When the Story Changes: Honouring a Life, Not Just a Script

A few days ago, I wrote about holding space when it hurts—about the delicate honour of sitting with someone near the end of their life and listening as they shape the story they want told. About a wonderful woman called Moira who welcomed me into her world with tea and cake, fierce charm, and a head full of memories—some bright, some bruised, all deeply her own.

Moira died last week.

Her son called to let me know. He was warm, articulate, and full of love—but also clear about something that celebrants often come up against, quietly and without warning. He told me that while Moira's version of events was deeply meaningful to her, it didn’t quite match the version held by her children. The life she narrated with pride and panache—the relationships, the timelines, the motivations—wasn’t, in their eyes, the full picture. Some chapters felt exaggerated. Others, edited. The script I’d drafted, based on long conversations with Moira, needed to change.

And so began a familiar and tender tension: the version of the story they had, and the version Moira wanted told.

This isn’t a betrayal. It’s not even unusual. When we face death, many of us become curators of our own lives. We hold up the best bits to the light, rearrange the difficult parts, tie off the looser ends. It’s an act of agency, yes—but it’s also an act of love. Moira, like so many others, wanted her family to remember her in a certain way. She wanted to be seen not only as she had been, but as she hoped she had been. She was writing herself kindly.

And yet, the celebration of a life is not for the person who has died. Not really. It is for the people left behind, holding the weight of grief in their hands and trying to make sense of the absence. It must reflect their truth too.

Celebrants who help someone with their advanced wishes walk this line often. Sometimes it’s a tightrope. The person who dies has trusted us with their memories, but it is the family who must sit through the service, carry it home, revisit the words when the room is quiet and the visitors have gone. They must be able to recognise the person being described.

This doesn’t mean throwing out a person’s self-told story. It means holding it with care, and placing it gently alongside the memories of those who loved them—sometimes with tension, sometimes with tenderness, but always with honesty.

Moira's son told me he and his siblings are working through how they want their mother to be remembered. Some of it, they say, was spot-on. Some felt out of step. And I respect that deeply. Our job, in the end, is not just to echo what was said to us, but to craft something that holds meaning for everyone present.

There is no villain here. Just a web of memory, love, misunderstanding, loyalty, and loss. Every family is a tapestry of perspectives. The celebration of life should reflect that.

So now, I will re-write. With the family's help. With care. With love. With all the truth that can be held between two versions of the same life. And with the humility that sometimes, as celebrants, we have to step aside and let the family lead the storytelling. Especially when the story has more than one voice.

Because it always does.

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