Dying To Ask with Christy B. – Details, episodes & analysis

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Dying To Ask with Christy B.

Christy B.

Education

Frequency: 1 episode/6d. Total Eps: 12

Most of us were never taught how to be with death and Christy's voice is just what the (hospice) doctor ordered. Hosted by death doula and end-of-life educator Christy Braun M.S., this podcast pulls back the curtain on all things end-of-life: hospice & palliative care, caregiver fatigue, advance directives, and what actually happens as someone is dying. Every conversation is honest and grounded, with no spiritual bypassing. Whether you are caring for someone you love or carrying grief of your own, you belong here. If there's something you're dying to ask, reach out: christy@christybraun.com

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Apple Podcasts

🇨🇦 Canada - howTo
19/07/2026
#93
🇨🇦 Canada - howTo
18/07/2026
#71
🇨🇦 Canada - howTo
17/07/2026
#47

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Shared links between episodes and podcasts

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https://www.sharewithleaf.com/
3 shares
https://ChristyBraun.com
3 shares
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sharewithleaf.app&amp
2 shares

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/leaf-voice-recorder-journal/id1668691902
2 shares

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Score global : 68%

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11. More Than A Memory

Season 1 · Episode 11

Friday, July 24, 2026 • Duration 38:58

This episode is dedicated to someone I love dearly. Don't worry my friend, I am holding our memories tightly; I carry them with me in this work and every day. I love you.

-----

Christy sits down with Lori Rizzo of Compassionate Crossings, her go-to voice on dementia care, to say the hard things plainly. Dementia is terminal, and it is more than memory loss.

Lori Rizzo shows up for the moments when everything feels uncertain ... as an end-of-life doula, dementia specialist, and grief companion. She supports people when a serious illness is diagnosed, dementia reshapes everything, death is close, and when families feel lost and overwhelmed. She offers steady guidance, education, and a grounded, calming presence.

Lori is also a community lead for Dementia Friendly Montgomery County, a volunteer grassroots initiative on a mission to change how communities understand, talk about, and show up for people living with dementia.

If you love someone living with dementia, this one is for you.

In this episode

00:00 — The calling came first. Lori's slow path from corporate life into death work

06:00 — How a career in learning, leadership, and communication carries into the work

13:00 — How dementia became central to Lori's practice

16:30 — Three things Lori wishes people knew.

22:00 — What stigma and silence cost a family

25:30 — What becomes possible when you get ahead of it instead of waiting for a crisis

29:00 — Brain health, cognitive baselines, and the case for a dementia advance directive

34:00 — Dementia is not instinctive, and nobody hands you a roadmap

37:30 — Story time. Sundowning, folding the towels, and prayer

43:00 — The grief caregivers carry in private, and the guilt they rarely say out loud

47:00 — How to show up for a caregiver. Presence, not perfection

50:30 — A message for the person in the thick of it, plus placement guilt and support groups

54:00 — Hope that changes shape, and finding joy in what remains

57:00 — Where to find Lori

Links

Compassionate Crossings (Lori Rizzo): https://www.compassionatecrossingsdoula.comDaughterhood: https://daughterhood.orgDaughterhood Circle Leaders (Lori's page): https://daughterhood.org/meet-the-circle-leaders/

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10. Dear Lisa Frank, (a gentle grief suggestion)

Season 1 · Episode 10

Wednesday, July 22, 2026 • Duration 09:18

When you are grieving, people hand you a lot of gentle suggestions when even the small things feel like too much.

This week I want to offer you one more, and it is smaller and lower stakes than almost anything else. Stickers.

I know how that sounds. So we are going to sit with that together, and I am going to show you how a five-minute thing you did as a kid might be a small comfort on the days that feel impossible.

In this episode, we talk about:

Why a small, finishable act can steady you when nothing else feels doable
How being in the present moment is where grief tends to hurt the least
Giving yourself a break from the endless list of admin that comes with loss
Why distraction is not the same thing as avoidance, and why you can let go of the guilt
How a few quiet minutes is a way of telling yourself you still matter
Making your own grief version of a reminder sticker sheet, one small nudge at a time

"On a hard day, one sticker is enough. There is no dose you are supposed to hit and no way to fall behind."

This one is tender and low pressure, the same way the practice itself is. If you are in the thick of it right now, I hope it gives you permission to do one small kind thing for yourself today.

Let's stay connected

If something in this episode landed, or made you want to ask a question of your own, I would be honored to hear it. You can reach me at christy@christybraun.com.

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1. I Just Want This to Be Over, and Other Things You're Allowed to Feel

Season 1 · Episode 1

Sunday, May 24, 2026 • Duration 10:41

Death doula, Christy Braun, M.S. introduces her podcast as an honest, untidy space to talk openly about death, dying, caregiving, and grief without platitudes, promising to stay with listeners through the hard parts. She explains that caregivers often seek more information, but what steadies them is practical support and focusing on what matters right now. Suggestions include creating simple daily anchor points (check-ins, medications, eating, resting), keeping all notes and questions in one place, knowing who to call when changes happen, and accepting specific help from others. She emphasizes making the environment physically supportive, normalizes feelings like “I just want this to be over,” encourages small breaks and having one non-entangled support person, and describes a shift from trying to control the process to supporting it while being reminded you’re doing a great job.

00:00 Welcome to the Podcast

00:17 What This Show Is

01:47 Caregiving Info Overload

02:51 Daily Rhythm and Notes

04:08 Know Who to Call

04:30 Let People Help You

05:16 Make Your Space Supportive

06:20 Hard Feelings Are Normal

07:21 Micro Breaks That Work

08:06 One Steady Support Person

08:49 Letting Go of Control

09:21 You Are Doing Great

10:14 Closing and Next Steps

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0.0 Trailer

Sunday, May 24, 2026 • Duration 00:49

Dying to Ask with Christy B. is a podcast about death, dying, and what it really means to care for someone at the end of life. Hosted by death doula and end-of-life educator, Christy Braun, each episode opens up honest conversations about hospice care, palliative care, caregiver burnout, anticipatory grief, advance directives, and the dying process itself. Christy brings tender, grounded, practical wisdom to the questions families wrestle with behind closed doors, with no spiritual bypassing and no tidy answers. Whether you are a caregiver, facing a terminal diagnosis, walking through grief, or simply death-curious and ready to live more awake, this show helps you face mortality with less fear and more presence.

www.christybraun.com

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09. Helen Dunkle, RN, on Doula Work and Why She Traded In Her Stethoscope

Season 1 · Episode 9

Wednesday, July 8, 2026 • Duration 43:54

Find Helen

Website: https://pinnacledoula.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helen-dunkle-msn-rn-bcFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/PinnacleDoula

A Luxury and a Privilege with Helen Dunkle, RN

Helen Dunkle, RN spent more than forty years at the bedside. She started in labor and delivery, crying through every birth, and she ended up in hospice, sitting with families through the last breath. Somewhere along the way, death stopped being the thing she feared. It became sacred.

In this gathering we talk about what changes when a nurse learns to set the clinical checklist down and lean into humanity. We talk about tea, gentle hands, why calling 911 can rob someone of the death they wanted, and why dying at home is a luxury and a privilege. Helen also opens up about the grief that cracked her open at twenty-three, red lipstick, and the Reiki work that surprised her clinical mind.

This one stayed with me. I think it will stay with you too.

About Helen

Helen Dunkle, RN, is the founder of Pinnacle Doula Services in Easton, Pennsylvania. She is a registered nurse with more than four decades of clinical experience, a certified end-of-life and elder care doula, and a Reiki practitioner. Her work grew out of hospice, home health, and healthcare consulting. She walks beside families through serious illness, caregiving, grief, and the end of life, in person and virtually.

00:00 Meet Helen Dunkel

01:11 From Birth to Hospice

03:08 Crying and Presence

05:05 Cup of Tea Care

07:50 Supporting Caregivers

09:46 Calming Bedside Panic

13:24 Hospice Bridge Role1

8. Hearing Voices: Legacy Recordings with Barrie Farivar of Leaf

Season 1 · Episode 7

Wednesday, July 1, 2026 • Duration 20:46

Website: sharewithleaf.com

Instagram: @sharewithleaf

There are sounds we hold onto. The way someone says our name. A laugh we would know anywhere. In this episode I sit down with Barrie Farivar, founder of Leaf, to talk about capturing the voices and stories of the people we love before they fade.

Barrie spent fourteen years in technology at Google and YouTube. Then her dad shared an old recording of her grandmother, and hearing that voice changed something for her. She left to build Leaf, a simple app for recording and saving the voices we never want to lose. We talk about why a voice reaches us so deeply, how to gather these moments without making them feel like work, and how our relationship with a recording shifts as we move through grief.

In this conversation

00:00 Welcome and Setup

00:24 Meet Bari and Leaf

01:38 Origin Story: From Seed to Sprout

04:06 How Leaf Works

05:59 Why Voice Matters

07:27 Recording During Illness

08:46 Family Stories and Legacy

10:12 Grief and Listening Later

11:15 Simple Prompts to Ask

13:56 Privacy and Control

14:36 Favorite Recordings

17:16 Albums and Group Gifts

18:49 Where to Find Leaf

19:31 Closing Reflections

Try this at home

7. The Casserole and the Getaway Car

Season 1 · Episode 7

Thursday, June 25, 2026 • Duration 15:16

We bring the casserole. We say a quick thing at the door. Then we get out fast, because standing in someone's grief with no plan to fix it is the part that scares us most. This episode is for the bystanders, the friends who want to help in the midst of death.

We take apart the belief that keeps us frozen, that we need the right words to show up for someone. There are no right words. There is no sentence that fixes grief, and grief is not here to be fixed. What people remember is not the clumsy thing you said. It is who stayed, and who disappeared. This one gives you something to do with your hands and your heart instead of fleeing.

"The wrong thing said by someone who showed up is worth a hundred times more than the perfect thing you never said because you stayed home".

Carol's Tuna Casserole

Since we spent the whole episode on casserole, here is one worth bringing. My mom's tuna casserole is still the one I crave when times are tough.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

3 1/2 cups wide egg noodles
1 can tuna, drained
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 cup celery, chopped
1/3 cup onion, chopped
1 teaspoon salt
1 can cream of celery soup
1/2 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Directions:

Cook the noodles until just tender, then drain.
Combine the noodles with the tuna, mayonnaise, celery, onion, and salt.
In a separate pot blend the soup and milk over low heat, then fold in the cheese until it melts. (RIP Moira Rose)
Add the cheese mixture to the noodles and stir to coat.
Bake at 350 for 20 minutes, preferably in an antique Pyrex casserole dish.

Timestamps

6. Dead People Don't Need Resumés

Season 1 · Episode 1

Wednesday, June 17, 2026 • Duration 12:45

Someone you love has died, and now there is a blank page to fill. Most of us freeze and reach for the dates and the job titles, and somehow the warm, funny, real person disappears behind a list.

This week we do it differently. Because a eulogy is not a resume. It is the story of a person. It is your chance to stand in front of everyone who loved them and say, out loud, here is who they were, and here is how we will carry them.

You do not have to be a writer to do this. You only have to be honest. And in this episode, we walk through it together, one gentle step at a time.

In this episode, we talk about:

Where to begin when the page is blank and your heart is heavy
How to gather memories from the other people who loved them
Why one small moment says more than a lifetime of achievements
How to find the thread that ran through their whole life
The quirks and habits worth keeping in, and why they matter so much
How to close in a way that stays with the gathering
A reminder to be gentle with yourself while you write

"Presence matters more than perfection. You only have to tell us the truth of someone you loved."

This one is tender, and a little funny in places, and I hope it leaves you feeling a bit braver about a task most of us dread.

Resources mentioned

Grab the free downloadable eulogy guide, plus everything else, on my resources page: https://christybraun.com/resources

Let's stay connected

If there's something you are dying to ask, I'm right here at christy@christybraun.com.

TIMELINE

00:00 Facing the Blank Page

01:33 What a Eulogy Is

5. Congratulations on your diagnosis: As a free bonus, you'll be handling everyone else's feelings about it.

Season 1 · Episode 5

Monday, June 8, 2026 • Duration 08:02

5. Congratulations on your diagnosis: As a free bonus, you'll be handling everyone else's feelings about it.

One of my closest friends called me today because she wasn't sure how to explain what I do to someone who needed help. I could have felt some kind of way about that. Instead it gave me this episode.

In this one I talk about the part of my work that almost nobody names. When you get a diagnosis, the people who love you start having their own experience of it, and somewhere along the way you become the person managing the room. You soften the news so your sister can handle it. You reassure everyone that you're fine so they can sleep. You end up carrying your own diagnosis and everyone else's feelings about it at the same time.

This is a look at what a death doula actually does in the middle of treatment, long before the very end. Finding your center when a diagnosis has scattered it. Finding the words to ask for what you need. Setting boundaries with the people in your life and having help saying them out loud. Handling the practical paperwork at your pace and nobody else's. And remembering that you are allowed to be in the center of your own experience.

If you are in it right now, or you love someone who is, this one is for you.

www.christybraun.com

Christy@ChristyBraun.com

Death Doula Training: https://go.compassdoulaacademy.com/live-online-doula-training-cohort

00:00 Friend Can’t Explain My Work

01:28 Beyond the Medical Room

02:21 Finding Your Center Again

03:06 Carrying Everyone Else’s Feelings

04:31 Boundaries and Real Support

05:04 Outside Person Who Can Hold It

4. Failure is NOT an Option

Season 1 · Episode 4

Wednesday, June 3, 2026 • Duration 13:19

In the latest episode of 'Dying to Ask,' we tackle the profound and often unspoken belief that death equates to failure. Join me as I offer a new perspective that transforms the narrative around life's inevitable completion, encouraging presence, love, and the understanding that death deserves as much care as birth.

ChristyBraun.com for more information and resources.

00:00 Welcome and Core Belief

00:53 Death as a Battle

02:39 Where the War Language Came From

04:09 The Hidden Harm of Failure

06:30 Death as Completion

08:32 Presence Over Perfection

09:08 What a Tended Death Looks Like

11:08 Letting Go of Guilt

12:59 www.ChristyBraun.com

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Dying To Ask with Christy B. – Details, episodes & analysis

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Dying To Ask with Christy B. – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

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Publication history

Latest published episodes

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