This blog was written by Gina Tarditi, one of the first graduates from our MSc in End of Life Studies.
On October 25th 2023, the Center for Palliative Care of Mexico1 organized the first “Café con Catrina” in Mexico City, which 28 people attended. The meeting was inspired by Death Café and Death Over Dinner. Both these movements, utilizing different structures, seek to break the silence around death and dying that is partly rooted in the fear that the mere idea of dying provokes today in most people. Their success has grown in such a way that they have gone global and today they are now present in many countries around the world, in both face-to-face and virtual forms. The Mexican “Café con Catrina” gets its name from a Mexican character, Catrina, a female skeleton, who has become an iconic representation of death not only in Mexico but well beyond our borders.
According to the Spanish Royal Academy, ‘catrina’ means elegant or dressy. The Mexican lithographer José Guadalupe Posadas designed her in 1912 and later, Diego Rivera, the well-known Mexican artist, named her as La Catrina.
Café con Catrina aims to be a space for spontaneous conversation among different groups in Mexican society interested in reflecting, in a respectful and playful way, on what frightens and confronts them about a reality from which nobody can escape. Death touches us all, but we can learn different, and hopefully healthier ways to relate to it and perhaps, also, generate a different perspective that makes us live life more fully. Because in the end, if we talk about death, it is because we are alive. So, talking about death necessarily leads us to talk about life, its value, meaning, and purpose.
In this first tertulia2 on October 25th 2023, there were 28 of us. The majority were professionally involved with the end of life, such as doctors, nurses, thanatologists and social workers. Other attendees were less directly involved, such as the young people that work at the Chez Vous café, who not only surprised us with the decoration for the Day of the Dead and their kind diligence, but they also showed genuine interest in the Café con Catrina.
The discussion topic was selected randomly from various prepared prompts: What does being sick mean nowadays? Does it represent a challenge or a failure? A doctor explained how difficult it has been as a medical clinician to understand that the impossibility of curing a patient does not represent a failure; on the contrary, he has found that caring and accompanying a terminal patient until death is very gratifying.
A nurse told the group that while he is not in favor of the arguments that claim that positive thinking and the healing power of self-affirmations can prevent or cure almost every illness, there are patients who find hope in these beliefs. Other participants reflected on some detrimental consequences that these ideas may have for some patients who may feel guilty or weak at the end of their lives.
This first tertulia lasted two hours with most participants expressing gratitude and interest in attending future gatherings. Thus, CECPAM will continue organizing “Café con Catrina. A singular tertulia” periodically, and the invitation will be opened to anyone who wishes to join. Each time, the topic will be selected at random; among them, aging, illness, pain, suffering, palliative care, advanced planning, assisted dying, funerals, rituals and bereavement.
Each participant will have the opportunity to contribute to the conversation so that we can, all together, build new knowledge and help demystify these issues so that finally, each one takes what they believe may be useful for them in their daily lives, according to their personalities, experiences and beliefs. It is important to clarify that this is not a therapeutic or emotional containment space. It is, quite simply, a tertulia.
- CECPAM is a non-governmental organization that since 2006 provides domiciliary palliative care throughout Mexico City, some municipalities in the State of Mexico and more recently, in the State of Morelos. As of 2021, they also serve pediatric population. The organization also delivers different educational programs for nurses, social workers and caregivers. ↩︎
- Tertulia is a Spanish word used to describe an informal and periodic meeting of people interested in a topic—from politics and sports to any branch of the arts, science or philosophy—to debate and inform themselves, or share and contrast opinions. ↩︎