Elderly Father insists no funeral

We had an unaccompanied cremation for my dad (you are told afterwards when it has been done and where). Shortly afterwards on his birthday, we gathered as a family to celebrate his life. I made his favourite meal and I put together a big display of photos of him and we had a few of his prized possessions about. Over the meal , each of us talked about a favourite memory and we toasted him. We collected his ashes and they will be scattered with my mum's at a place where we all have very happy memories. It was just perfect.

I can’t imagine going against someone’s specific funeral wishes (except for the kind of practical reasons a couple of posters have mentioned). It’s part of them and who they are and a last and final respect they should have. It just feels so disrespectful to go against that. People can choose how they wish to remember someone, of course that is up to them. However if someone decided to deliberately go against my specific wishes for my funeral - I just find the idea incomprehensible. I couldn’t do that to someone I cared about, even someone I didn’t care about.

I’ve been to lots of funerals with celebrants who were amazing - weird that you’d tar them all with one brush 🤷‍♀️.

The worst funerals I’ve ever been to were Catholic ones - I’ve been to two and they were absolutely identical, no reflection of the deceased at all.

My dad had a direct cremation - I do get the appeal but it was hard not to have a proper goodbye 😢

Losing someone close is hard and lots of people struggle to cope, sometimes for years afterwards. The trouble with leaving strict instructions not to do anything at all is that those left behind are damned if they do and damned if they don't. So the choice is struggle with your mental health with feelings of guilt for not following instructions, or struggle with your mental health for following instructions that don't allow you to grieve properly. I find it hard to understand why anyone would want to leave that as their legacy to people they supposedly love.

Think celebrations of life when the nearest and dearest have had a bit of time to adjust are definitely preferable.

However, the wedding/funeral industry has spotted this as a new revenue stream and reworked wedding tat is being increasingly marketed. We stayed well away from the COL table favours and the like but it would be easy to be emotionally blackmailed into it becoming very expensive to mark a loved one's passing.

Like in any job, some are better at it than others. The celebrant who did DH's was brilliant. He only asked me handful of questions and managed to speak warmly as if he'd really got to the soul of the man.

The vicar who did my DGM's was awful. Tried to talk her about part of the church family, but didn't know her as she wasn't able to attend in her later years and had clearly made no attempt to find anything out.

Just to add, an elderly atheist relative of dh had requested no funeral service, though he was cremated. There were only about 6 of us - we took wine, glasses and some nibbles into the crem chapel and had a little fond reminiscences party there, with his coffin on its stand nearby.

Crem staff were fine with it and the family all thought he’d have approved thoroughly.

We attended a funeral with a celebrant recently. Suffice it to say that although I’m not remotely religious I said to dh afterwards, don’t ever organise a funeral like that for me! Give me a good old CofE vicar and a few nice hymns any day!
The bloke wore the most hideous lurid suit and the way he spoke - I don’t mean his accent - was cringe-making. Sort of fake over familiar and waffly-gushing over someone he’d never met. I’m sure she’d have been appalled.

I’ve not had personal experience, but I’ve known a family where the father requested no funeral, no wake, no get together, no dinner to send him off, and he was such a strong personality the family didn’t feel they could challenge it. They were so bereft at having no way of marking his passing, it was distressing to see how sad it all was. His wife would have liked an informal wake if not a formal funeral. They just tidied up and plodded on.
I did think it was a cruel request on his part. It is an opportunity to express support for the grieving families left behind.

I'd argue that a lot of rituals and customs are massively outdated and that a more pragmatic approach to death and funerals is more helpful In the days after my mother’s death, I could have done with old fashioned symbols of bereavement - closed curtains etc. I could have done without repeatedly explaining to well-wishing tradesmen that my mother had died.

If it were only a glass of Jamesons, I'd bloody well come back and haunt them. I expect a very, very decent single malt!

I am having a direct cremation too, and the instructions are that my ashes be divided amongst family and friends who are to go anywhere in the world, find a place that they think I would love, and raise a glass / think of me. They can also have a fun get together if they wish. But no funeral, no service, no misery and no black. I've celebrated my life whilst alive and I want that to be the way people remember me - a celebration.

And those instructions are set in stone, in my will, and will not be defied (not that my family would defy them - they have more respect for me than some people here seem to have for their loved ones).

ive planned and paid for my own funeral already.
Here today incinerator tomorrow.
No flowers no gathering no stupid speeches im not there to hear it my ashes will be giving back and let loose.
Why well if you cant buy flowers for a loved one when there living why do it when there dead.
If you cant make time to see them when they are living why make the effort to go to the funeral.
Enjoy the time you have with them now take them flowers dont do it when they're dead.
Tell them now what you think not what you think at the funeral.
Fun in funeral nothing fun about it just a bunch of people that couldent be bothered with you when you were alive but made it for the send off.
My children know all about it so no worries we make time for each other now plus they get me flowers now while im still living.
No sad faces i want them to get on with their life not run to a grave yard.
My will is even better what money is left they have strict instructions to spend every last penny and have a good time.
What they dont want from my home bin it get on with life and live.

Just awful. With me All that’s happened now is that when my mum dies I will definitely not be telling them!

I think it’s the “but we are family” - like some awful soap opera where everyone thinks it’s normal to scream at each other.

My father was as the same mind as yours OP. We had a direct cremation and then had a high cream tea at a local vineyard in a function room with friends and family. I spoke about him and we held a toast. Ironic as he was teetotal in life but we’d visited the vineyard frequently as a family. We also read some poetry which I also printed in the ‘order of service’ - not that it was in a church.

Although it was a sad day it went really well and my mother said she’d like the same for her. Which sadly we did within the year of her being widowed.

Both were quite small memorials but went well.

How would you feel if you wanted a huge funeral with a dozen big fancy limousines with 200 people there, and a massive party for all afterwards with a disco, 100 balloons, fireworks, and a congo. And the people closest to you (DC/siblings etc,) said 'nope. No way is that happening, Massive waste of time and money - we are giving you a direct cremation, then having a beer at the pub with half a dozen people after.'

@SweetBirdsong not quite as extreme as that, but we have had elderly relatives who wanted/expected a full traditional church service followed by interment and big wake, but by the time they died they'd outlived most of their friends and close family. Those that were still alive were too unwell to attend. We did our best to abide by the spirit of their wishes with a formal and dignified service in a side chapel of the church. We got about 9 or 10 attendees including neighbours and carers, but no we didn't do the horse drawn carriage etc etc.

I'd be upset if they ignored my wishes, although I am only specifying the Catholic parts so they can do what they like with the cars/fireworks etc. As I said my DH doesn't want anything, no meeting for drinks/scattering of ashes or anything and I will respect that even though it does upset me as I feel his passing should be marked. I would always respect people's wishes and I'd expect them to respect mine.

Funerals are for the living. There's a reason every single culture/religion incorporates some sort of send off. It's not a waste of money if that's what loved ones want/need.

I nearly didn't bother with a proper funeral for DH. At the time organising it seemed like too much and he too would have felt it was a waste of money, but I can see now that it was an absolutely necessary part of the process for me and DC. People often remark on how lovely the (very simple) service was, which gives me some comfort.

If a celebrant is what you want OP, have one.

@nonumbersinthisname

The deceased’s wishes around what happens to their body should absolutely be respected as it is the final bit of autonomy that they have. The ritual around that, that I consider “the funeral” is in the hands of the living. Wishes should be taken into consideration, like the pp who wants the full rites of the RC church. But there are circumstances when I think it’s perfectly appropriate for the family to over ride. Particularly if the deceased says no funeral but the family still wish to come together to grieve and hold some form of ritual, whether religious or not, and it would be of comfort to them.

Hmm well if someone wants to meet with their siblings and their siblings partners and their niece and nephews and maybe an aunt and a cousin or two who they are all close to - and more importantly - who the deceased was close to - and raise a few glasses to them in the local pub, (after they get their ashes after a direct cremation) - then that's fine.

What I and some others object to is the idea that someone specifically requests a direct cremation, and NO FUNERAL, and some posters are saying 'ah ha to heck with that, they will have a funeral whether they like it or not!' Why do this? Why disrespect their wishes so horribly?

Let the direct cremation go ahead and then raise a glass to them a few weeks later (as I said, maybe when you have their ashes,) with the people closest to them. Don't have a funeral and advertise it in the paper or on facebook, and allow all and sundry to attend who have had nothing to do with the deceased for a quarter century. As has been said, loads of people turn up to peoples funerals when they never gave a shiny shite about them when they were alive!

As for the poster who wants the whole kit and caboodle in the RC Church - and good for her if that's what she wants... I will ask her - and other people who want to have a funeral for their loved on (even when they specifically say NO FUNERAL..... ) How would you feel if you wanted a huge funeral with a dozen big fancy limousines with 200 people there, and a massive party for all afterwards with a disco, 100 balloons, fireworks, and a congo.

And the people closest to you (DC/siblings etc,) said 'nope. No way is that happening, Massive waste of time and money - we are giving you a direct cremation, then having a beer at the pub with half a dozen people after.' How nasty and disrespecful would THAT be? Going against your wishes, and just giving you a direct cremation. No religious ceremony, no blessings, no rituals, no Church service, no vicar or priest, no hymns, no eulogy, no-one coming to see you off. Just NOPE, to heck with what YOU want. YOU don't get a say when you're dead! How would you feel if THIS happened? Be honest now!

I'll just leave that there......... ^

@TorroFerney

... To offer another view an immense upset. I had a couple of awful messages from relatives who I'd not seen, and who had not seen my elderly relative for years before they died but took umbrage that I'd not told them immediately he'd died (I'd no contact details for them for one thing) and decided to find me on facebook and berate me on fb messenger and tell me how awful I was. All very Jeremy Kyle on their part...

This reminds me of a man I used to know around 25 years ago. (John.) His dad died on Easter Sunday, and his mum's health went downhill quickly, and she died 16 months after - the following August ... He was an only child and had to arrange both funerals himself. His mum was too infirm and weak to arrange his dad's funeral, so he did it. He did hers too. It was a very stressful and upsetting time for him, especially with them dying so close together, having to arrange both funerals, and only being in his mid 30s. (They were 35 when he was born, and died when they were in their early 70s.)

John's mum's sister Linda - had had nothing to do with his mum for about 20 years. (And they were not super close anyway.) His mum left the area she and her sister and parents and aunts, uncles, and cousins, had grown up in, aged 37-38 and moved 50 miles further north... taking her young son (John) with them.. and John's dad went too of course. His mum tried to keep in touch and kept up the contact until John was about 12 and then stopped, as she got sick of doing all the running.

So anyway, when his mum died, John didn't let his sister and 3 cousins know (in the town 50 miles south) as they had not been bothered with her for some 20 years. (His mum asked him to make sure they didn't know and didn't come to her funeral.) When the sister found out she had died (from someone - a few months later,) she went fucking batshit! Wrote a vile and nasty letter to John full of expletives and insults, and calling him a nasty cunt and everything. It was SO toxic.

When John's mum was dying, (and she knew she didn't have long left,) she begged him to not let that lot know. She said 'not a single jot of contact for 20 years! NOPE they do NOT get to come to my funeral. I don't want them there.' She was actually upset at the thought of them coming. Not only because they had had no contact for 20 years, but also because they weren't that close anyway. What did the sister and the cousins think they were missing?

@nonumbersinthisname
Every culture in the planet has rituals and customs around death. They help the living to come to terms with the bereavement and to move on

I'd argue that a lot of rituals and customs are massively outdated and that a more pragmatic approach to death and funerals is more helpful. Doing things just because that's the way they have always been done is going to be good for "some" people but not being constrained by old traditions and customs is freeing. Working out what works for your family is what matters.

We 'came to terms' with the death of my father with NO funeral or service whatsoever. We miss him and we reminisce about him but we think about him when he was alive not about when he was dead.

Everyone needs to do what suits them and their families.

Mum had a direct cremation, she had already told me her one regret in life was that she hadn’t learnt to swim so wanted to have her ashes scattered in a river so she could swim to the sea. All the family got together on a lovely day, scattered her ashes in a beautiful river and then went and had a meal together. I also donated to have her name put on a lifeboat so she will be swimming and saving lives for a long time https://rnli.org/support-us/give-money/donate-in-memory/launch-a-memory

It was his life, should be is wishes how it ends, im the same decided no church service, decides want my ashes scattered, picked a poem to be read , want my family to celebrate my life not my death, ((( there are some lovely poems about death, passing on , my poem is so lovely

Didn't think of that did ya? Don't be so ridiculously patronising. I was answering a specific comment about not wanting people turning up who couldn't be bothered in life.

I’ve got the information pack for leaving my body for medical research, I also enquired at the Funeral Directors this morning about direct cremation.
Absolutely no way do I want a service or gathering of any kind.
will leave a sum of money for everyone to have a lovely meal somewhere but that’s it.
The more funerals and cremations I go to the more I dislike them. I an atheist.