Laurel Miller

Laurel is passionate about working with people, young and old, around end-of-life topics.  She completed the Anam Cara Program at the Sacred Art of Living Center.  She volunteers with Compassion and Choices working with individuals and their families as they make their end-of-life choices.  She’s a member of the Southern Oregon Hevre Kadisha.  She leads workshops that support the participant’s desire to explore themselves and the mystery of life and death.  Also a seasoned mediator, an independent coach and facilitator, Laurel is dedicated to supporting individuals and the conversations that they need to have before they are no longer able. 

 

Pat Fitzsimmons

Pat is currently the volunteer "on-call" chaplain for Asante Ashland Community Hospice and has served with the organization for the last seven years. He is ordained as an interfaith minister and spent 18 years living, working and teaching in intentional spiritual communities. Pat has continued his education here in Oregon completing four modules of the Richard Groves, Anam Cara training. Pat says: “I see myself as an ‘anam cara’, a soul friend and companion. I am ineffably drawn to abiding in the mystery of the moment with those in the dying process (and aren't we all)."

 

Jennifer Mathews

Jen is a writer, consultant and laughter yogini with a passion for uplifting the human spirit. After her life-partner died in 2011, Jen began sharing her experiences of death, grief, joy and optimism to support others on their journeys (JenniferMathews.com). In her 2019 TEDx Talk "Death is Inevitable, Grief is Not," she challenges us to rethink the expectation of grief and how we respond to death. In recent years, Jen has worked with the community outreach and training team for the award-winning film Death Makes Life Possible. She has facilitated conversations about death and the afterlife across the US, as well as the UK and Ireland. Her home base is Mount Shasta, CA.

 

Judy Dolmatch

Judy is a licensed clinical social worker, practicing in Ashland since 1988, with a specialty in life passages and trauma recovery. She teaches and performs Playback Theatre, improvisational theatre based on audience stories. She facilitates Zegg Forum, a group process that values authenticity and aliveness. With the death of her mother last year, she immersed herself in a process of exploring end of life issues, loss and grief through literature, media and ritual. Judy attended her first Death Cafe this year. It was so meaningful that she was motivated to become a facilitator for the Ashland Death Cafe. 

 

Judith Milburn

Judith is a psycho-spiritual, Jungian oriented depth psychologist particularly concerned

with making peace with one’s inner depths and learning to love ones self unconditionally,

as the way to live fully and prepare for conscious dying. She says, “Death, has presented itself to me viewing my great grandmother lying in her casket in her darkened living room, hearing my grandfather before he died say he was hearing the angels sing, brushing my Mother’s hair moments after she had died, and sitting with my brother as he released his last breath.  I am a student of this Great Mystery."

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Julie Freed

Julie was “introduced” to death at birth as her 2 year old sister had died 2 weeks prior.  It’s been a lifelong journey that brought fear of death for much of her childhood and recently has turned her towards exploring the vast field of death and dying after attending a Death Walker training last year.   She is also honored to be part of the Hevre Kadisha for many years. She is studying dream therapy and teaches yoga, facilitates constellation groups, dream circles and loves bringing people together.  Ashland and this beloved community have been her home for over 20 years.

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Mira Sophia

Moved by people’s willingness to speak about death and share from a place of depth and vulnerability, Mira was drawn to the Ashland Death Cafe. She spent two years as a hospice volunteer and has been in service to friends who desired home death ceremonies. She is honored to be a part of the local Hevre Kadisha. As a compassionate teacher, mentor and guide, Mira creates ceremonial space for deep healing and transformation including sacred travel pilgrimages. She has been a group facilitator for over 25 years. Her life is about depth and mystery which she explores through her personal relationships, community and being in service. She has lived in Ashland for 20 years.

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Hayriya Heidi Hansen

Born on Halloween this ‘good witch’ seeks to uplift and empower individuals struggling with life threatening diseases. Through her Compassionate Care business she gently coaches, supports and honors each person and family with their unique life and death challenges. 
Additionally, Hayriya has adult adoptee support groups and meditation circles in Santa Cruz, Williams and Ashland. Her enthusiasm, honesty, and positive approach to life and death is palpable and infectious. Sitting at the bedside of dying people for over fifteen years,  Hayriya is a private End of Life Doula and also volunteers with Southern Oregon Friends of Hospice at Celia’s House.

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Estevan Serrano

Estevan is an Arizona native happy to be among the trees in Oregon. Before moving to Ashland with his partner Kristen and their canine sidekick Khloe, Estevan facilitated retreats for men and their high-school aged sons. When he discovered ADC, he fell in love with the open dialogue and group contemplation of death. Since then he has felt called to help to open more conversation around death in our community. He also loves and hiking and his connection to nature is central to his interest in life, death, and the connection between matter and consciousness. He is passionate about creating healthy relationships and sharing conversation around these topics so that we may live happier lives rich with meaning. When he’s not helping entrepreneurs improve their marketing Estevan can be found clipping blackberries, doing yoga or listening to books.

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Ian Luepker

Ian Luepker is a naturopathic physician with a special interest in palliative and hospice care. As a hospice volunteer thirty years ago, Ian began to recognize that at the end of life there is often a 'window of healing' that opens for both the individual who is dying, and for the friends and family supporting and caring for that person. Taking a holistic approach that considers mental, emotional, physical, social and spiritual suffering, Dr. Luepker offers a form of consciousness medicine called Ketamine-Assisted Therapy (KAT) to support people with treatment resistant depression, anxiety, and end-of-life suffering. By regularly contemplating death and impermanence through meditation and open discussion, Ian amplifies his gratitude for life and continues to fine-tune his search for meaning. 

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Ian Luepker

Ian Luepker is a naturopathic physician with a special interest in palliative and hospice care. As a hospice volunteer thirty years ago, Ian began to recognize that at the end of life there is often a 'window of healing' that opens for both the individual who is dying, and for the friends and family supporting and caring for that person. Taking a holistic approach that considers mental, emotional, physical, social and spiritual suffering, Dr. Luepker offers a form of consciousness medicine called Ketamine-Assisted Therapy (KAT) to support people with treatment resistant depression, anxiety, and end-of-life suffering. By regularly contemplating death and impermanence through meditation and open discussion, Ian amplifies his gratitude for life and continues to fine-tune his search for meaning. 

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Art Fortgang

I was a teacher for over 30 years.  I also worked with novice teachers remotely. This work involved facilitating discussions concerning subject matter/curriculum, classroom management, and/or working with difficult students.  I learned early on that during these on-line group meetings, participants learned more from one another than they did from me.  After my father died when I was 19 and got back to my university, I was aware that friends seemed antsy around me.  Years later, when someone I knew had a parent die, I found myself gravitating towards them. I would often offer my condolences and let them know I would be available to chat if they wanted to talk.  I’ve come to learn that my greatest contribution to being with grieving friends was to simply listen. In late 2018 after reading about an ADC meeting, I decided that I wanted to participate.  I've come to most meetings since then.  After the first session, I realized I was comfortable chatting with folks with whom I had never met before—listening to their intimate thoughts about death of loved ones, deaths they’d dealt with in the past, and potential near-future deaths of folks they know and love.  I saw how the ADC facilitators did not make judgements about what participants said but focused on the commonality of what was being said.  I also experienced how some of the participants started to be more confident with their conceptions of death.  I saw the benefit of having these discussions and decided that I wanted to be part of this process as a participant and facilitator.

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EMERITUS Facilitators:

Selene Seltzer
Lily Myers Kaplan

Barbara Acquilino

Michael Cecil

Julian Spalding 

Eric Grace

Anya Kumara