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What Hospice Nurse Penny Knows: Truths About Death
53 Plays2 months ago
What if the way we fear death is actually what makes it harder?
In this episode, Jennifer sits down with Hospice Nurse Penny to talk about what really happens at the end of life, the moments most people never see, and the truths that change how we think about dying. Penny shares her journey into hospice later in life, how her own fear of death led her to this work, and why caring for dying people became some of the most meaningful work she’s ever done.
They explore deathbed experiences, the signs people show when they know they’re dying, and why many loved ones pass when family step out of the room. Penny explains how open conversations around death can ease anxiety, bring peace, and help people live more fully long before the end arrives. These are stories that are honest, emotional, and deeply human.
The conversation also dives into how Penny took hospice education online, why one story went viral, and how social media has become a powerful way to normalize death for millions of people. Together, Jennifer and Penny talk about authenticity, trust, misinformation, and why talking about death openly may be one of the most important conversations we’re avoiding.
Tune in to hear the stories we rarely say out loud, and why understanding death might actually help us live better.
Key Topics:
-Finding purpose through caring for the dying
-Losing fear by facing death honestly
-What people reveal at the end of life
-Trust, truth, and authenticity in sharing death stories
-Why talking about death helps us live more fully
Quotes from the episode:
“Talking about death doesn’t make it happen, but avoiding it doesn’t stop it either.”
-Hospice Nurse Penny
“The more we talk about death, the more normal it becomes.”
-Jennifer Muldowney
Timestamp:
[00:00] Podcast Intro
[00:22] Hospice Nurse Penny opens up about finding hospice work later in life, the personal turning points that led her there, and how caring for the dying gave her work lasting meaning beyond a traditional career.
[07:59] Through shared stories of loss and bedside moments, Penny and Jennifer reflect on how direct exposure to dying reshaped their understanding of what comes after and reduced fear around death.
[19:09] Penny explains how the pandemic pushed her to share hospice experiences online, how one story changed her reach overnight, and why each platform serves a different kind of connection.
[28:18] The conversation closes on why authenticity matters more than saturation, how trust is built through honesty, and the responsibility of speaking clearly when discussing death in public spaces.
[39:01] Outro
Connect with Hospice Nurse Penny:
Instagram: @hospicenursepenny
Website: hospicenursepenny.com
Connect with Jennifer/The Glam Reaper on socials at:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jennifermuldowney/
TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@therealglamreaper
YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@TheGlamReaperMuldowney
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifermuldowney/
Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/MuldowneyMemorials/
Email us - glamreaperpodcast@gmail.com
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Listen to The Glam Reaper Podcast on Apple Podcasts:
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Transcript
Facing Death Anxiety
00:00:00
Speaker
I also had severe death anxiety and maybe morbid curiosity. i thought, hmm, maybe yeah exposure therapy, being around dying people will help with the death anxiety. And spoiler alert, it actually did.
Introduction to the Glam Reaper Podcast
00:00:22
Speaker
Hi everyone and welcome to another episode of the Glam Reaper podcast. I'm your host Jennifer Muldowney aka the Glam Reaper. Not looking as glam today because we are running in between a million appointments today but I am actually super excited. We have been talking about this for i think months now. Super, super excited to have hospice nurse Penny on the line. Penny, welcome. Lovely to meet you on the Glam Reaper podcast.
00:00:48
Speaker
Thank you. Thank you so much. Yes, it's been a while. We've been trying to get this going, but we finally, we're finally here. Yay. That's exactly two very, very busy ladies. um And so, well, let's get straight
Meet Hospice Nurse Penny
00:01:00
Speaker
into it. So your name on your socials and stuff is um ne Hospice Nurse Penny.
00:01:05
Speaker
So tell me um a little bit about obvious. I mean, it's kind of obvious what you do, I guess. But, you know, and if you're looking at this on YouTube, you know you've got some cool like influencing death sign behind you.
00:01:16
Speaker
So yeah, tell us a little bit about you and and where Hospice Nurse Penny came from. Yeah, so I am a nationally certified hospice and palliative care nurse in the U.S. And I am recently retired, actually, after 20 years of being in the death biz, as we say.
00:01:33
Speaker
I am also a social media influencer, a deathfluencer, bestselling author of Influencing Death, Reframing Dying for Better Living. So I got my start in hospice when I was about 41. I went to nursing school when I was 40 years old.
00:01:49
Speaker
I worked for about ah less than a year, well, less than a year and a half in clinic and then in hospital and then went to hospice. And pretty much that's all I've ever done ever since. Yeah. Okay. So you're just recently retired, hanging up the... Yes, in June.
00:02:04
Speaker
Wow. Hanging up the stethoscope. so I know, I was nearly going to say, hang what do what we hang up, I guess? Yeah, figuring that out. What's retirement look like for you? Let's start there. Just, you know, I know we're going to go backwards to go forwards, but yeah, what's retirement looking like for you?
Life After Hospice
00:02:18
Speaker
ah Very busy, busier than I thought it would be. One of the reasons that I retired was because the social media has become like a full-time job for me. And and it's been so much busier than I expected. But I live in an off-grid cabin in the mountains and i garden. i have a huge vegetable garden. So I've been busy picking produce and canning and all that that you do with the vegetables and fruits, doing keynote speeches. I'm in the process of writing another book or with my my friend who is a hospice social worker has just been incredibly busy.
00:02:55
Speaker
Wow. i mean, we're retired, but not really retired. I think we'd call that kind of half retiring. Right. retir Yeah. Retired and tired. Yeah. Yeah, that's it. Re-entired. That's right. That's right.
Penny's Path to Nursing
00:03:10
Speaker
That's amazing. So tell us um a little bit about your journey, how it started, what made you go into nursing at, quote unquote, I mean, I'm 43, at a late stage in life. I don't think going into a career in your 40s is that late, but there will be young people listening to this as well. So i do want to get into the social media and the influencing part of it. But you know what your story started and you know what life was like for you back then, what led you to make make a change?
00:03:33
Speaker
Well, ah so I went, like I said, I went to nursing school when I was 40, and that was a product of an impending divorce. I had been a stay-at-home homeschooling mom for 10 years during that marriage, and I needed a career. And the only thing I really could fall back on was bartending from my earlier life, and that didn't seem suitable to be a single mom.
00:03:56
Speaker
I had had a really rough beginning in my life, and ah in my adolescence and an early on my whole 20s. I was into drugs. I was a drug addict. I went to jail several times. I gave my son to his dad to raise. So I just had a really rocky path. And when I decided to become a nurse, I wanted to choose Something that was going to be what I would consider more service work for redemption. Like all nursing is service work. But to me, hospice seemed a little bit more serving. And my former mother-in-law had died a year before I went to nursing school on hospice. I felt like those nurses were just really doing sacred work.
00:04:43
Speaker
i just It just seemed like something that really you know fit what I was looking for.
Choosing Hospice Care and Redemption
00:04:49
Speaker
also had severe death anxiety and maybe morbid curiosity. i thought, hmm, maybe yeah exposure therapy, being around dying people will help with the death anxiety. And spoiler alert, it actually did.
00:05:01
Speaker
So there was, it's I always say it's layered. There were many reasons why I chose the hospice path. and And found that it really was something that I could do. I think just having gone through what I did when I was younger, the whole, you know, there but for the grace of God go I mentality, um the ability to to take care of everybody without judgment, it just was something that just really worked for me.
00:05:25
Speaker
Wow, that's a really beautiful story um and powerful too. I mean, is that, I presume that's included in your book. I presume you do keynote speeches on on that path and stuff because that's obviously, that's definitely something to to influence the world with you know um is that there is always other options and and you can make your life, you It can. be one you can be one decision away incredible life too.
00:05:56
Speaker
that's That's a really popular story. um Really, really great. So tell us about your hospice journey then, I guess. um You know, did you have, did you ever have a favorite patient or, you know, it was there a particular story or, you know, from one of your patients that really um ah read I worked in a hospice in Ireland for for a time and they didn't actually know I was in the funeral space at the time. and They just, they need to staff and stuff. Yeah. I don't know if they they'd have hired me. Maybe. if I don't know. Maybe they would have. Maybe they wouldn't have. um But it was it was just really eye-opening. It's really it's a really beautiful thing. sounds weird, but it's it's a really beautiful thing to be in a space where people are dying, actively dying. yeah like I was in charge of um the letter the letters that the doctor would write, you know, about...
00:06:48
Speaker
to to the family about the deceased and um just just knowing that that was impacting people's lives for for the better and the worse and stuff it was just it just it felt very powerful um in a good way you know just knowing um and just seeing people and and it was a very beautiful hospice and you know everyone was treated very well and it was just It was just an eye opening experience. I don't know that it's something I could ever do full time. um I've always said that like what I do, you know, people say, oh, I don't know how you do what you do. And I said, well, everyone is, I believe anyway, put on this earth to do something.
00:07:25
Speaker
And, you know, whether you follow that or not, it's up to you. But um I definitely know I was drawn to do what I do, but I don't think I could work with the dying day in, day out. i don I don't think I would emotionally be able to hold that. and Whereas, you know, I do I'm able to hold it with the families, though, that are grieving, you know, so there's just it's amazing the different people that are in this space, I feel like. and So, yeah, if you if you can tell us like one or two stories about your hospice time or, you know, ah something that super impacted you or a a patient that's extra special.
Beliefs About the Afterlife
00:07:59
Speaker
Well, i'll I'll tell you. So when i when I went into hospice, I didn't have any ah concept of an afterlife, which is what my death anxiety was rooted in, like this fear that we die and there's nothing more. i had not ever been raised with any religion, so I just had no concept of afterlife. And I was really pretty new in hospice. And the patient that I was caring for, one of the patients, I was working in a hospice house. So I've worked in hospice care centers and I've worked in home hospice.
00:08:33
Speaker
ah But I started in hospice care centers. So I'm working in a hospice care center, a hospice house. And one of my patients is an elderly lady and her daughter was a nun. And so she had all these nuns coming in and out visiting her all the time.
00:08:47
Speaker
And it was in the evening and I was at the nurse's station and the last visitor was leaving and she was a nun. And she walked up to the nurse's station and she said to me, she's gone.
00:08:58
Speaker
And I said, oh, and I stood up and grabbed my stethoscope and she said, no, no, no. Her body is still here doing the work of dying, but her spirit has left. You can see it in her eyes.
00:09:09
Speaker
So I was just very curious about that. So as soon as she left, I walked into the room and looked at this woman. And I exactly like immediately knew exactly what she was talking about. ah Her eyes were open.
00:09:25
Speaker
And she just had this fixed gaze. It was like the lights are on, but nobody's home. You know, nobody was in there. And I just felt like what she had just told me was it was real, you know, plus it came from a nun. So seemed like it had to be true. But, you know, so that was really impactful for me. And, you know, to see that and to think, wow, you know.
00:09:47
Speaker
I do believe that. And I've seen it, you know, so many times, hundreds of times since then. So that was something that started kind of getting the ball rolling for me in terms of feeling like, hmm, maybe we do have a spirit. Maybe there is something more.
00:10:02
Speaker
And then as I continued my work and started seeing people who were having deathbed visions where they see deceased loved ones or even pets and really believing, you know, like they believe what they see and you can't help but believe it too because they're so convinced that they're seeing what they say they're seeing.
00:10:24
Speaker
And I remember one of the patients that I had She was a lady, and ah you know, older lady, and she was talking about her the baby girl. And her adult daughters were in the room with her. And they were like, why is she talking about a baby girl? we You know, there's no no baby girls that that we know of that have died.
00:10:45
Speaker
And my patient's sister came and she said that these girls' mother, my patient, had a baby when she was a teenager out of wedlock and the baby was stillborn. And so she was seeing this baby that nobody knew. was like a family secret, you know? Yeah. She had never even told her daughter. so Careful what you take to your deathbed, folks. It might just come age with the Elecate or not. Right? Right. Yeah, true.
00:11:14
Speaker
Very true. That is that's amazing. um And it's i've I've experienced similar similar things myself in in the work that I do. um And again, not everybody believes this and that's totally fine and everything. and But I've definitely I get signs from the deceased um when I'm doing my work. i am I feel like they send me signs.
00:11:37
Speaker
you know, to maybe point me in the right direction of what the family would want for the memorial or just to say, thank you, well done, or you're doing good. Or, you know, it's not that I, I don't think that they, am whatever happens to our spirits, you know, that I don't know myself, but I definitely feel like there's some presence around us. And even from my, from my own experience, my grandmother who, oh God, I, even though it's over 20 years, I still get upset about it. and She passed when I lived in Washington, D.C.,
00:12:05
Speaker
And, um, I remember my mom, God, I really can't believe I'm still getting emotional about this, but, um, I, uh, she was, she was put into hospital with a panic attack and, um, and that was it. It was just panic attacks, but I mean, she was, I think, 84 or something at the time and she was sitting on the bed. And she my mom said she had, you know, her she was very well aware of everything and told my mom to mind her purse, keep her her purse close to her and stuff like she still had a she still was looking out for everybody and being ah the boss lady she was right up to the end. But she asked my mom, she said, when is Jennifer coming home?
00:12:40
Speaker
And my mum said, oh, she'll be home in in two weeks. I was due home in two weeks. And she said my grandmother just a kind of audibly sighed and said, you know, she knew she wasn't going to get to see me.
00:12:52
Speaker
And then she told, oh God, then she told my mum that um she said she really liked this world. And that was sort of kind of what she said. It was just... I really like this world. You know, it wasn't any sort of grand expression or anything and not saying I'm leaving or, you know, anything like that. But she was she was gone, you know, and i think a couple of hours later. And what was very interesting is that I had a I was running the Miami Marathon that weekend and I was running it um in Miami and it was crazy heat. And I went it got a panic attack at the eighteenth mile.
00:13:28
Speaker
Never had a panic attack in my life, never had one since, but I got a panic attack at the 18th mile. And it was around that time that her funeral was happening at home in Ireland. So, you know, there's we can look into things. I know, you know, that the skeptics amongst us will say you're looking into things and stuff. But I do think people, not everybody granted, but I do think a lot of people know when they're dying.
00:13:51
Speaker
There's there's an exception. Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. So people will often use travel language. We call travel language where they talk about, i need to go. i need to get out of here. I need to pack. I'm going on a trip. I need to go home.
00:14:07
Speaker
That happens a lot. I need to go home. Sometimes a patient will be in a hospital and the family feels terrible because they keep saying, I need to go home. And the family's like, we wish you we could take you home. But they don't mean home, home. They mean something different.
00:14:22
Speaker
Home means something else. Also, people seem to have the ability to, not everybody, but many people, seem to have the ability to control when they die.
00:14:33
Speaker
So there's been so many people who will say... You know, i I didn't make it there and I feel so bad. I feel so guilty. I wasn't able to make it on time. I didn't get to be with him or or I was with my mom and ah for 24 hours and then I stepped out to go pee and she died while I was gone.
00:14:50
Speaker
And it's it seems like people have the ability to control When they die, sometimes they wait for people to arrive, but more often they wait for people to leave.
00:15:01
Speaker
So it's, it's, you know, really uncanny. People feel so guilty about, I've had that so much in my social media world where people comment, you know, I feel so bad. i i tried to make it there and I couldn't make it there. And I always say, look, if they needed you to be there when they took your last, their last breath, they would have waited for you to get there.
00:15:21
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. But some people don't want their their loved ones to watch them die. Some people are private. They're introverted, you know, or they don't want their kids like a lot of times moms don't want their kids present and they'll wait until all the kids are gone and then they'll die. And that makes total sense because we were actually even only speaking about this recently in the pet world, how our pets leave the room or leave the the home or wherever it is to to go and die because they inherently don't want us to see them in pain or to see them leave.
00:15:55
Speaker
um Oh, God, I'm getting all the emotions today. I know what's going on. um it's it's It's just, it's such an emotional topic, but I guess we, this is what I love about what we do though, is you know, people often will refer to people that work in this profession in any shape or form, whether it's hospice or funeral or, you know, the before, during or after, um as hard, cold hearted or anything like that, just because we're in this space talking about it. And it's absolutely the opposite. I mean, it really is. i
00:16:27
Speaker
yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I get that all the time, like that I'm desensitized. You're just desensitized. I am not desensitized. I am just a realist. I know that we are all going to die someday. And I have seen that the best way to have a good death is to acknowledge that.
00:16:47
Speaker
And accept that. And if you don't, like if you, you can, you can not talk about all you want, but that's not going to not make it happen. You know, like you're still going to die at the end of the day, whether you want to say, you know, whether you are are are going to say the D word or not, you're still, it's still going to happen to you. very much a proponent of like, let's just get it out on the table. And that's what also helps with death anxiety with, and that's really common. And that's something I didn't know until I got on social media. I thought I was kind of weird for having that fear around dying. And then I learned that so many people, so many people feel the same way.
00:17:23
Speaker
and have found that by talking about it, learning about it, understanding it and accepting it, that you can actually alleviate it.
00:17:34
Speaker
Yeah, 100%. And, you know, anybody who's regularly listening to this podcast will know that I'm a big fan of um Dr. Catherine Mannix, the UK palliative care doctor, and her book, With the End in Mind.
00:17:48
Speaker
It was actually that book because, again, it was assumed that because I'm in this business, that i I'm okay with death and I don't mind seeing bodies of my loved ones and, you know, I'm desensitized it to a certain degree to it. And i at that couldn't have been further from the truth. i It took reading her book for me to sort of go, oh, okay, death is going to be okay. I knew it was coming, so I was a realist about all of that and my mortality because that hit me in my 20s when two friends of mine passed away.
00:18:17
Speaker
But the actual action of dying, I was still afraid of. I was like, oh, God, you know, i Is it going to hurt? Is it going to be that, you know, and you're turning this open, especially I think when you're in this business, because we're faced with it every day.
00:18:29
Speaker
and So it did. It took me reading that book and just, ah you know, and we had her on the podcast as well. But just, yeah, just listening to people, hospice nurses tell me about actually it's not as horrific as we as humans looking ah looking on it think it is. So tell me a little bit about um you moving from the hospice world into the social media and the death fluencer world, and because that is something that has really taken off in the last, I would even nearly say, I think feel like since COVID, it's definitely taken a spike um and maybe because people face their death. But yeah, tell me a little bit about that.
Social Media Journey
00:19:09
Speaker
I've always been a passionate advocate for hospice and And like I said, you know, understanding that people can have a better death if they're willing to learn more about it and talk about it. And when COVID happened and we went into the lockdown, I, like everybody else, was stuck at home. I couldn't do anything. My husband worked nights. I worked days. And I couldn't go to the Y and work out anymore. I couldn't, you know, I just couldn't do anything.
00:19:35
Speaker
So I heard about TikTok. And I started... you know, doing little trends that were on TikTok, which, you know, didn't, didn't do anything, didn't go anywhere because I was 57 the time. And, you know, it was it was a kid's app. One day I decided to tell a story about a hospice patient and it went viral. And I realized that people really wanted to know about this mystery of the end of life and that I could give them so much information. So that's really when I got started and it just kind of blew a mushroom out from there. Wow. Wow. Now, are are you the majority of your followers followers on TikTok or Instagram or where's your favorite platform? Is it TikTok?
00:20:20
Speaker
TikTok is not my favorite platform. I hate it and now. ah they're They're very biased. I get a lot of community guideline violations. um ah It is my biggest platform, ah nearly a million followers, 997,000, but it is closely being followed up now by Facebook, which I just hit 950,000 on Facebook. And I really like Instagram and Facebook better in terms of the ability to kind of, um you know, like you have the stories.
00:20:54
Speaker
TikTok has stories too, but I just like the functionality better of Instagram um and Facebook. But my new jam is Patreon. I, I'm into Patreon now. I'm really starting to um have fun on there.
00:21:08
Speaker
It's just kind of more... i can have like more personalized interactions with people through Patreon. So that's that's kind of fun. And I'm on YouTube too. YouTube is my smallest platform. um i haven't really embraced that one as much. I've got like a quarter of a million followers on there. But um I haven't really... Just because I'm not into the like...
00:21:32
Speaker
I'm not into the, um you know, like YouTube, you you do the widescreen stuff for television. yeah and I bought the camera for that and I tried that, but it was so much work.
00:21:44
Speaker
I just prefer, you know, the iPhone. It's just so much easier to do the vertical. And so they have the shorts now on there and you can do like a three minute and people do the vertical on that. So I do that, but it's not really as, it's not my favorite.
00:21:58
Speaker
not your I mean, it's hard to win them all. It really is. It's hard to I mean, they're hard work, each of them. I i struggle. I struggle. I'm very much a, you know, in real life person. And even though some of my friends would say I'm on the socials and quite a bit, I'm like, I'm not always talking about sort of.
00:22:18
Speaker
I'm talking about all sorts of things. You know, I'm really all over the place. and And I think, as you said at the start, you know, you found your niche or your niche, as Americans say, you know, you found that and you have to run with that, you know, and that's where I think TikTok rewards and and does really, really well. i am I'm still...
00:22:36
Speaker
still Still very much trying TikTok out, but I find, um I think it's maybe the generation I am, but um I find Facebook and and Instagram, their interactions to be great, to be much better and easier. And I understand it. But I think that's just like everything. It's like when the iPhone first came out, nobody, oh, how do we figure this out? And then all of a sudden it's inseparable and you're you're using it and stuff like that. um But for for the young people that are out there, or maybe not even young people, I don't know, maybe there's a lot of me people out there and who are listening to this, who are maybe either trying to get into... um Well, let's focus actually, because those are two big questions. and If they're trying to get into... um
00:23:15
Speaker
social influencing in this space. um Because I have heard positive and negative things thrown around about it. I personally think, you know, as as long as we're not touting fake news, I think the more the merrier because it's start it's it's allowing Joe Public, as I call them, you know, the person on the street to engage with these conversations. And I think that acknowledging our mortality is something I'm a massive fan of.
00:23:41
Speaker
So I personally am a fan. and But I know a lot of people in the profession, in the funeral professional profession, should I say, don't particularly like death fluencers. What's your thoughts on that? And what would be your advice to anybody wanting to get into it?
00:23:56
Speaker
Well, you know, my thoughts on that are there are more than one ways to skin a cat. And, you know, if it depending on who you're trying to reach, social media can work really well. So as a hospice nurse, my interaction was with...
00:24:13
Speaker
families that I cared for and patients. I didn't, it was only within that sphere. I never was able to be outside of that other than maybe bringing it up at a cocktail party or whatever.
00:24:24
Speaker
So, you know, people that are wanting to learn more about hospice death and dying are only learning it when they're in the midst of it or, you know, professionals who go to conferences, but the lay person doesn't really learn about it that much. And I think Now, then we've got the death cafes that are starting to be popular, right? Those are for the people who are more into the let's go in person and mingle and learn, right?
00:24:47
Speaker
And then, you know, you can Google things and read things. That's great for people who like to read. You know, so social media is just another another ah modality of learning.
00:24:59
Speaker
It's just another way
Educating Through Social Media
00:25:00
Speaker
to learn. And I think that that people should, you know, they don't have to do it if they don't want to. You know, if you're if you're somebody who works in the death business and you. don't feel like you want to be on social media talking about it, then don't, you know. But obviously, when I have nearly 3 million followers across my platforms, there are people who want to learn about it. And not only are there that many people, there's a wide range in my audience from age 13 to
00:25:30
Speaker
all the way up to as old as people are that get on social media. And there are some really old people that get on social media. So I am reaching so many more people than I ever did as a hospice nurse.
00:25:42
Speaker
Yeah. So I think it's really beneficial and, Don't knock it till you tried it. You know, um that being said, you do have to have thick skin if you're going to do this. If you want to be somebody that is, you know, going to be a death fluencer, because I don't know if you've experienced this, but I have experienced a lot of hate from people who misunderstand.
00:26:03
Speaker
hospice. And speaking of misinformation, who think that we, you know, kill our patients by giving them too much morphine or that we get a bonus when they die or all kinds of stupid stuff that people make up. So you do run into that kind of stuff. So you have to have thick skin and you have to just like persist. And for me, I think the most important thing is to have fun with it, because if it starts to feel like it's not fun anymore, then, you know, if that's going to show. your if your heart's not in it, you're just not able to to do that. And, you know, when I started, I was the first person, as far as I know, I've been told by many, i was the first person who started truly educating about hospice on social media and death and dying. There wasn't anybody else that was really doing it.
00:26:48
Speaker
And ah now there are like tons of hospice nurses and there's palliative care doctors and there's hospice CNAs and hospice social workers and hospice chaplains. There's morticians, you know, people that work in the funeral industry. So it's it's become like very, very mainstream.
00:27:11
Speaker
it's It's, you know, people are really, and there's a reason for that because people really want to know about it. You just have to, like you say, I actually say niche, by the way. I don't say niche. Oh, you do Niche. Yay. I say niche.
00:27:24
Speaker
That is what it is. It's a niche. Yeah, once you find that niche, you know, then you dive into it and and go for it. And for me, it's been, know, varied. My my content has been varied because i I believe in adult learning. I know that people learn differently. Like I said, people read, people ah like it in person they like hands-on and i do short videos that are TikTok trends lip-syncing dancing around pointing at words answering you know questions that I get in my comments straight talk telling stories you know there's like all these different approaches that I have to teaching and that's the other beauty of social media is that there are so so many people that that learn differently on social media you can you know
00:28:12
Speaker
mix up your way of teaching and and reach so many more. Yeah. And that's really it, isn't it? There's like, even though, because I feel like talking to some people nowadays, especially younger people, they might feel like, oh, the area I want to get into is saturated because there's loads of hospice nurses in it now or whatever it might be.
00:28:32
Speaker
And that's really not true because everyone learns from people differently. And you can, you know, there'll be people I know there's people out there who maybe hate the sound of my voice, hate the look of me or whatever it might be. And they love the the sound or the look of somebody else. You know i mean? Because we all just...
00:28:49
Speaker
even Even social media, if you're being truly authentic, I genuinely do think you can connect with people through the screen. As wild as that sounds, you know, and I'm not trying to take away from in-person. I love everything in person. about in personson But there is something to be said about how when I'm ready to receive the information from Nurse Hospice Penny that I can click on and scroll or like watch a video and and be educated like, be entertained or whatever it might be and and and feel a connection with you. Whereas, you know, when you meet people in person and I'm just fresh back from a conference, maybe this is why I'm saying this, but in person can be exhausting because you get that sort of, you know, can't pick and choose when I consume the content. I have to go at a certain time. I have to meet everyone there. It's, you know, it can be a lot. It can be draining. i feel like i'm an introvert, extrovert nowadays. But I would say to people who are considering doing it, and I'm very much a late bloomer. Like i I mean, I don't consider myself an influencer at all, but i am I'm still only in the baby stages of of trying to get out there. um But which it can be hard. I mean, as an entrepreneur, my advice to people, I guess, would be. You know, make sure you've got your ducks lined up, you know, in your business before you start sort of getting distracted and with social media. But make it a part of your strategy, which can be hard, you know, when you're doing all the things. But there is absolutely room for everybody out there. There really is. There's still a lot of space. Yeah, you know, one of my favorite things to see is when these um senior living places, there's a few of them that have TikTok accounts and the seniors at the senior living places are making TikToks and they are so great. I always think, boy, if I was looking for a senior living home, I would go to a place like that because they are having so much fun. You know, it's amazing. And I do think, I do think it if you can work social media in to your business plan,
00:30:45
Speaker
it's it's It can do wonders for you. And you know it's funny because i I do have hospice agencies that reach out to me and they're like wanting to collaborate, but they don't know exactly know how to do it. And like I don't know what to tell you because you know I just go out there and I just do my thing. And and and like you say, ah authenticity is important and and you can reach people. people they do You do have these like parasocial relationships right with people. like They really trust you.
00:31:11
Speaker
My people who follow me, really trust me because I feel like I have been very authentic with who I am. I've talked about my sober journey. I've talked about my jail time. I've talked about going to nursing school when I'm 40. I'm very open about my life.
00:31:27
Speaker
I always have been. And I feel like that has gained their trust. And the reason why I did that was because When I'm talking to you about something that's as serious as death and dying, and I want you to believe what I say, that it's nothing to be feared and that it can be okay, need to be trustworthy. I need you to believe what I'm saying, you know?
00:31:51
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, not to get political for a second, we don't try and talk too much about religion and politics. where We're um Switzerland on this podcast as much as we can be. But, you know, at least as much as we can be. and But like the latest stuff, and just with your and you the guy Charlie Kirk, and you know, he inspired people, whether you loved or hated him. that The fact is that he inspired millions and thousands and millions of Americans. And none of them, you know, half them didn't even meet him.
00:32:23
Speaker
And you could see it, you know, when they showed up at his memorial and how they're defending him online and stuff like that. And, you know, I've talked about this before in and terms of like AI and stuff like Whitney Houston, same thing, Aretha Franklin, all these iconic people, whether you loved or hated them. and you know, inspired people um to, and they had this relationship with them, even if they've never met them, just because of how much like they trusted Taylor Swift, Beyonce, all of these people, there's, there's a trust element. You, you think, okay, Taylor Swift, when she talks to me about singing or maybe, you know, being a boss lady or whatever it might be. am I'm not necessarily a Taylor Swift fan, so, but, but whatever she might be, think, listening to her, you're understanding if if I'm into her, you know, um I'd be more taking business advice from Beyonce, but listen, I'll take it from Taylor too. So hit me up, lady.
00:33:14
Speaker
oh But, you know, there's these people who, like, I just think it was it was so extreme what's been going on lately. And and just to see that with Kirk's memorial and and how passionate people are. And most of them have never met him, never crossed paths with him, but maybe showed up to his funeral, his memorial. um You know, and so social media, I think it's a Gary Vaynerchuk, who I follow, um who always speaks on this topic. He made a comment that, you know, he he foresees in 2026 that individuals will become empires and have as much
00:33:50
Speaker
sort of control or influence as these major companies. I mean, the world's your oyster and you can start with nothing but an iPhone or Samsung or whatever, right? iPhones work better, but.
00:34:04
Speaker
I'm an iPhone girl. My brother is a Samsung and I've tried to con convert him, but he won't he won come to the darkness. I tried. I couldn't do it. Yeah, it doesn't work for me either.
Addressing Misinformation
00:34:14
Speaker
I actually used to have an iPhone as my personal phone and a Samsung as my work phone. And it just, yeah, that that was that was way too confusing. ah Yeah, but it's it really is. It's just, you know, as I said, politics and religion aside, social media is is where people are getting their news now, you know, for better or worse. It's where they're getting educated again, for better or worse. And so when I hear sort of people in the funeral profession saying, oh, you know, death fluencers and they're always touting fake news and this kind of that, and I thought, yeah, but at least they're having a conversation with people. They're having real conversations with people. You know, there is there is some fake news going around. Sure. But I feel like the majority of it can be opinion and it can vary state by state and country by country. And, um you know, again, it just comes down to having the conversation because I think specifically about death, a bit like sex was such a taboo subject and still kind of is and death.
00:35:09
Speaker
The more we talk about it, the more normal it is. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And it is normal. Yeah. Normalizing death is is important. And back to like the authenticity. That's another reason to really try to be as authentic as possible is so that people know that you aren't spreading misinformation.
00:35:27
Speaker
Yeah. You know, to to know that you are is not fake news because there is a lot of it out there. There's a lot of misinformation out there. And it's unfortunate. That's the downside of social media, you know, and that's why i continue to be on it, you know, addressing and readdressing these lies about hospice. Like we get a bonus after they die, which makes zero sense. When a person dies, you don't get paid anymore.
00:35:52
Speaker
you know, like we hasten their death. Yeah. Zero sense. We make money while they're alive. When they die, it's all gone. so yeah you know, no, no. Not that that's the reason, but you know, if you're trying to be practical and make sense about something, like think about that.
00:36:08
Speaker
It's just, you know, there's so much of it out there. is You have to be careful about what you consume because there's, there's a lot of, and it's just getting worse where people who are, you know, really, really public figures or people in authority are spreading misinformation. yeah It's like i really getting to be a scary place.
00:36:28
Speaker
it It really is. It really is. And yeah, Oh, God. I mean, I don't have children myself, but I often say, God, I'm kind of glad that I didn't, even though, you know, am because it just it's it's the world is just getting scarier and scarier because because there is just so much misinformation out there and and and just the things that are happening. And. So it is, it's good to have people online who are being authentic. And and even for me myself, you know, I always will and start off with explaining people who, especially when I'm meeting them, I'm not a death doula and I'm not a funeral director.
00:37:00
Speaker
and The amount of times where I'll get introduced, oh and this is a funeral director we have to talk. And I'm like, I'm not a funeral director. Nope. Not a death doula. Nope. And the like those terms even are to me are very specific career choices. And that's not what I do. I'm a celebrant and I am an event planner in the funeral world. Like that's that's what I am. So I don't need to wear 10 million hats. And, you know, if I'm which sometimes happens if a family asks me a question that delves into hospice or funeral, like the the deceased actual person, the the body or any anything like that. And if I don't know the answer, I will say I don't know the answer to that question, but I will find out and I will get it for you.
00:37:41
Speaker
Or if I make a claim that says something and somebody corrects me, then great. I just learned something new as well. You know, it's it's really just about having an open, honest and authentic conversation like we would when human beings used to connect physically, you know, and that's what it's about. Yeah, it's listen, it's been absolutely incredible
Conclusion and Thanks
00:38:00
Speaker
having you on. Thank you so much for joining us and influencing death. I love this. I also love the pink strand of hair. I love that. i actually had a red one when I was younger myself. So it would have been twinsies. But it was it's really nice um you just having you on Hostess Nurse Penny.
00:38:16
Speaker
And we're going to leave all your and links and everything for everyone to connect with you down below. If they're not already, I'm sure if they already are following you. um And you've you said you're writing a second book. Yeah, well, my first book, Influencing Death, is available wherever books are sold online. And yeah, my my my podcast partner, ah Hallie, is a hospice social worker, and i are ah just beginning to write a book together. We've paused our podcast for now while we while we embark on this new journey together. But yes, we are we are writing a new book.
00:38:49
Speaker
So... Very cool. Well, we look forward to hearing more about that and maybe we'll get you back on to talk about that again when it's when a the time comes. Well, thank you so much for joining us. It's been a pleasure.
00:39:00
Speaker
Thank you for having me.