want!”

I screamed these words to the funeral director who sat opposite me on the sofa two days after my husband had died. Read More

Berenice looked horrified. In the group I was running, she was coming to terms with the idea that she really needed to speak to her parents about the fact they were coming towards the end of their lives…
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Alone. Head in hands. Sobbing. Unable to understand what to do next. Unable to take in what had just happened, or to perceive how her life would now pan out. Distraught, and yet needing to keep the family together…

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Diane was a practitioner in a complementary health clinic. She always seemed to have a smile for everyone. Sitting on reception, I would notice that she was one of the therapists who always had a full client list…
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Walking in a beautiful memorial park in Coventry, England, dedicated to the huge numbers of men killed in both World Wars, I felt the peace in the air. Read More

Life administration is never at the top of our priority list, is it? Hopefully, we are having too much pleasure in our actual days to think about the administration that needs to happen in order for our lives to go smoothly. Read More

Marie’s son was distraught. He had told his mother he would have the doctors do everything they could – but now they were saying that they didn’t know how long she would be able to breathe on her own without the tube, nor did they know how long she might last if the machine continued to do most of the breathing for her. Read More

I never thought about death much, other than as a concept, until my husband was diagnosed with cancer in 2010. Then it made its entrance with a bang. Even though he was 65, it felt far too young to be contemplating death. Read More

This is a photo I took of my parents’ joint funeral.

Unbelievably, they both died in the same week, in their sleep, aged 86 and 84. My dad had had a stroke a year previously and hadn’t been doing too well, so it wasn’t entirely unexpected when I got a phone call one morning saying he hadn’t woken up. Read More

You imagine ahead to your traditional dinner: you know what you will be eating, you know who you will be celebrating with, you know where you will be – but suddenly your heart drops. This year there will be an empty chair round that table. Read More