The death taboo in England.

[Fifi1010]

I did a training session on dying well and wow so many people are so uncomfortable with dying even mentioning it . I have a will and life insurance. I have informed my family of my current wishes and I have written this down. If I change my mind I will update it. I don't think of death a lot but I see it as inevitable and a transition.

It saddens me when people haven't done the planning so decisions are made in crisis when emotions are high and people might not get the end they would want. What could be done to ease the taboo of death?

Really? In my experience of my huge Irish clan, they are quite obsessed with death in a proper miserable way. The talk always turns to who is sick and dying, who is bereaved. Lots of heaven and hell stuff. I find it suffocating.
I have no problem accepting death, I just don't want it in the next room at every conversation.

Of course it 'only affects a minority'.

It's never happened to me, nor any of my friends. I was in town today and it was rammed with people, all of them going about their lives apparently still perfectly alive and well.

As a priest who spends a lot of time around the dead and the bereaved, I am always happy to sit down with anyone (religious/non religious/anything in between) to listen, chat, answer awkward questions and give non biased, non pushy practical advice, and I know lots of my colleagues are. Just come and have a coffee, talk about death, go home feeling a little lighter and never see me again (unless you want to). That’s what we’re there for.

I’ve always thought the “pass away” type of phrase trite and disliked using it. Until my dad died a couple of weeks ago and I found myself saying “passed away” to others I didn’t know well, not because I found the word “died” upsetting myself but because it sounded so jarring in some situations eg. Cheery casual work conversation by a visiting colleague who visits weekly asking “oh I didn’t see you last week, have you been ill? Wasn’t COVID was it? <Cheery laugh>”

it didn’t right to give a blunt “no, my dad died.” So I found myself saying “ah, no, I lost my dad” or “my dad passed away”, in order to protect THEM from feeling uncomfortable at the sudden switch from a cheery smile and question to the dark topic of death.

daft really.

for some reason I cannot abide anyone using “pass/ed” on its own without the word “away”. It’s naff, like the sort of thing a crappy medium would say. “Pass over” is even worse. They’re not a rain cloud or an aircraft going overhead.

I'm not sure.
It's denial rooted in fear with a helping of superstition ('tempting fate')

True, but in some ways wanting to talk about death and remove the taboo is the same thing. It's the same thing but the other way, to imagine that if you talk about and plan for death, it will make it easy, painfree or not sad for your loved ones. It won't though. You can't organise your way out of death any more than you can hide from it.

Same with funeral arrangements - who cares, you are dead. You don't have wishes any more and you'll never know.

for some reason I cannot abide anyone using “pass/ed” on its own without the word “away”. It’s naff, like the sort of thing a crappy medium would say. “Pass over” is even worse. They’re not a rain cloud or an aircraft going overhead

I agree with this. I find even ‘passed away’ to be a bit avoidant and think it’s an attempt to avoid the reality of the situation. But bad and all as those phrases are, they pale in comparison to ‘gained angel wings’… I can somewhat understand that when it’s a parent talking about a young child who has died, but when I see that about an adult or elderly person, I raise an eyebrow. I agree with a pp that it’s all contributing to a society where death is feared and we don’t recognise it as part of life and the natural process.

Our family is recently bereaved but unfortunately we are experiencing delays disposing of the body because the case is with the coroner and police.

My mother doesn't like the way my husband and I speak about death. She's not religious and has planned & paid for her funeral. She believes her body should be revered because it represents her in life.

We are of a different view. Once the person has died, that's it, they're gone. We don't believe the body needs to be treated with respect, it's just remnants of the person who has died. Our family member said he didn't care how we got rid of their body, they will be dead. We don't subscribe to all the usual rites. We just want to be able to get the death certificate, resolve their personal business, and move on.

We would prefer not to have a funeral because all the people who didn't bother staying in touch during their life suddenly come out of the woodwork and claiming how sad they are. Ghouls, all of them. Pretenders. They didn't make the effort when they were alive, why bother if they're dead? A free drink and sausage roll, probably. Our family member didn't have any money so they'll be disappointed in that regard.

My husband also complains about The Script: "Oh I'm so sorry for your loss. Let me know if there's anything we can do, ok?" Yes, please stop being so fake and foxtrot Oscar. They aren't being genuine, they just say it to be polite.

I want a direct cremation. The crematorium can throw my ashes in the bin because I won't care through being dead. My husband wants to be donated to medical science. We are both ardent atheists who are entirely practical about these matters.

I'm grieving so I hope people aren't too offended by my comments.

@Judellie
Still not sure what to do tho if someone died; do you ring the undertaker straight away or do you call the doctor or what are you meant to do?

If your loved one dies at home you should call the GP first. The undertaker cannot collect the deceased until the death has been certified. Sometimes, if the death happens out of GP hours, then a paramedic will do this.

Be aware though that if the death was not expected then the police will need to be informed and the death referred to the coroner. The attending police will arrange for the deceased to be taken into the care of a local undertaker who they have a contract with. You are not obliged to use that undertaker for the funeral, you can instruct whichever one you prefer to use.

My death will have no impact on me, only others.

Dying may do, but it’s transient.

Focus on getting people to make a will.

Big topic.....being going since the dawn of ti me.

with the decline in religion and reduction of opportunities to discuss death we are in a position collective head burying to escape continual existential angst.

I think this has lead to a cult of youth and a determined if doomed attempt to eradicate all the features of aging. We do not talk about social care or hospices at an individual level as often and as early as we could.

this mentality has knock on effects on health care where increasingly aggressive and invasive treatment s are used in the elderly in artificially extending life often with little quality. The majority NHS spending is spent on the over 70s. For instance cancer proportionately impacts the elderly and yet the level of treatment is the same as for someone in their 30s and we have to question the holistic benefit of this.

People.I know are too proud to discuss degenerative ailments such as arthritis that disassociated with the elderly and we have a plethora of celebs who guard their appearance jealously aiming to eradicate the signs of old age of weakness.

I work in healthcare in community nursing so death does not phase me what so ever, in fact i see many people being kept alive in some horrible states, no quality of life, or dying from cancer where we just can’t get on top of their pain or anxiety and to me that is far worse then death.

In elderly people we need to have far more frank conversations with people and their families as healthcare professionals, be more honest about pro and con of treatment, yes we can give you some treatment for that cancer but it will likely make you poorly and have little quality of life for the few extra months it might give you im talking about people in their 80s who want everything done, if it was me I’d rather not have the treatment and have a few months where I feel well enough to go out with friends or family etc

I mean they are open about it in a way that the English are not.

Neighbours, friends, relatives, the whole community all go to the funeral and wake. It's not shied away from. Lots of open caskets, the body at home etc.

If you've been brought up in England with an English culture around death, I think its different to being brought up in England with an Irish culture around death.

People need to grow up because death comes to us all, it's unavoidable.
How is anyone to know what the wishes of the deceased were for their funeral for example, if they never spoke of it.
If you try to discuss it you get ' oh don't be so macabre ' and shit like that.
Fine, I'll just dump you down the local household waste site then shall I.

This is exactly how we feel as a family too. We had a direct cremation for my Mum and dh and I will have the same. It was amazing how many people were angry with us doing that and came out of the woodwork after 20 odd years of not seeing her or contacting her to say how upset they were that there was no funeral. 🙄 Utterly ridiculous. Even my Dad who had treated her terribly and had been divorced from her (and remarried for 25 years) suddenly wanted to turn up to her funeral. Errrr nope. If you couldn’t be bothered with someone in life you don’t get to turn up when they’re dead.

"Neighbours, friends, relatives, the whole community all go to the funeral and wake. It's not shied away from. Lots of open caskets, the body at home etc.

If you've been brought up in England with an English culture around death, I think its different to being brought up in England with an Irish culture around death."

I think those two things should be separated in discussions. I think it's good to talk about the persons wishes, what will happen to assets, and how the person would like to be remembered without the pressure to watch the actual death, view the body, or have the body at home which is maybe what puts some people off thinking about it.

Yes and that's fair enough, but what I mean about the Irish culture around death is that people are USED to doing these things from an early age. There is less of a taboo around it (eg there would be absolutely no discussion in my family as to whether a baby, or toddler, or 4 year old, or 10 year old would attend a funeral, or even see a dead body...trauma deaths and limited circumstances excepted)

I would argue that their attitude towards all of it comes from the fact that these sort of things are the done thing.

Oh I hear you @JacobsCrackersCheeseFogg about the “script”. We live in a small village, everyone knows dad has been unwell and is in hospital. So many people have stopped us in the shop or street and asked how he’s doing and said “if there’s anything we can do” and I think about 2 of them really meant it.

There's also the thing of advanced care planning. If I had an accident it's not just for illness. I love my DH and my DF but chances are they wouldn't want to let me go even if had a terrible quality of life. Which is something I personally wouldn't want. By avoiding the conversation or planning you are handing over all the power to your relatives and you have to hope they do the right thing by you.

I am fed up of being told off about my apparent attitude to death as an Englsih person.

I don't want to live into old age and be a burden to dc and expense to the nhs.
The dc know I'm going to end my life if I felt I was becoming reliant on others or had a medical condition which will become worse.
We've always been open about dying and death so they have grown up with it. They accept and respect my wishes as does dh. It is freeing and I have control to a degree over my life's end.

No one is telling anyone off, lol.

Just that if you're from a family where (by virtue of immigration) you get to see another culture's attitude to it...you are in a position to compare and contrast.

You can dump me in the local waste site if you like. I am not such a bighead as to want to dictate what happens at my funeral - I won't be there, so people can run it however they want.

@Neededanewuserhandle - that was exactly what my mum said. She was a Humanist, but she recognised that my sister and I might want a church funeral - dsis is very active in her local church, and would definitely prefer a church funeral - and said we should do what gave us comfort.

Her letter has made things much easier for us, in the past few days.