As promised Funeral Director here (waves)

[oohnarna]

I am ready for your questions!

I will do my best to answer, I have a few bits I am doing at home but will answer regularly throughout the evening as much as I can.

@sj257

I am so sorry for your loss. Obviously I can't know but it is extremities (fingers before hands before arms etc) that are affected and sometimes blotchy rash on the skin but not skin breakdown or anything horrible like that generally speaking - please don't imagine anything horrific about her back. You are right, 79 for many people is not "old" and you do not have to be old or frail to be affected or die from sepsis.

Turnitupdrhill thank you, I thought it was OK, it must just be cremation where it isn't allowed, maybe, so I can be buried in a shroud but not cremated in one.

My gran has been the only and fairly recent one I’ve seen. She looked pretty good to be fair, she looked worse on her last few hours if you ask me :/ I said I wouldn’t visit but my cousin encouraged me last minute.

I fixed her hair (I used to cut it) and chatted.

My cousin was there and his phone made a sound of knocking on wood, as a text message. I didn’t realise it was his phone and had such a fucking fright 😂 she would have loved that too.

To read this thread has made me feel much better about how she would have been treated.

I still wanna know if I can go with my pole though 😂

OP I hope you don't mind me asking one and I hope my question doesn't upset anyone.

Several years ago we lost a relative in quite a violent accident. His injuries were quite horrible but we were able to view him in the chapel of rest at the FD. They'd arranged his coffin in a really peculiar way, diagonally across the doorway and as there were a few of us that went in together I ended up squished around his head end a bit and soon realised why the odd angle because one side of his head and face was a little misshapen, which in one respect was shocking but realistic in relation to how he had died.

For a long time I couldn't look at a photo of him because I'd be reminded of how he looked in the coffin.

Having recently re-watched 6 feet under and seeing how they portrayed how much work goes into preparing someone for viewing, it made me wonder exactly how much, if any, reconstruction or preparation is done before viewings?

If someone does have facial or head injuries/misshapen features are these filled somehow to try to create a more normal appearance?

Do you use makeup to improve colour of skin tone or to make someone look like they would usually do in life?

Also, are people embalmed for just a standard viewing before funeral, if the funeral is a couple of weeks after death? Or are they just kept cool and brought out only for viewings then placed in the cooler again?
I suppose I'm asking what circumstances would someone be embalmed usually?

A family member had a direct funeral - by which I mean , if I have it correctly - he was collected from the hospital - and Funeral Director organised his cremation with no ceremony - no attendees other than FD people. I do not think it will ever replace a "proper funeral" but it was what the immediate family wanted. They then collected the ashes - scattered them in a meaningful place and had a nice lunch and talked about him afterwards. It was not done because of cost ( although it was cheaper) but he had become reclusive and a sparsely attended funeral I think they would have felt would be a little depressing.

I have given my DH instructions ( and this will out me no end) for my funeral. I want just baby's tears ( the plant ) on my coffin. No bright plants. When asked - he said proudly - Oh I know what Basilisk wants - she wants lamb's lettuce on her coffin ( he's not good on plants) & I cannot help smiling that if I go to my end covered in salad my husband will be very well meaningly , but wrongly , & to the quizzical looks of others , be saying "it's what she wanted".

This is so interesting and informative. Thank you so much! A very quick question from me if that’s ok. I visited my mum in the chapel of rest and found it reassuring. One thing that stayed with me though was she had what I assume was blue nail polish on. I found this bizarre as she never wore polish at all . I know this would have been to disguise any changes that had happened but why was blue chosen? Is it that it masks decomposition more or would it have just been by chance? Why not a red or dark pink colour?

@guntyMcgee when my mum died in 2014, I asked for her not to be embalmed I know it sounds silly but she had frontotemporal dementia and I felt she wouldn’t have wanted to be left alone now she was st peace. The FD were fine about this but she had to be kept at the mortuary were it was cooler and brought to chapel a few days before her funeral. Her funeral was 9 days after she died.

Just to add she was perfectly fine no smell or anything, something that was lovely one of the ladies arranging her funeral asked if I would like a lock of her hair, this would never of occurred to me but I decided I would, they gave it to me in a little pouch. Some might find it creepy but I still sometimes look at it, it brings me comfort.

oohnarna
Thank you for your thread. I was wondering, when a deceased person is being transported during their funeral in the hearse, do family members sometimes request certain music is played (if possible) in the hearse on this journey?

I've wondered about a funeral plan, but am holding back on it as don't know where I'll be living when it will be needed, one daughter lives fairly near, but the others live a way away, and if I need care as I get older [am in my 60s] it might be easier for my family if I move nearer [or they might move nearer before then, who knows. If it happens here, I know I'd go for the local independent FDs, [who might at that stage have been taken over by the coop lol! ] how do you do plans in a situation like that? I hope it will be a while as my parents lived until their late 80s but how do I find out now about funeral plans? I've to say used the local FDs who had been taken over by the co-op and they were great

My mum, who was a nurse, has requested her body goes to science.

She says the teaching hospital will pick her up after death. The students could work on her for up to 2 years. They will call her by her first name and know a little about her life.

Every year there is a memorial church service for the cadavers that the deceased person's families are invited to and the students must attend.

After the teaching hospital has finished with the body they will 1) return it to the family or 2) Cremate it at their expense and return the ashes to the family.

This is another option. It helps the next generation of doctors and is free.

My beloved Mum died in 2007, we were with her when she passed. A few days later at the chapel of rest her head/neck was on a wooden stand at a really unnatural angle and I know her neck had been broken. It broke my already broken heart. I still have flashbacks and I don't think I will ever get over it, perhaps it's the reason I still wear black clothes. It haunts me. I think I want to ask you how that could have happened? Did they drop her? When my Dad passed 2 years ago his head was laid on a pillow and his neck wasn't broken, but it was a new funeral director in the same place. I asked the new FD and she said she would never show a deceased person with their head on a block. Since then my MIL has died and her head was on a pillow, and 14 years ago my FIL was also laid on a pillow.

for all those still grieving. Thank you for the thread op

This thread is weirdly comforting. Death is such a taboo in the U.K.
I am slightly freaked out about the mouth sutures though.

If my Mam had mouth sutures then they were expertly done. When I went to see her in the chapel of rest, she looked like I remembered her, not at all like when I found her.
There was a chemically/disinfectant type smell though, would that be embalming fluid? I don't remember discussing that with the FD.

Thanks so much OP and other contributors. Like so many others, I found all things 'death', terrifying. This and the cremation thread have really helped make it easier to think about.
So sorry, on reading your post, @laziestsusan. Upsetting isn't the word...

I've found this thread really interesting. I lost my Dad last month and am finding it really hard to come to terms with. Have drawn some comfort from the posts on here so thank you.

This has been an interesting thread, and I'm glad it's come up - as well as the one by the Crematorium Technician - it just shows how much people need and want to be able to talk about this stuff openly and honestly.

I just wanted to pick up on the comment about celebrants up-thread. I don't think it is accurate to say there is 'sh*t-loads' of money to be made as a celebrant. Of the celebrants I know (and I am one myself) charges are on average in the same region as the CofE - around £200. For that, I will expect to work with a family and FD over a period of a couple of weeks.

I start with an in-depth meeting with the family, getting a sense of their wishes and hearing all about the person who has died. I speak with others who may have input. Based on that, I prepare - from scratch - an individual and unique funeral service. It will take around 10 hours in total. As an independent celebrant, I will work with whatever spiritual or religious framework the family want - or keep it firmly non-religious, if that is their preference. I lead the ceremony on the day, and assist any other speakers (I'm there for back-up if they are overcome). I later send a keepsake copy of the full service.

I don't see myself ever wanting to take more than 3 services in a week - as I wish to make sure I am able to fully serve each family, and keep on top of all the associated behind the scenes work of liaising with FDs, arrangers, venue, music providers and other friends & family.

Hope that helps to clarify.

I am a little confused on how bodies are stored in the cold rooms. I have this image of each body being stored in indivdiual refrigerators, then pulled out and placed in the coffin for viewings in the Chapel or Rest until the dead person’s final journey to crematorium or burial plot.

However, @oohnarna, I think earlier in this thread you said once dressed and embalmed they are permanently placed in their coffin which is stored in a cold room, so the body isn’t in a sealed refrigerator? Thank you.

Cock ups happen on death certificates, the 'mistake' on my dad's was deliberate though. Instead of telling the registrar I am his stepdaughter I simply said daughter, and that's what they wrote. I'm not treading on anyones toes because I'm the only offspring he had. I know he'd smile at the quiet rebellion.

Do you ever have the feeling of the soul having left a body or still being around in the case of traumatic death?

Former nurse here rather than funeral director, but very much aware of something, (soul), departed.

@Idontmeanto, please can you elaborate?

I’ve nursed a lot of older people who are taking a long time to die. They are often confused and rambling, and there are lots of good clinical explanations for it, but if you listen to them they are often talking to friends and family who have passed. They do seem to be somewhere “real.”
Then there’s the complete stillness and coolness when they go. Something feels gone to me.