Dying to Tell You

Join the Dance: A Reflection

Alan Watts said "The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance." This week, Cody reminds us that change isn't something we control but how we react to it is. Without exception, every single guest on Dying To Tell You has come face-to-face with something they neither expected nor wanted. Change has crashed into their lives, shattering their sense of a normal world. Last week's episode with Bridget is a perfect—and somewhat literal—expression of that idea. After being cancer free for years, a car crash brought cancer back into her life and now she's facing it once again, but with a different perspective. In this week's Reflection, Cody talks about the whiplash he's felt in the past several weeks, bouncing from life event to life event (to life event), all of them momentous, none of them the same. He turns to the teachings of Eckhart Tolle for support. And the words of Alan Watts set the beat for he and the rest of us can keep moving.

E407 - We Talk Living, Not Numbers: Defying the Odds of Stage Four Breast Cancer

Five years cancer-free, Bridget thought she was in the clear — until a scan the day of a minor surgery revealed stage four metastatic breast cancer. A hospice and palliative care nurse practitioner herself, she talks with Cody about the oncologist who told her "we don't talk numbers, we talk living," the financial toll no one warns you about, her faith, and why she's determined to outlive every statistic she's ever been given. Join us for a conversation about living fully, on her own terms. Sponsored by Iliff Death Care Collective - https://www.iliff.edu/death-care-collective/

Don't Grab the Tissue: A Reflection

Sitting with someone facing difficulty—an illness, a crisis of any kind, even their own mortality—is in itself difficult. And how we react in those moments can either make it easier for that person, or harder. Many times, our instinct is to soothe. And while that's not wrong, the way we go about it might be. This week, Cody reflects on something Courtney brought up in last week's episode, when the people around her offered what they thought was comfort but instead delivered the exact opposite effect. Be sure to listen to Courtney's full episode "Living Inside I Don't Know" and find all episodes at dttypodcast.com

E406 - Living Inside “I Don’t Know”: When Answers are as Rare as the Cancer

Courtney was in the best shape of her life — and also the most exhausted she'd ever been. Her body had started sending signals that no one, including herself, knew how to read yet. A stroke scare that turned out to be a misdiagnosed migraine. Weeks of worsening symptoms she chalked up to ordinary aches. And then, on a family trip to Mexico, a swollen neck that sent her home and straight into emergency surgery. What followed was a diagnosis so rare that her own doctors didn't have statistics to give her — she was told, at first, that she had "the good kind" of cancer. She didn't. She asked, point-blank, whether she was going to die, and got the only honest answer available: I don't know. Four years later, after a successful treatment, she's still living inside that answer. Courtney and Cody talk about the twelve days between diagnosis and chemo, the slow stretch from three-month scans to yearly ones, and the arm lump she's mid-wait on right now — a fresh round of "I don't know" playing out in real time. They talk about the strange, hard-won gift of learning to trust herself after years of not being able to, the unsettling nature of strangers projecting their faith onto her, and why "I'll pray for you" can be the emptiest thing a person can say — and what to do instead. And they talk about what she wants to leave behind for her kids: not a diagnosis, but a habit of kindness. Find Courtney online as @cancercourtney and at https://cancercourtney-press.cliniewski.chatgpt.site Dying to Tell You is sponsored by the Iliff School of Theology's Death Care Collective. Learn more about their educational programs for end-of-life care at https://www.iliffdeathcare.com

Good Job: A Reflection

As a palliative care chaplain, Cody has helped hundreds of people transition from life to death. This past week, he faced a different but maybe more relatable situation for the majority of us—his dog died. And as he and his wife sat on the floor and helped their dog through his final moments, they told him, "Good job." We should all be so lucky. In this week's reflection, Cody talks about his conversation with Jonathan and how it reminded him of the moving and hopeful vision he has about a peaceful end of life, when all your loved ones come to tell you that you've done well and to thank you for all you've done.

E405 - Movement Is Medicine: How an Ironman Faces Stage Four Cancer

Jonathan Pascual is a lung transplant nurse practitioner and 16-time Ironman finisher who's spent years helping other people through the end of their lives. Now, three and a half years into his own terminal diagnosis, he's still training, still racing — including a finish at the Ironman World Championship in Kona. Movement is his medicine, and stoic philosophy is his compass. Join Cody for a conversation about clarity, defiance, and what it means to keep choosing to move, even when the rock keeps rolling back down.

Falling Back into the Arms of Each Other: A Reflection

Nobody turns to their car for comfort. Nobody's pain is eased by holding a wad of cash. Especially in times of challenge, all we have is each other. Cody's deeply personal reflection this week points to this critical fact of life. We see this so movingly in MaRee's kids coming together to support her as she sold her house and became the wandering mom with ALS, welcome in every home, supported at every turn. And Cody himself saw this when he attended and spoke at a dear friend's Celebration of Life this past week. Amid all the grief and sadness, he felt the real meaning of connection and support from the people around him. All we have is each other. Give it a listen today, and be sure to listen to MaRee's full episode if you haven't already.

E404 - Do It Now: Living with ALS, One Trip at a Time

It took MaRee two full years to figure out what was happening to her body, and at the end of that frustrating journey she faced the one diagnosis she most feared — ALS. Maybe because of the severity of that diagnosis. Maybe because she's a hospice nurse of 17 years who's cared for ALS patients and knows what's coming. Or maybe because she simply is who she is. Whatever the reason, MaRee took the advice she was given straight to her generous heart: Do It Now. Don't wait. She quit her job, sold her home, and has been traveling with her family ever since. She's racked up more miles than anyone else we can think of in the year since she's been diagnosed. For more information on the sponsor of this episode, please visit the Iliff Death Care Collective. For free access to additional content and updates from Cody, visit our Patreon! And to listen to music from this episode and all episodes, follow our ever-growing playlist on Spotify.

The Person Remains: A Reflection

Why? The shortest, most impossible question. The ironies and injustices of terminal diagnoses seem impossible to reconcile. They came up in last week's episode as we talked with Ross, who went from expert to patient in the space of four days. Cody reflects on not just that but also on what we can do when we face these kinds of unanswerable questions. And the one thing he finds we can do is kindness. We can be kind. And for people facing their own terminal diagnosis, we can be kind in a very specific, meaningful way.

E403 — Cancer Expert, Cancer Patient: A Doctor Faces the Disease He Knows Best

Who better to get lung cancer than one of the world’s leading experts on lung cancer? Admittedly, the word “better” is not really right here. But this is essentially what we heard from Dr. Ross Camidge when he sat down to talk with Cody for this week’s episode. Ross is a global expert in his field, the doctor other doctors go to. In 2022, he was diagnosed with a form of advanced non-small cell lung cancer driven by a specific acquired genetic change in the tumor cells — one of the exact types of lung cancer he has spent his career researching and treating. For more than two years, Ross kept his diagnosis close, only telling a small circle of peers and his family for fear of negatively impacting his patients and the work he still had left to do. But disease progression eventually made it impossible to hide it any longer, and he came out of his diagnosis closet. When people found out he had the very type of cancer he’s an expert on, they’d often react with dismay at the irony. “You’re the last person who should get this,” they’d say. But Ross sees things differently. Who better to understand and navigate cancer’s maze of diagnoses and decisions? Who better to learn through his own experience what it has been like for the community of cancer patients he’s treated for years? And who better to take this two-sided coin of knowledge to the world and share what he’s seen? As he says, he sees it as a privilege that he gets to “take one diagnosis for the team.” Join Cody and Ross for a brilliant, touching, highly informative and poignantly funny conversation about facing a cancer diagnosis with every card on the table. For more information on the sponsor of this episode, please visit the Iliff Death Care Collective. For free access to additional content and updates from Cody, visit our Patreon! And to listen to music from this episode and all episodes, follow our ever-growing playlist on Spotify.

Can You Be a Gentle Place? A Reflection

Difficult situations can either harden our hearts or open them. And generosity is a choice that each of us can make to resist hardening ourselves, to instead soften and be a safe place for others who might be feeling vulnerable and in need. Join Cody for this week's reflection on generosity and softening our hearts in the face of difficulty, thoughts inspired by his conversation last week with Jody. Be sure to join our community on Patreon for free at patreon.com/DyingToTellYou for more content. And if you feel called to support those who are dying, please visit our sponsor, the Iliff Death Care Collective, where you can find courses to help you pursuit this worthwhile journey.

E402 — Crash Landing: A Mother's Journey Into Grace

Jody Gelb had a calm, healthy pregnancy — and then, in the span of a single hospital stay, everything changed. A rushed delivery. Forceps. A baby who wasn't breathing. An emergency trip to the NICU before Jody had even held her daughter. Days later, a nurse handed her the poem "Welcome to Holland," a metaphor often given to parents of children with special needs. You planned a trip to Italy, you landed somewhere unexpected, and it turns out to be lovely too. Jody appreciated it. But it didn't fit. Holland was calm. This was a crash landing. In this conversation, Jody — a stage actor with 40 years on New York and San Francisco stages, and author of the memoir She May Be Lying Down, But She May Be Very Happy — tells her daughter Louisa's story on her behalf. She and Cody trace the slow climb from that terrifying first year — hoping for a limp, then a wheelchair, then simply that her daughter would know she was loved — through years of real joy, a tracheostomy, and a worldwide community of families who taught her how to keep her heart open. It's a story about how much a person can survive, and how grace tends to show up exactly when it's needed — in a husband's words, a stranger's kindness, a stage manager who drove a grieving mother home.

• Transcript

Looking Up: A Reflection

Sometimes it takes the unexpected—even the unwanted—to remind us of the extraordinary experience of living. In our first Reflection of Season 4, Cody shares his thoughts on his conversation with Keaton, a young father who was living what he called an "ordinary life" until his diagnosis of cancer. Listen to Keaton's full story here or on dttypodcast.com. Be sure to join our community on Patreon for free at patreon.com/DyingToTellYou for more content. And if you feel called to support those who are dying, please visit our sponsor, the Iliff Death Care Collective, where you can find courses to help you pursuit this worthwhile journey.

E401 — One of One: Advocating for Your Life in a System Built for Many

At 35, Keaton was an "average guy" — husband, dad to a two-year-old, into cooking and woodworking — until a routine ER visit found tumors on his liver. Now living with intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, Keaton talks with Cody about what it took to get his doctors to listen, the loneliness of "cancer planet," and chasing a shot at a liver transplant — all while training to climb Mount Rainier for cancer research. Keaton is our first guest of Season 4. Be sure to subscribe on your preferred podcast platform to get all the upcoming episodes including Cody's reflections between guests. And join us over on Patreon for free to connect with a community of life-minded folks who are living life to the fullest: https://www.patreon.com/DyingToTellYou >>Theme Music by Michael Shynes, "The Other Side"<< Music featured in this week's episode: Jackson Rau, Vampire Ziv Moran, Evergreen Louis Island, I Know a Place J. Lind, For What It’s Worth

Pre-Season 4 Encore - Sue

As we get ready to start Season 4 of Dying To Tell You (next week!), we wanted to share with you the first episode of each preceding season. Our final encore episode this week is Sue. In this first episode from Season 3, Sue shares her beautiful story with us all the way from Melbourne, Australia. She found us through the podcast Chris produces for Sounds True, "Insights At The Edge." (Thank you again, Tami Simon!) Sue experienced an Out of Body Experience (OBE) when she received her cancer diagnosis, and her story is so full of life, love, and an entire reframing of our human experience. We'll be following up with Sue very soon to see how she's doing. You'll be able to hear that callback episode when it's ready, as well as other bonus materials as we have them, on our Patreon. It's free to join! Give Sue your time and attention today, and we'll see you next week for Season 4!

Pre-Season Four Encore - Aimee

As we get ready to start Season 4 of Dying To Tell You (can you believe it?), we wanted to share with you the first episode of each preceding season. This week is Aimee, who kicked off Season 2. Aimee is the daughter of Linda, who was a guest of the show in Season 1. As Linda approached the end of her life, she chose M.A.I.D. (Medial Aid In Dying), which is legal in Colorado. With the approval of her healthcare team, Linda decided on the time and place of her death and prepared for it with her family. Aimee welcomed Linda into her home and was in the room as Linda took her MAID "cocktail" and laid down for her final moments. The story leading up to and throughout this experience is both more down-to-earth and hilarious than you might expect, as well as being truly touching and beautiful. Aimee and her family helped Linda through her final days, and sitting down at her kitchen table to hear about it all was truly a blessing for us. Much thanks and gratitude to Aimee and her family for being so welcoming and open.

Pre-Season Four Encore - Aaron

As we get ready to start Season 4 of Dying To Tell You (can you believe it?), we wanted to share with you the first episode of each preceding season, starting with the man who started it all—Aaron. If you're not familiar with Aaron's story, we were connected with him before the pandemic as a possible first guest for this show. And of course, we had to put everything on hold while the planet shut down. But then we reconnected with Aaron, invited him over to Chris's house and, balancing microphones on tables on tubs, we recorded this interview. We are eternally grateful for the gift Aaron gave us that day, which was himself.

Dying To Tell You Trailer

Dying To Tell You is a weekly podcast about death, dying, and life. Palliative Care Chaplain Cody Hufstedler sits down with people living with terminal illness for intimate conversations exploring how facing our finish line brings clarity, wisdom, even joy. Join these people who are facing everything from cancer and ALS to Alzheimer’s and rare diseases to hear wonderfully insightful explorations of life, no matter what stage you’re in.

Fluent: A Reflection on Living Open to Life's Unexpected Turns

In our last reflection of the season, Cody looks back on his conversation with Clara as well as the entire congregation of guests we were honored to talk with over the past year. Clara's statement that cancer takes and takes and takes but it also gives inspired this meditation on flexibility, multiple truths, and staying open to whatever comes our way. Thank you for listening to the stories of our guests this season. We are moved by this privilege to share these inspiring voices and we can't wait to share more next season. Until then, do what needs to be done, say what needs to be said, and live your life with intention and purpose. This is Dying to Tell You.

Cancer Takes and Takes, But It Also Gives: Clara's Story

At age 31, Clara sits down with Cody to discuss a year that changed everything. What started as hip pain from running turned into a devastating diagnosis: Stage 4 Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer with metastases to her bones, liver, brain, and pelvis. Clara shares her journey through aggressive chemotherapy that nearly killed her, the difficult decision to stop treatment, and facing the loss of her ability to have biological children. She talks honestly about moving from independence to needing help, learning to voice her needs, and the challenge of setting boundaries when you're sick. Far from giving up, Clara has found new purpose in advocacy work and is looking forward to skydiving, traveling, and being there for the people she loves.