Guest blog post by Maxime T, co-founder of www.remember-me.co website. Remember-me is a simple and safe way to share, preserve and send on personal messages and memories to loved ones once you’re gone.
The idea of a web-based service that would give the power to people to communicate a little bit longer than life normally allows came to me a few years ago. It was initially a response to my childhood anxieties about the death of my parents, but became more urgent after the loss of my grandmother to the progressive dementia of her Alzheimer’s. What remained unacceptable is not being able to say a proper goodbye after either sudden death or long degenerative disease. I had to find the time and the funds to give life to the project, but finally in October 2015 www.remember-me.co was born.
Unlike some “after life” websites, the purpose of remember-me is not to offer a one-stop-shop where people manage their digital afterlife. We used today’s technology to create a simple platform purely intended for our users to create and send posthumous messages. Besides taking all necessary security measures, our focus was to make this service simple, easy and accessible to the widest of audiences. What developed was a three step process: write a message and add some content such as a video or a selection of pictures, assign a contact and decide the moment of delivery.
Besides giving the possibility to users to reiterate their affections for their loved ones, family members and friends, remember-me can be a great support for those left behind, for those in grief and to get the proper closure they need. But mourning has to end and so does the messaging. This is why we decided to limit our service to the year following the death of the user.
As in my own case, remember-me can be a priceless tool for users suffering from dementia to be remembered the way we all deserve to be. For the users unable to do it alone, working together with a close friend or family member can be such a meaningful project.
There are as many good reasons as there are individual cases and personal situations to use remember-me, each one with their own value. We purely created this service to give the chance to those who feel the need to say a proper goodbye; the words that really matter.
We won’t solve the pain caused by death, but we hope it might help in some small way.
