The big gamble that paid off!
We held the 9th National Palliative Care Conference in Melbourne last week. It was a long and exhausting week, full of fantastic presentations, social activities and time to network with colleagues as well as great opportunities to celebrate what we do.
For me personally, there was a number of anxieties, not least of which being the premiere of the play I collaborated on with my friend and renowned playwright, Alan Hopgood. “Four Funerals in One Day” is a performance piece that explores issues around life, death, euthanasia and the importance of story telling in palliative care.
“Karen is a community nurse caring for her first dying patient. Clarrie has had enough of being a burden on his family and wants to die now. Vi is tired and bad tempered and wondering why she stays working in palliative care, particularly as she has her own problems at home and Sue is walking the fine line of acting as a mentor for junior staff and supporting a colleague who isn’t coping. Four Funerals in One Day is a performance piece that explores the human reality for patients and professional carers living and dying in palliative care.”
I need not have been nervous! The performances of Alan, Babs McMillan, Margot Knight and Michelle Hall were filled with joy and compassion. They truly captured the emotional rollercoaster of working in palliative care……………….the audience laughed (and some admitted to me later, they cried), but mostly the feedback I got was that it made them think.
As practitioners we have always understood the importance of our client’s stories, but we often forget the importance of our own……….. and how our own stories inform our capacity as carers to support people living with terminal illness.
For me, it was wonderful to sit in an auditorium filled with my colleagues from all around Australia, New Zealand, Canada, America, China, Hong Kong, Japan and the U.K and experience the impact of parts of my personal story, combined with fiction (and Alan Hopgood’s mastery of language and performance).
Including a play as a Keynote address at a high profile conference was a big gamble for the organising committee, but given the feedback, it was a gamble that paid off.
The lesson in all of this? if we are to get people in the community talking about what matters to them, thinking about why they are here and what they’re here to do……………we can’t just stand up and lecture them…………..we need to be creative! Using the creative arts to tell stories and engage people is a wonderful way to do just that without it being confronting or overtly prescriptive. For me personally………….it was a wonderful climax to hours of reflection, discussion and hard work and it has not only made me feel proud of my professional work, but has enabled me to build a friendship with a man I have watched on television since I was a kid…………….Alan Hopgood.