Birds Hold our Secrets

An important addition to the literature of Unitary Caring Science and Conscious Dying, Birds Hold Our Secrets explores the universal question of how do we, as nurses, nurse our own? 

Drawing on her many years as a nurse, mother and wife, Biley tenderly takes us on an autoethnographic journey of conscious dying as she supports her beloved nurse academic husband Fran. Diagnosed with cancer, Fran’s wish was to die mindfully - whatever the circumstances.  Anna travels alongside whilst trying to balance normality in family life. Painfully tender, Anna offers an insight in what it’s like to consciously care for a loved one the way they wish to die - honoring the sacred covenant until the end. Biley skillfully guides the reader on a Caritas pilgrimage as she lives out Caring Science principles, digging deep to remember her life’s purpose, which resonates for us all.

The book offers important advice and new thinking on issues surrounding grief, death and dying, Watson’s Caring Science, Nurse Theory, Conscious Dying, Healthcare Systems, Nursing and Palliative Care.

READERSHIP This story will touch anyone experiencing grief or death of a loved one. Nurses, Chief Nurse Officers and Healthcare Professionals using Caring Science Theory. Conscious Dying Institutes and Hospice workers can use it as a guide for families and others as inspiration. Holistic Health Practitioners, Therapists and Mindfullness practitioners. Death Doulas, Memoir Poetry -  using the ’cut up technique’ inspired by William Burroughs. Autoethnograghy. 

Anna has been supported and driven by the values of Caring Science throughout her nursing and voluntary sector career and continues to find it helpful in the ups and downs of everyday life. To her surprise and delight she is a doctorate graduate of the Watson Caring Science Institute. Born and bred in the North of England, the wild moors of Brontë Country is home to Anna. Love and nursing have taken her the length and breadth of Britain. She now lives in Dorset and seeks stillness in walking every day with her little dog Dot, in the gentle, rural landscape that inspired Thomas Hardy and T. S. Eliot.

ILLUSTRATED BY SARAH HOUGH: A visual artist born in Devon, UK in 1970, I studied at Oxford Polytechnic between 1988-1991 where I was taught and mentored by Ivor Robinson MBE, Chairman of the Visual Studies Field honours degree. This degree combined the disciplines of painting, drawing, 3D studies, printmaking, photography, graphics, typographics and bookworks, and was the first course of its kind in Britain. I am an active member of the School of Landscape Painting which combines the practical challenges of landscape painting with that of academic study. Within the school there is a culture of discussion and shared experience. I am also part of The Dorset Salon, a selected fine art membership group that encourages critical debate. As well as undertaking commission work, I have exhibited drawings, paintings and monotypes in joint and group exhibitions for a number of years where the works have been traditionally framed and hung on walls. More recently I have been exploring projection and 3D formats for drawings and paintings, as well as researching how changing the way my work is presented and challenging convention alters the audience experience. Working with Dorset AONB, The Arts Development Company and Dorset History Centre, I have delivered large scale drawing and painting projects as part of the dementia friendly Stepping into Nature programme that aims to connect people with nature through creative engagement. As artist in residence in Horatio's Garden at Salisbury NHS Spinal Unit, I have continued my interest in the health and wellbeing benefits of combining art with nature by engaging patients, visitors and staff in drawing outdoors. Ambition and scale need not be compromised by individual physical ability, and through adapting: materials; mark making method and forming collaboration, patients with significant spinal cord injury demonstrated great courage and determination, creating drawings over 5 metres long. My collaboration with Dr Anna Biley relating to grief, loss and art has recently been presented at conferences in Brighton and New York and published in A Handbook for Caring Science: Expanding the Paradigm by Springer Publishing. I have also worked in partnership with Dorset Wildlife Trust to create images across their product range, and Oxfam have used my images for their greetings cards. Bridgeman image library license my work which has been featured in publications worldwide. I live and work in Dorset, United Kingdom.

Dr. Jean Watson is Distinguished Professor and Dean Emerita, University of Colorado Denver, College of Nursing Anschutz Medical Center campus, where she held the nation's first endowed Chair in Caring Science for 16 years. She is founder of the original Center for Human Caring in Colorado and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing; past President of the National League for Nursing; founding member of International Association in Human Caring and International Caritas Consortium. She is Founder and Director of non-profit foundation, Watson Caring Science Institute. Dr. Watson has earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in nursing and psychiatricmental health nursing and holds her PhD in educational psychology and counseling. She is a widely published author and recipient of many awards and honors, including The Fetzer Institute Norman Cousins Award, in recognition of her commitment to developing, maintaining and exemplifying relationship-centered care practices; an international Kellogg Fellowship in Australia, a Fulbright Research Award in Sweden. The Hildebrand Center for Compassion in Medicine Award Notre Dame University; Academy Integrative Medicine and Healing Award for pioneering work in Caring Science; Japanese International Society of Caring and Peace Chair. She holds fifteen (15) Honorary Doctoral Degrees, including 12 International Honorary Doctorates (Sweden, United Kingdom, (2) Spain, British Colombia and Quebec, Canada, Japan, Turkey, Peru (3), and Columbia, South America). Clinical nurses and academic programs throughout the world use her published works on the philosophy and theory of human caring and the art and science of caring in nursing. Dr. Watson's caring philosophy is used to guide transformative models of caring and healing practices for hospitals, nurses and patients alike, in diverse settings worldwide. At the University of Colorado, Dr. Watson held the title of Distinguished Professor of Nursing; the highest honor accorded its faculty for scholarly work. In 1999 she assumed the Murchinson-Scoville Chair in Caring Science, the nation's first endowed chair in Caring Science, based at the University of Colorado Denver & Anschutz Medical Center. As author/co-author of over 30 books on caring, her latest books range from empirical measurements and international research on caring, to new postmodern philosophies of caring and healing, philosophy and science of caring and caring science as sacred science, global advance in Caring Literacy. Her books have received the American Journal of Nursing's "Book of the Year" award and seek to bridge paradigms as well as point toward transformative models for this 21st century. In October, 2013 Dr. Watson was inducted as a Living Legend by the American Academy of Nursing, its highest honor.