Lana Lewis-Talib

Lana Lewis-Talib, was born and raised among her twelve siblings in Indianapolis. It was one of her siblings, her sister, that inspired her to write the book, “In Their Shoes.” “In Their Shoes is a story of a loving sister, sharing the journey of her sister‘s battle with dementia. She candidly opens up about the different stages and accompanying emotions that comes with caring for a loved one suffering with this debilitating disease. She offers resources that helped her give voice to the disease many struggling to understand. This will resonate with anyone caring for or wanting to better understand the challenges of dementia”. This book gives a genuine insight into the world of a person with dementia and their loved ones.  It is a beautiful tribute as well as highly educational.  Lewis-Talib says she wrote “In Their Shoes,” to help others understand what this journey entails as they are caring for their loved one. “This debilitating disease not only affects the person with the disease with those loved ones around them are impacted as well,” she adds. 

Lana Lewis-Talib is certainly a woman of many talents but what so many Indiana Muslim community members are familiar with about Lewis-Talib is her service to the community by leading, performing and teaching janazah ghusls for sisters.  She volunteered to assist with the final care of a beloved sister over twenty years ago.  I asked how she got her start. She tells me, “I was not extremely comfortable, so at that point I realized I had to learn everything about this. As I learned from others and research information for myself regarding this process, I realized I needed to share the information to ensure sisters in the community would be able to carry this out for one another as needed.” And this she certainly has done by attending mosques in the Indianapolis and surrounding areas presenting a very educational, visual and practical classes. I have attended her presentation twice over the years, attending a second time for a refresher but learning new information each time.

I asked Lewis-Talib what brought her to take on such a strong lead in the community both teaching and performing the janazah ghusl.  She says, “It is from Allah that I have been asked by many masjids in Indianapolis and surrounding areas to facilitate presentation and workshops. My experience has been great. The information has been well received and appreciated. The certification piece was added on maybe 8 to 10 years ago, which is advanced training, not a part of the presentation workshop. It allows each participant to demonstrate what they have learned and then receive a certificate of completion.” She adds, “it is and has always been my belief that we as Muslims need to take care of our own sisters to prevent them from having to be cared for by anyone else. This is also a part of our religious practice”

 As one can imagine, the most challenging thing about performing the janazah ghusl are times when Lewis-Talib performed this service on a sister that she was close to for many years.  However, the rewarding part of volunteering to do this service for a sister is knowing that she is participating in giving someone her last rights.   I asked Lewis-Talib how she keeps herself grounded emotionally after so many years of leading and provided the janazah ghusl service to so many people in the community.  She says, “trusting in Allah and reminding myself that one day I will also taste death, and someone will In shaa Allah offer this service.”

I learned from attending her presentations that assistance from multiple volunteers is necessary to provide a janazah ghusl.  She says that the number of volunteers needed varies depending on each situation, preferably five people which can sometimes be a challenge to find enough volunteers. The janazah ghusl and shrouding presentation by Lana Lewis-Talib is highly educational and interesting. If you think you’ll not provide janazah ghusl at any point for someone, I still recommend attending this class if you get the chance. You will walk away with a wealth of information.

In addition to the years of service providing janazah ghusls for the Indianapolis community, sister Lewis-Talib has provided countless acts of community service; leading a volunteer feeding service at Indianapolis local shelters, volunteered as an EMT, volunteered with suicide crisis prevention and has served as member of the Indianapolis Eid Committee, just to name a few.