Death - Not Safe For Work

I went to Reddit the other day, wanting to join the conversation around end-of-life.

What I didn’t expect was a big red warning: NSFW - Not Safe For Work.

Curious, I clicked through. 

What was I about to see? Violent and disturbing images, gruesome accidents or stories about awful deaths? I mean, Reddit can be… intense. I held my breath a little and skimmed the Subredds.

“Coping with the idea of losing a loved one.” ... "I can’t get over my ex’s death.” ... “AITA for avoiding my Nan during her last days of life?”

Wha…?! These threads weren’t graphic or grotesque. They were just… ordinary everyday heartbreak. Normal, honest, vulnerable questions about end-of-life.

That’s what stopped me in my tracks. We have become SO uncomfortable with death, that even talking about it gets flagged as inappropriate. Not safe. Too much.

According to Google the average person spends around 90,000 hours of our life at work. We talk about deadlines, breakups, vet bills, reality TV. But death? Grief? End-of-life planning? Noooooo thank you, that’s not safe. That’s too much.

But given how much time we spend at work, if we can’t talk about death there, where can we?

(Shout out to those companies who do their utmost to support bereaved employees. This isn’t just about workplaces though. It’s about all of us.)

Here’s the thing. We all know how this ends.

At some point we will die. Our loved ones will die. It’s the only certainty and yet, we treat death like a taboo. We pretend we will live forever, that life is infinite and sometime, when we're ready, we'll quietly pass on in our sleep. 

We’ve confused discomfort with danger. I often liken talking about death to sex. Just as talking about sex won’t get anyone pregnant, talking about death won’t kill us.

And we need to normalise talking about death. At work. With our friends. With our loved ones. Over dinner. On the bus. In line for coffee. In the sunlight. In the dark. Around us people are grieving the loss of loved ones, dealing with anticipatory grief, long goodbyes, being challenged by the fragility of life... and yet we still don't talk about death.

Please, let’s stop thinking of talking about death as morbid, inappropriate or unsafe. 

Let’s change the narrative. It’s love. And it’s time we made space these tender and important conversations, even at work.