I’ve come a long way in my “let’s talk about it” journey. And by “IT,” I mean death and dying and getting older and grief and loss and the normalcy of IT all — stuff everyone’s always DYING to talk about at gatherings, not.

I say I’ve come a long way because my mom died when I was 20, back when absolutely no one was talking about IT. Now, IT is all I want to talk about because I feel it’s this conversation is the single most critical piece to a workable Grand Plan, yet few people are ready to jump right into the real talk. Like every other life situation, communication is key when it comes to managing our golden years. So why the heck aren’t we more open to it?

It’s probably because it’s scary talking about our mortality. Maybe it’s human nature. But that’s dumb, IMHO — and not very healthy, like not at all. After Mom died unexpectedly in 1992, we tiptoed around talking about her in our suddenly three-quarters family of four. My brother and I were encouraged to “stay strong” for our grandparents and family, which to me felt so fake and scary and wrong. I was sad and needed someone to stay strong for me darn it! Yet, onward we trudged, saying very little to each other about what had happened, how we were handling it and what our future as as family looked like without her. As a consequence, I felt like a total weirdo. No one else I knew had lost a parent, or at least, no one willing to talk about it. So death felt taboo and FOR TOTAL WEIRDOS ONLY. My dad cleared out our family home several months later after my brother and I returned to school and he dealt with all the paperwork and planning. None the hard work ever really touched me — the closet clean-out, the weepy conversations, the move, addressing the legal and medical stuff, none of it. My dad just did it — he did allllllllll the things, wizz, bam, boom. It was the same modus operandi when my grandmother and maternal grandparents eventually passed away. It was someone else’s mess, it was not on my to-do list. As a result, I learned nothing about the hardships of death and post-loss. I remained blissfully unaware of anything painful. To this day, I’m not sure whether to be grateful for that, or to consider it a missed opportunity.

Maybe that’s just not stuff most 20-somethings need to talk about. Fair enough.

Not talking about it, however, had long-lasting implications. I was a bottled up freak show just waiting to explode. As I went into my late-20s and motherhood, I still rarely encountered people who had lost a parent and were willing to flog it out there and real talk and boo hoo about it with me. That is, until I stumbled upon a community of people on the line: MOTHERLESS DAUGHTERS. I felt like I’d hit pay dirt. I was stupefied. There were actually people out there MY AGE — some younger even — who had lost a parent. And they were being honest with their feelings and how they were handling it. For the first time, I felt like a non-total-weirdo. I was finally equipped and in-the-know.

But I soon learned was still deplorably uneducated.

Flash forward to five years ago when I was helping an elderly couple navigate their geri-misfortunes. That was when the real learning began. As their power of attorney and “person” I took a crash course in home health care management, senior living, geriatric issues, medical and psychological trauma, multi-home stuff purging and righting financial distress. It was the worst course ever! Worse than the Algebra II class I failed in high school! Much, much worse than Dad made it look! I was pissed this was all such a surprise. But nonetheless, I received my bachelor’s degree in Navigating Geri-crises. I was getting so smart!

Then Dad died and I pursued my masters in death coping. I doubled down on hospital experiences and funeral preparations, legal drama and more stuff purging. Though I felt somewhat more prepared for this work both mentally and practically, I still felt pissed. Pissed this was all such a stupid secret. Pissed at all the people in my life who had already gotten their higher death degrees for not revealing their helpful truth to me. Pissed that I’d spent so many years of my life feeling like TOTAL WEIRDO.

It doesn’t have to be this way, folks! Conversation is the key to honest understanding, expectations and the peace they both bring. Conversation is the key to it all!

I like to describe my current educational status as an ABD (All But Dissertation) Ph.D student in geri-talking and all things Grand Planning. I still have a lot to learn, but I’m in communication mode. I’m talking about it. My doctoral work requires me to share, share, share and put the conversation out on the table — to convince all the beautiful TOTAL WEIRDOS out there they are not, in fact, total weirdos. It’s my work now to normalize it all and help save my fellow Gen Xers from feeling unnecessarily unprepared for or overwhelmed by their senior experience on the horizon.

Recently, I read Michael Hebb’s bestselling book “Let’s Talk About Death (Over Dinner).” I encourage anyone and everyone to read this book, it puts this whole conversation thing in perspective.

“We’re a little messed up about death, to put it bluntly,” Hebb says in his book’s first few pages. “On the one hand, it’s all around us. We flock to dark cable dramas and slow down our cars out of morbid fascination with traffic accidents. But to talk about it with one another? Honestly and openly? Forget it. When we live within this contradiction, we lose the chance for connection, communication, healing and the richness and value that can come from facing our mortality head-on.”

Hebb prescribes dinner events with family and friends during which guests honestly explore questions about death. Each chapter is a prompt and includes his experiences with people answering them. His list of question includes: If you had only thirty days left to live, how would you spend them? Your last day? Your last hour?; How do you talk to kids about death?; Do you believe in an afterlife; and What would you want people to say about you at your funeral? There are so many more that get my brain working, you simply must check out or purchase this book and see how it inspires you and conversations you’re willing to have with your family and friends.

I think Hebb, and so many other brave writers who share their experiences with death and post-death, are spot on in their intentions: talking about it is healing work. Other great books that push this agenda include Katy Butler’s “The Art of Dying Well: A Practical Guide to a Good End of Life” and “Knocking on Heaven’s Door,” and “Margareta Magnusson’s ‘The Swedish Art of Aging Exuberantly” and “The Swedish Art of Death Cleaning.” These are all excellent, perspective-filling reads.

Our mortality and that of our loved ones should not shock us in any way. We should expect it, plan for it and celebrate it — and most of all, we should begin honest conversations about it. #GrandPlans