Oh my.. would I be responsible for organising DH funeral now?!

[Overstimulated]

I just woke up from a dream where I attended DH funeral.. but I did just rock up before the service. I was even going to sit at the back🤣 it wasn’t until my mum said “you’re his wife, we should be at the front” that I decided to sit at the front.

anyway, I woke up and now I’m thinking.. I’d have to arrange it wouldn’t?! It wouldn’t Be a case of just receiving a time and date and showing up..🤣 poor DH I feel useless.

anyway, here’s hoping to better dreams 😴💤

Yup, that's the way it works. You arrange his or he will do yours. From experience, the funeral directors have it all sorted. Someone has to pay though.

'Donate to medical science' absolutely needs a back up plan. Even if your body is what they require at that particular moment, unpredictable things like dying in a bank holiday can affect it. My partner left his body to London School of Medicine (who later paid for direct cremation costs). It would not have been my choice at all, but it was his.

I am really sorry for your loss.💐 I don't want a funeral either. I think many people are coming round your DH's way of thinking.

Please don’t do that. It’s very cruel to the people who will mourn you. My husband’s dad did this and it was heartbreaking. Just awful. We ended up having a memorial service a year later because it felt like we hadn’t laid him to rest.

Sorry for your loss. Could i just ask though what happens in this case? My mum keeps saying neither her or my step-dad will be having a funeral. So what will i need to do then (because i will be their next of kin and i think it will be me dealing with it) Do funeral directors just arrange a cremation or burial without a service first. Obviously this is something i need to talk about with my parents but i find it very hard to bring up the subject with them.

To everyone concerned about my body.

I have signed up with the nearest medical school. I know there are bodies they reject, you have to be a certain size and weight.

I know they are not open on weekends and bank holidays so if I die on one of those my body will need to be kept in the morgue.

Thank you all for your concern.

I think it is fine for people to do this. The funeral business is a cynical money making machine and guilt trips people into spending thousands of pounds.

My plan is to leave money for people to have a nice lunch or dinner where they can raise a glass to me. Much better than shivering in a crematorium and then having a usually sad buffet.

Both my parents pre-paid for direct cremations and when dad died I was devastated that there wasn’t going to be a funeral. He was ex forces and would have had full military honours if he’d wanted it. At the time I was strangely angry with him for denying me and his huge number of friends and comrades the chance to see him off properly. My mum absolutely couldn’t have coped though, and she had the final say, so I got over myself!

My mum died a few months ago and this time I was incredibly relieved I didn’t have a funeral to sort on top of all the other death admin.

DH and I will also go the direct cremation route I think. If our kids want to have a service for us they can, but they really aren’t the type for public mourning so I’m pretty sure they will be quite happy not to.

Find out if they’ve prepaid for a direct cremation, and if they haven’t, encourage them to. Not an advert or even a recommendation, but my parents used Pure Cremation, and I was very happy with the way it was all dealt with. You make a phone call to them when the person dies and they organise everything, and keep you updated with kind and sensitive phone calls.

We have had 3 deaths in the family over Christmas. All of which are very different in their handling.

My mum who wanted direct cremation (friends all dead, family all over the world). All done, will spread her ashes in the summer.
Seemed a little cold and transactional, but a bit relieved we have time to grieve and arrange a summer get together.

My stepmum (father's widow) , wanted a funeral, had laid out and paid out all arrangements. Funeral soon.

My MIL, Dh is arranging funeral. Only instruction was cremation. Having to make it all up as we go along.

Our kids (23 and 25) are in bits - they lost all 3 grans in 4 weeks. What a bloody awful Christmas.

We have arranged direct cremations for ourselves. Including a nice photo for the death notice... MIL was the photo taker, there were not many of her to choose from, and AI was involved in background removal.

Just want the funerals to be over.

My sister named me as next of kin. She wanted a simple funeral. We just instructed the undertakers and they did everything. It cost about 2 grand which was paid from her estate. We couldn't have a wake as it was during lockdown

They ain’t all £10k though . My Cousin recently died and it cost my Auntie just over £4k for a cremation . If you bury the person it can cost more . It can depend on your area I’m guessing and the package you choose. Some areas the flowers for example will be double the price of somewhere else.

They won’t keep you in a morgue, they’ll just tell your next of kin to speak to a funeral director and arrange a funeral. My mum died just before Xmas and that’s what happened to us. The university said they were closed for Xmas and not accepting bodies, so we would need to make other arrangements. The funeral director and the celebrant both said a very small percentage of people that want to go to medical science are actually accepted.

And I agree with the person that said not having a funeral is very difficult for those left behind grieving. My best friend died and only allowed ten of us to go to the Crem, with no speakers and no music. It was so much more upsetting than a normal Crem service for us all. She had a party for everyone else a few weeks later, but it didn’t really work. Nobody was feeling like a party.

Its probably best to have a conversation about what you both want from a funeral and also each have a death book

that is where you have bank account numbers, life insurance details, music you'd like for funeral, passwords or details that the other person might need. POA for each other etc

This will mean a lot less stress for each of you at a very stressful time. Asyou could put 90% of the useful information in one place making life much easier for the other person.

Also knowing that you have to register the death, where to go and that you have to do this before you can have a cremation. The tell us once service can be used. Even which undertakers you'd like to use.

Don't funeral dreams mean transitions in your waking life?

Sadly no, you don't get to rock up. As "nice' that would be.

Prepaid funeral plans are a good idea though.

Just a note about pure cremation. It can still be quite expensive to the 1400 quid an independent funeral service would charge for the same thing.

The funeral director dealing with my partners Grandma did manage to send her body for medical research, (she was 99), but he said it was the first time he had ever managed to make that happen as it’s so difficult to make the timings work out.

The university then paid for a small funeral and cremation 3 years later which the family were able to be involved with. It was simple and nice.

Both my parents have stated they want a direct cremation when the time comes, and I'm so grateful. The thought of having to arrange funerals & make decisions whilst grieving seems unbearable.
Personally I hate the idea of funerals. If I go before DH I'm happy for him & DC to do whatever they're most comfortable with (direct cremation, funeral etc).

A friend of mine lost his father

he went round the town to each undertakers getting quotes for the exact same funeral - there was £2000 difference between the cheapest and most expensive.
He paid £3000 for a simple cremation with one car, yet another organisation wanted £5000 for the same funeral.

many "local" firms are actually owned by large American companies but they keep the local look by not changing the name of the undertakers etc.

Also cremation costs vary from district to district, my local crematorium was £1000 for the cremation, whereas a city 10 miles away was £500. The city crematorium had video links and my local place didn't. So in terms of whats on offer it wasn't due to better services. Now 6 years later the city is £1224 on a week day and a Saturday is £1836, they also charge £700 for a child. My local crematorium don't charge for children who resided in the district up to the age of 18 and the cremation of over 18s is £1175, Saturday is £1700

I spoke to my therapist yesterday about the desire to just ‘not’ have anxiety anymore, to just face the fears that my anxiety give me and to ride them out. He agreed that’s the best way to teach my mind and body that the things that put me into fight or flight, don’t actually need to. So the funeral dream may have been in relation to by desire to bury this anxious part of myself and start a new me that’s capable of things I was sure I was before.

thanks all for the replies!

Personally I would a natural burial. Im
not interested in having someone stand and talk of a god, or a faith that I’ve never truly believed in. I want my passing to be a time of remembrance of me, and not the thanking of a god that took me 🤷🏼‍♀️

Even if you have direct cremation, you still have to organise it. The hospital needs to issue paperwork before you can register the death - that can take over a week. Once that's done, you need to book an appointment to register the death. That is usually at the local register office, but in some areas it is in a library. You need to think about how many copies of the death certificate you need. You need to choose a funeral director. That means checking prices first.

My mother had a policy to pay for her funeral - it only covered half - and that was a direct cremation with no service!

We just contacted a funeral director and they did everything necessary.

I certainly will be doing it.

I’m glad it was just a dream for you.
for me, it was reality and even though my husband was ill for a while we were both in denial that he would pass. When the time came, I couldn’t function but luckily his best friend came to the rescue and arranged EVERYTHING. So yes, I did just “rock up”.
so moral of the story - get a plan in place or make sure he’s got a great best friend.