“Consider the Conversation”

In early 2009, hospice worker Mike Bernhagen and filmmaker Terry Kaldhusdal of southern Wisconsin came together for a project that would become the film Consider the Conversation: A Documentary on a Taboo Subject. The project explores the 21^st century American struggle with the conversation about the end-of-life.

The film, which debuted in February 2011 and was recognized in the Best Shorts international film and television competition, seeks to stimulate communication about the end-of-life by providing “the questions we need to contemplate.”

Motivated by their own experiences with grief and loss, the producers set out with three main goals for the film:

1. Change the American attitude from viewing the end-of-life as a “failed medical event” to one that sees it as a normal process.

2. Inspire dialogue.

3. Encourage healthcare professionals and organizations and religious leaders to take the lead in counseling others.

This project acknowledges the historical shift in how we die. Forty years ago, the slow, incremental end-of-life process was far less common than it is today. Our culture’s comfort with the subject has not yet fully evolved to meet the needs of this process.

The film looks at multiple perspectives on end-of-life care through interviews with patients, family, healthcare workers, clergy, social workers, and industry experts around the country. It opens with on-the-street interviews in New York City.

Consider the Conversation raises the important point that death and dying are still largely taboo subjects in our culture – but we need to move beyond the taboo. By opening the conversation about the end-of-life, we can finally ensure that we will not only live the life we want, but we will be able to die the way want to.

Learn more at considertheconversation.org.