Sacred Crossings

Life-​changing. Profound. Healing. The guidance that Sacred Crossings provides is professional, gentle, insightful and so caring and compassionate. I didn’t know this experience was available until my Mother died. The Sacred Crossings team helped me participate in a way that helped heal my relationship with her in this final act of love and service.

Sacred Crossings prepared a ceremony for a loved one’s burial. The ceremony was full of heart and soul. It was the most thoughtful and spirit-​filled burial ceremony I have ever attended. Jessica wrote a beautiful eulogy, which captured the spirit of our Loved one. She, Alex and Olivia were tremendously empathetic at a difficult time for our family. I highly recommend.

This review has taken me so long to write because, literally it is hard to convey how special and touching this was to my entire family and friends. It is also impossible to convey just how important Olivia is now to my family. She is an angel sent from heaven.
I found out about sacred crossings through my hairdresser. It was a very cool concept to me.
My father suffered a cardiac arrest and after some time they revived him and he was left on life-​support. This had my family shaken to the core. It is so hard to be faced with a decision like the one we had to make. Personally I was prepared to remove the machines from dad pretty quickly. I told the doctor I am a straight shooter so give it to me straight. I had to wait and wait for it to be good for everyone’s conscious to catch up on this with me. I know everyone needs to feel solid about making such a decision. I literally thought I was having a nervous breakdown one of these days, freaking out and calling my psychiatrist. More drugs and a psychologist appointment was not what I needed. Then I remembered what my hairdresser Kym told me about Sacred Crossings and called her if I could somehow get in touch with Olivia. She contacted Olivia, and low and behold we were sitting in my brothers living room the next morning with her.
Olivia, first of all, is beyond words. She had the greatest gift of just simply speaking with my family. Presence was constant and comforting. I could reach her with a single phone call and she came to the hospital multiple times and sat with us and prayed with us and sang soothing songs with us.
The end inevitable was no doubt going to happen. So, besides all of the soothing and comforting she gave us she was also busy helping us. Behind all of the hospital scenes, Olivia took her time in looking for a casket and looking for a cemetery in on our budget. She handled arranging for transport with the hospital. She has her own services to do this. She came out to visit the apartment where we would have dad’s three-​day stay with us to get an idea of how we would arrange the service and where we would put dad. There were so many different forms and things that we had to deal with, and she guided us every step of the way,
The day we all decided to remove life support Olivia was right there with us the entire time. There is no way that we would have been able to do it as peacefully and sacredly through it all without Olivia. Things after Dad had passed ran very smoothly. Olivia had already arranged for dad to be transferred immediately home. As soon as dad arrived Olivia guided us through the bathing ritual which part of it we did not want to be in the room for which was fine with her. She gave dad the oil that they placed on Jesus (I forget the name of it), as she did to all of us in the hospital while dad was passing.
Olivia is mighty strong for her petite stature. She helped us dress dad and every other detail including washing his hair, shaving his face and placing him in a natural looking position & making sure he looked perfect. As for myself, I never knew that I could feel so comfortable around a dead body let alone my dad. But there I was, trimming his eyebrows, nose hairs, sideburns and just making sure he looked his very best because I know that dad love to be pampered and well groomed and that’s what I did for him while he was alive.
Let me just say this– I have always told my husband that if and when my parents pass I will probably end up going crazy. And if it weren’t for Olivia who knows how I would have been. Olivia was the angel that guided us very softly through every single day of this from the moment we met her. An angel sent from heaven. She was with us spiritually & peacefully.
She helped us make the room beautiful that dad was in and put up pictures and different Momentos. We lit the room with with candles. We decorated with flowers. I could not imagine the alternative. I would not want to imagine my father with a tag on his toe in a refrigerator in the basement. I would not want to imagine my father lying on a cold steel table having his blood drained from his body & embalmed with fluid that is poisoning the earth. I would not want to have scheduled hours to visit dad. That’s all just so impersonal.
It felt so right & precious taking care of Dad those three days & sharing stories around him & being with him. It gave us more closure with his physical being. In the beginning the grandchildren would not even go into the apartment because they were afraid. On the day of dad’s service the grandchildren were decorating him with flowers and hang out around him for a while. It was a beautiful sight to see.
Olivia performed the service for dad. It was perfect. Friends & family got up & spoke. We had a big party after. All of our friends & family said they loved it. Olivia arranged for transportation to the cemetery the next day. She led us with a small ceremony. It was beautiful.

My sister and I are deeply grateful for the generous, knowledgeable and truly heartfelt support we received from Olivia and Sacred Crossings. She saved us so much valuable time that allowed us to be present much more with our mother as she crossed the threshold. Having her die at home, holding the vigil and funeral in the home she’d lived in for so many decades was exactly as death should be — peaceful and right!

I used Sacred Crossings when my Dad passed in 2009. I wanted to have a home funeral for him and Olivia (who knows ALL the applicable laws in California) was able to get Dad back home from the hospital where he died so that we could take care of his body ourselves. We were gently led through the rituals of washing & anointing the body, dressing him, and laying him in honor for the time prior to the funeral.
Dad was a WWII veteran, and it was his childhood friends and other friends in his same age group who most appreciated the differences between a home funeral and the typical hands-​off mortuary approach. They ALL told me so and said that this was the type of farewell they want when they pass.
I cannot imagine ever turning over the aftercare of a loved one to strangers again.