I sat in on my first arrangement with a funeral director. The last one was an Imminent but this one was for a man who had just passed away after a short battle with cancer and his two daughters were making the arrangements. The funeral director, Cameron, started off by offering his condolences and I knew by their responses this probably wasn’t going to be a typical arrangement. One lady just starred, the other one said “K” and shook her head, as if she was annoyed. As the funeral director went through all the steps of asking questions and getting, well, some of the information he needed, I learned a ton about the first steps in organizing a funeral and a lot of the options we offer. Unfortunately, they didn’t bring a lot of information that was originally requested when they first called (Dad’s sin card, copy of the will etc.) and they were very indecisive on what they wanted. Also they wanted the funeral in two days so even though I wasn’t the funeral director I started thinking “Is Cameron stressed? How’s he going to pull all the information he needs from these women in less than two days?” At the end of the meeting, he made a list for them of all the stuff they needed to email him. He told me that it’s not that common to have such a difficult family but reminded me, as I felt I already knew, that it’s not him, or us that they are frustrated or angry with but it’s the way they are coping with the death of their father. A few hours later they called with only one minor decision made. Somehow it came together in time for the funeral but there was still information we needed for death certificates etc. At the end of the funeral, I was there when Cameron reminded them and one lady raised her voice and asked why he didn’t tell them that before the funeral. He said quite nicely that he had and it was on the list he gave them and went over, she shut up but I was in disbelief. Are these the types of people I have to look forward to? At least they did thank him before they left and said the funeral went really well.
Random learning’s from the last couple weeks:
- Identifying- Although there are plenty of steps to help ensure the body is in fact the correct person prior to it arriving at our home, there is one additional step we take with the family. When arranging with the family we give them a choice 1) They can give us a photo where we can do a match with the deceased or 2) They can do a an ID View. If they choose an ID view the body is not embalmed, (if it is the wrong body there could be legal action if an embalming took place without the right families authority), the body is washed and it can be dressed in their clothes if the family wishes. Personally, I think it’s strange that some people would want them naked or with just a white sheet around them but sometimes people are thinking differently when their loved ones die. Anyway, we place them in our comfortable viewing room and the family can identify. Sometimes the family chooses to do this to also say their goodbyes, usually in replacement of a viewing, but they are limited in the number of people they can bring to do this “ID”. Whereas, viewing although they can be private, are usually open to all the family and friends. There have been stories, from recent years, where a viewing took place and it was the wrong person who was prepared – yikes! We would rather take an extra step and avoid that from ever happening.
- In The Tour, I discussed a prep room before the actual prep/embalming room and it’s where rituals take place. We call it though the wash/dress room. When we just have to wash and dress a body that’s where we take them, no actual chemicals or tools are in this room.
- Cremated remains often range in grey shades. The color depends on the material of the casket that was chosen for the body to be burned in and the volume of the casket compared to the volume of the body. The more casket and less body there is, the darker they tend to be.
- We remove pacemakers but nothing else. We ask the family to list any other artificial parts but artificial hips, knees, you name it are kept in as well as any implants – they just melt away. Any remaining artificial parts are kept and every so many years a mass burial is done.