Burial or cremation?

[GutsyShark]

Apologies for the morbid thread! Was at a funeral today which is what brought it to mind.

Would you rather be buried or cremated? I’ve a will and letter of wishes that says no preference but having thought about it think I’d rather be buried.

@HebeHerbivore Exactly! I love to think about random people seeing my mum's name and wondering who she was.

You can have a hybrid approach. I had my husband cremated (I suspect he’d like to have been buried, but I also know if the boot had been on the other foot he’d have done what was easiest, which is cremation 😂). But his ashes are interred in a local cemetery, with a ‘gravestone’ marking the plot. Cremation plots are much smaller than burial ones, so a better use of land! There’s room for my ashes, and inscription as well :)

Terramation is my first choice.

If not available in my area before I die, then a natural burial at one of the places near me where they're using burials as part of creating and maintaining a nature reserve.

This is what my parents have done. It was actually lovely, interring mum’s ashes in the same plot as dad’s - she had moved away from where they had lived and where he was buried, but always longed to go home, and this meant she could.

It is an approach I have considered, but whilst it was definitely right for dad and mum, it has left me feeling sad because I live hundreds of miles away from where they are laid to rest, and they are in a very remote village, so I know it is very unlikely that I will get to visit the grave again (distance plus cost of travel and accommodation plus my poor mobility). I don’t want my dses feeling this way because my grave is not somewhere convenient for them if they wanted to visit - and they currently live in Scotland, the South East, and the Antipodes, so there is nowhere that would be convenient for all three of them!

Hence why I want to be scattered in the sea - then I am everywhere and nowhere.

Buried. I like a service, then outside, the body put in the ground and family scattering a little earth on the coffin as they leave.

It seems compact and I like the finality of it.

Cremations mean saying goodbye at the service, then having ashes to scatter or interr and say goodbye all over again, it's a bit drawn out for me.

I have to have the conversation with my daughter re a direct cremation . As although I say I want one , it's also about your loved ones left .

When I took the bus to work we passed a Natural Burial Ground. I used to joke with the drivers that when I die I wanted my coffin taken there on the bus, my bus pass could be taped to the coffin.

They said however that it would be luggage so free

"I’d like to feed the worms and nourish the earth, sounds weird but I think it’s nice - like going back to nature.
*
I wonder about the pollution with cremation?*"

I feel the same.

There is a lovely natural burial site near us (in Cornwall). All very eco, only natural coffins allowed, the land will naturalise into woodland eventually.

The thought of not having a gravestone doesn't worry me in the least. DHs GPs have quite a wizzy grave in Plymouth but no one in the family ever visits.

Burial!

I'm terrified of fire.☹️

I read something ages ago about a body farm - it’s a research facility for forensic scientists. The deceased leave their bodies to the facility and they are buried at various depths and conditions to study how they decompose over time. If the option was available this is what I would do.

As it is I would probably prefer to be cremated but don’t really care either way. Both my parents are buried and I never go to the cemetery even though it’s only 10 minutes away, I just don’t get anything from going.

You can have your ashes made into a firework, I think that sounds fun.

I don’t like modern burial. The embalming and the heavy duty coffins contaminate the natural order of returning our atoms to the universe.

green burial isn’t easily accessible and I’m claustrophobic enough that I don’t love the idea, even in death.

my ideal would be cremation by funeral pyre, but I will settle for a more industrial, efficient cremation.

I live in Denmark. If you get cremated then they bury the urn which I find a bit odd. I'd like to be scattered at the guide hut (probably at the fire pit) and at Skallerup where we have our lovely summer holidays. But apparently you have to apply for permission to do that.

I like this idea! Though i don't like heights that much...

As long as it’s not a loud one that scares the animals.

My auntie looked into the forensic body farm thing, apparently it was loads of money, which seems a bit silly. If they want your body to experiment on surely it should be free?

My husband recently had a direct cremation - not with the heavily advertised ones but a local undertaker and I found it easier to cope with.
He had asked for this and had nothing to do with cost and in now in a lovely wooden box on side table surrounded by photos and personal possessions. It is not morbid and I often talk to him before I go to sleep.

I'm having a direct cremation. Just updated my will this week. Everything in place

I would like my remains to be scattered at Disneyland. I don't want to be cremated 😆

I had to read that a couple of times 😆🤣

I'll be organising my post death affairs at some point ... I'm 45 so I hope not for a while yet.. but I want a direct cremation, no fuss, no muss, just dead, disposed, everyone move on.

If my daughter wants to do something to remember me by, she should go on a memorial holiday and have toast to me with a pint of Vodka..

(The thought of people stood around and all sad and shit because I'm gone horrifies me tbh.)

I mean, I'd rather become tree food or a diamond - the former requires burial while the latter would be initial cremation. However, I'm sure the former is a US thing and not possible here and both are a tad out of my price range. So cremation it is.

I used to want burial but I hate the idea of neglected graves and people feeling obliged to visit.

I worried with cremation that you had no ‘place’ to remember them but I’ve realised with losing my brother that you carry them with you wherever you go.

Do cremation for me and my loved ones can do with my ashes what they choose. I’d like to be scattered in the sea but I’m not sure the impact of that on the sea!

We had planned to be buried in our village church graveyard. But neither of us are particularly religious! MIL died at New Year and she wasn't religious either, so we opted for a non religious cremation presided over by a celebrant, a very small/simple affair, no guests except immediately family. We thought it far more appropriate so we're changing our wills to specify the same as we don't like the idea of a church funeral service with loads of "hangers on" attending who we've probably not seen for years. Our remaining question that the funeral directors are checking is whether we can have our ashes buried in the church graveyard as the crematorium is miles away in a different town that means nothing to us or our son as and we've lived in the village for 30 years and son always lived in the village, went to primary school in the village, it means a lot to him!