Every morning Kennita Perry feels joy when she opens her eyes.

She has moyamoya, a progressive disorder caused by blocked arteries at the base of the brain. She also has cerebral atherosclerosis, a disease that occurs when plaque build-up causes arteries in the brain to harden.

Ms Perry has survived several small strokes and the collapse of her carotid artery and has had surgery to open up blocked arteries on the left side of her brain. Recently doctors discovered she also has problems on the right side of her brain.

“[Waking] means I made it to another day” she said. “I think, ‘What can I do with this day?’ ”

“They may not be able to do anything more for me. I have to learn how to live life with this condition.”

The 48-year-old’s great concern is Aurora, her seven-year-old daughter.

“I am not ready to die, but when the time comes I know I will be OK,” she said. “But I do worry about Aurora. This may be part of her reality. I have had to say to her let’s focus on the time we have right now. We are together right now.”

Her illness has shown her just how difficult it is for many people to discuss death. It’s what gave the Bermuda College counsellor the idea of hosting a “death café”, a place for people to chat about death, dying and grief.

The first one will take place this month at the Bermuda National Library.

“For example, people might start to talk about what is a good death,” she said. “Of course, a key part of having a death café is tea and cake.”

Death cafés are held all over the world. Ms Perry thought about holding one for years but kept putting it off, partly because of her own health challenges.

A friend who works at the library kept urging her to launch.

“I believe in energy,” she said. “Every single person who is meant to be there will show up. I guarantee there will be interesting conversations. Let’s create a tribe of people who feel it is OK to talk about this.”

Everyone who comes doesn’t have to chat.

“You might want to just listen sometimes,” said Ms Perry, who has always had a comfortable relationship with death.

“We walk together. I call her ‘she’. Going through this situation I realised that my purpose is to allow people to come to terms with death.”

Ms Perry has a master’s degree in social work and a bachelor’s degree in psychology. She then spent a year studying spiritual psychotherapy, a form of counselling that looks at the spiritual dimensions of mental health

“I wanted to study ways to connect and help people without as much talking as conventional therapies,” she said. “I was introduced to modalities that focused on spirituality, energy work, death and dying in conjunction with psychotherapy.”

The death café is her latest effort at counselling people who are near the end of their lives and their families.

Three years ago she started Meaningful Existence, a business that helps people to celebrate loved ones who have died, and heal after their death.

Ms Perry is also a certified soul midwife, a non-medical companion that provides spiritual support and care to people who are dying.

Her own experiences with soul midwifery started before she even knew what it was.

When she was in college, her older sister developed cancer, and eventually died from it. Ms Perry comforted her by sitting and talking with her, and holding her hand.

She has helped many others since.

“I had the joy of being with my friend as she transitioned,” Ms Perry said. “She asked me to be with her during her last months. We sat and talked. During the transition time, the window to the spirit world opens up more. She was able to see people across the way. She would talk to them. It was truly amazing. When she could not speak, I would give her hand and head massages.”

She believes that when we die we shed our physical bodies but our energy, or soul, remains in the world in a different form.

“I will see my friend in the next lifetime,” she said. “I was not there when she had her last breath, but I was there a day or two before. It was such an honour to experience that. I just know it was something I wanted to be able to offer anyone. She had the opportunity to be loved by many people and not everyone has that.”

The first death café will be held at the Bermuda National Library on May 17 from 6.30pm to 8pm. It will then run every third Wednesday of the month. Admission is free. For more information, see @meaningfulexistence on Instagram, e-mail meaningfulexistencebda@gmail.com or call 707-7779.