With Sincerity.
Sarah Port
"Sarah's effortless kindness, understanding and compassion during the planning of our little boy's funeral helped to guide me and my husband through the fog and pain........."
“…...very many thanks for all your hard work on our mother’s funeral. As we said on the day and others have said since it was delightful, fitting for mum and delivered beautifully…...”
To have the honour to help bereaved families who are mourning and are suffering grief, is a great privilege.
Increasingly, as the years have passed since my own personal bereavement of a very close loved one, over forty years ago, I have felt the desire to work more closely with those experiencing grief and bereavement. A desire to share my experience, offer my strength through my understanding and to show that there is hope.
When my beloved father died in 2008, I was able to create, with my own family, the funeral that he would have wanted. The time before his death gave me insight into palliative care. A pivotal turning point for me - the time that I realised how, through these life changing experiences of my own, I could help others suffering the raw emotion of severe grief - occurred several years later. It was after three very different funerals for friends and family, all within a few weeks of each other. I realised that by becoming an independent funeral celebrant I could fulfil a role that would combine many of my natural characteristics and enable me to help others.
When I decided to train as an Independent Funeral Celebrant, I was keen and enthusiastic, hopeful that I would be able to do the work and that the training would empower me to help families in their hour of need. That I could be their voice at a time when emotions are in turmoil and raw grief is so deeply distressing.
I didn’t know if my wish to help would be sufficient to enable me to lead a congregation. Now, with years of experience, I have no doubt of my vocation.
With a naturally calm demeanor, combined with empathy and understanding, I have found that drawing on my own love of music and words, enables me to create unique and personalised funeral ceremonies.
I believe that being alongside others during this time of loss is a gift; an honour, to help bereaved families who are mourning and suffering grief.
I create simple, elegant ceremonies, weaving the stories, memories and thoughts of those left behind to give a moving and respectful celebration of the life of their loved one.
I gain immense professional fulfilment, and huge personal rewards from my work.
Away from my work with bereaved families I enjoy hours tending my West Sussex garden with my partner, we volunteer with a conservation group on the South Downs, I am a Parish Councilor, the chairman of a local charity and enjoy spending time with family and friends.