As my three month probationary period was creeping closer and closer, I felt myself getting more and more unsettled about the fact that I was still undecided whether I wanted to get my dual license (funeral director and embalmer) or just funeral director. On one side, the dual would take me more places – outside this corporation they look for duals, especially in small towns and small funeral homes. However, on the other side, I like this corporation and I like this funeral home so if I ever wanted to change my location there are a number or funeral homes in this corporation I could transfer to. With this being said I couldn’t come up with a reason to do the embalming side. In just the last couple years the funeral directors apprenticeship changed, requiring one to learn how to wash, dress, set features, cosmetize etc. So as far as the business goes, I would still have prep room experience and a good understanding of what exactly goes on in there. I felt uneasy about making the decision I had to make and decided to have a heart-to-heart with my boss. It went really well, he agreed with every point I made and told me if I ever regretted not doing the embalming apprenticeship that the corporation could pay for me to go later on. After this conversation I felt great and at peace with my decision to just get my funeral directors license. Basically this means I won’t be authorized or certified to do embalmings or work on autopsied bodies. Now, since I have some issues with eyes and packing *ahem* holes… I’m going to continue spending time in the prep room before my apprenticeship officially begins to get as comfortable as possible.
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Tags: apprenticeship, autopsy, cemetery, embalmer, embalmer apprenticeship, embalmer license, embalming, funeral chapel, funeral corporation, funeral director, funeral director apprenticeship, funeral director license, funeral girl, funeral home, funeral profession, funeral professional, funeral service, interview, role of funeral director, the funeral girl, undertaker
I’ve been asked what happens if you can’t get the jewellery off the body and whether jewellery can be left on or not when it comes time to burial, cremation, etc .
It’s our policy that when we are picking up the body at the location to bring it back to our home, we check for jewellery. If there happens to be jewellery on the person we do try our best to get it off and then give it to the nurse, care home person, whomever, to make note it was removed and return it to the family. On the rare occasion where the jewellery doesn’t want to come off, we inform the appropriate person and make a note of it ourselves. Most of the time, it’s the rings that don’t want to come off swollen fingers. Sometimes the family is aware it’s been left on too; often the family has been with the person in their final days and does remove the jewellery or attempts to take it off. When we meet with the family back at the funeral home to make arrangements, we bring up specifically what was left on the body and we ask if they would like it removed. If so, with rings it’s a matter of some cold cream and a string. The cold cream is slippery and then you shimmy the ring off with the string. Worst case scenario, we have the tools to cut any jewellery off as well, but it’s all about communicating to the family first that it may be the only way.
A family can decide if they would like any jewellery to remain on the person when they are buried or cremated, it’s their decision. Sometimes they have jewellery kept on just for the viewing/visitation. It’s my understanding so far with cremation though, that some metals will not break down, the jewellery would be ruined though and possibly removed before the remains are grinded down – and they will not be returned. Another option is to place the jewellery in the cremated remains when transferred to the urn.
Tags: burial, cemetery, crematorium, embalmer, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral professional, funeral service interview, interview, jewellery on deceased, the funeral girl
Management figured they better get me more involved with the deceased to make sure I could handle things before it’s time to sign me up for the apprenticeship. Determining whether I can deal with the emotional and physical aspect that comes with being around the deceased will let us know for sure if I’m cut out for this profession. Anyway so we’re taking baby steps and I was asked to follow the caretaker around for a day to do some removals and transfers.
Removal refers to removing the deceased’s body from either the hospital whether that was the place of death or another place of death to our funeral home. Transfer has a broader definition. Some of our sister homes do not have a prep room or cremation. It can refer to bringing a prepared body for viewing to one of our sister homes or bringing it back to ours (usually to do the cremating since most of homes to do not crematoriums). Then transferring can also mean taking the cremated remains back to a home or even taking the deceased to the airport if they are going to another location. We have a care taker, Michael, we use to contact for all removals and transfers, we send him the appropriate paperwork (basic info…who, what, where) and then he prioritizes all the calls.
So we started off the day by heading to the local hospital to pick up a body from the morgue. We drove a van that has space for two gurneys in the back. When we arrived we pulled in front, reported to a small admin office, picked up the doctors paperwork and then headed in the van to the back of the hospital in a pick up/drop off zone. There are a few security guards there but they knew the care taker so no identification was asked for. We pulled one of the gurneys out of the back and headed to the morgue. It was just as you see it on tv, just a room with a wall of metal doors. Each door had a number and a small slot with ID tags. We showed the security guard the paperwork, then we looked in a file there that told us what spot body was in. We opened the door and slid the metal tray out, the body was in a white body bag. Mike explained that we have to open the bag, check the body for jewellery (the ears, wrists, fingers). This one was an older woman and there wasn’t really any smell. We didn’t find any jewellery on her but if we had we would give them to the admin office (the one we had checked in with and it would be there responsibility to take inventory and contact the family about the jewellery). When we open up the bag we also do a quick ID check, often they are still wearing the hospital bracelet or we do a quick comparison with the little information on Mike’s paperwork and the doctors. Then we tag them with our own bracelet and put it around the ankle. After that, we had to get the body on our gurney. Our gurneys have a fabric body bag that we place the entire body bag into, so we opened it up and there’s also a couple seatbelts to keep them strapped in. We pulled the gurney right up next to the tray used a pulley system to haul up the metal tray on an angle then just slid the body onto the gurney. There are no patients near the area so we didn’t have to watch out for anybody on our way out, we just wheeled it into the van and we were on our way back to the home.
The next trip was taking a body to the airport. The woman had lived here a number of years but the family wanted her buried in her hometown where most of the family still lives. The price on flying a body is based on the weight and dimension, since weight is such an issue, most of the time a family chooses not to fly it in a heavy casket, it’s done at the funeral home receiving them. So we simply put it on a wooden board with a special insulated cardboard top. There is some documentation that goes with it so we put it in an envelope and tape it on top. We dropped it off at a cargo area and that was it. Pretty simple. I wondered this, so I know some of you are…yes they fly on regular passenger planes, you’re probably flying with dead folks all the time and you had no idea!
The next trip was doing a transfer of a prepared body from our funeral home to another sister home because there was a viewing that afternoon. While we were there we picked up a person who had just been viewed that morning who had to be brought back to our crematorium, so we basically did a switch.
The final trip of the day was picking up a man from a care home. He was 90-something years old and his body had shut down, the nurses went to wake him in the morning and he had passed away through the night. Going to the care home was awkward. We reported to the front desk and it’s in a big open area where the residents dine and watch tv. They were all around us and I think they knew who we were…what our purpose was. I started reading their faces, I felt like they were judging me, I didn’t feel welcome. We went into the man’s room, thank goodness it didn’t smell. His mouth was wide open and his eyes were open. I thought the open eye thing would really bother me when I would see it but it was fine actually, they were still glossy and not frightened. There were a couple of rings and a watch left on him so it took a couple minutes to get them off, something the fingers swell up a bit. I started thinking about my grandmother and how her room was very similar when she was in a home and started to wonder if she looked like that when she died. Then I snapped to it…what was I thinking? I was mad at myself, you can’t go to that place in your head. When we were finished belting him on the gurney we told the nurse we would be making our way out. She cleared the hallway of any people (without letting them know what was going on although I’m sure most knew) and then she opened the elevator so we could get out as quickly as possible.
Mike and I headed back to the funeral home and it was nearing the end of the day. We figured since I was unfazed by the day’s events that we would take it one step further. The embalmer, Lynn, had just finished embalming so Lynn and Mike suggested I go in the prep/embalming room and have a look. There were two decedents completely uncovered on metal trays. Lynn was washing one down with some disinfectant soap and a cloth. She was dressed in scrubs from head to toe. There was just some blood on the underside and either than that I stood far enough back that I couldn’t really see the embalming openings. Although I was surprisingly fine with what most would normally consider a disturbing sight, I figured this was enough for one day.
Tags: a day in the life, body bag, crematorium, dead, dead body, death, decedent, embalmer, embalming, funeral job, funeral professional, hospital morgue, morgue, remove body, the funeral girl, transfer
We had a man arranging his mother’s funeral with our funeral home. From the first meeting until the time of the funeral three days later, he visited our home multiple times. Quite often a family member or the family members doing the arranging can be in just once, that’s very common, or sometimes maybe two or three times max. The first day, I counted six visits from this man, the receptionist swears it was 10 but it’s hard to say if he had actually left and came back or was just floating around the home somewhere. I asked the receptionist what was going on as I wasn’t familiar with this funeral arrangement. Was this a very large, detailed funeral? Were there complications? Did he have issues with the funeral director? She says “Oh, we call these The Obsessers, we get them every so often. They just can’t focus on anything else but the death so they involve themselves as much as possible – they are literally obsessed.” The next day, he came in three times then decided he would just like to stay for the afternoon and set up camp in our Clergy waiting room (thank goodness we didn’t have any funerals that afternoon). Even after the funeral took place he said he had to run an errand but would be back, we told him it would just take a minute to finalize the payment and get him his photos back and he could be on his way but he insisted he would come back. When he did awhile later, it was almost difficult for him to say goodbye. Funeral directors and the staff know not to say “hope to see you soon” or anything along those lines, it’s usually “take care, please call us if you need anything at all” and the family usually does a thank you and are on their way. With The Obsesser it was like he was trying to think of any possible question, even standing at the door looking down in deep concentration, even asking some of the same questions twice and reconfirming answers. It was definitely awkward but it would seem he’s a fairly normal guy usually, I’m just learning that death makes us say or do stuff we wouldn’t normally do.
Tags: Funeral, funeral girl, funeral profession, funeral professional, funeral service, obsessed, obsesser, obsessor, the funeral girl
We had a guy come in today completely smashed…true story. He says he’s been wandering around the cemetery trying to find his friend’s grave and that every time he stops by, he has a hard time finding it. He’s bent over the reception desk reeking like liquor and it looks like he hasn’t bathed in days. So the receptionist, Lauren, says “Okay sir, what is the name of your friend?” where he replies “I dunno.” Lauren goes “Well sir, we will need you to recall his name if we’re going to help you…why don’t we start with the year he died.” Drunk guy says “In the 80’s.” At this point I am trying not to laugh and Lauren turns and looks at me like “WHY ME!?” He suddenly blurts out his friend’s name. So Lauren asks him to have a seat and we’ll have a staff member look it up and give him a map. He says he’s going to wait outside (which was quite a relief), but then he proceeded to hang out just outside our entrance. In our entrance we have a water fountain and there he is running his hands through it and having a super time and even had his face about 2 inches away from it, Lauren and I were gawking waiting to see if he was going to drink from it. Anyway the point of this story is, lay off the liquor and maybe you’ll be able to find your friend’s grave. Also, my job will never be boring.
Tags: a day in the life, cemetery, dead, drunk, Funeral, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral job, funeral profession, funeral professional, grave, liquor, receptionist, the funeral girl, water fountain
Of course, that’s the way it goes – hire the new girl to assist the overwhelmed funeral directors and have the slowest week ever – even with a two funerals directors away. I learned some basic funeral office stuff like how to answer phones, which is different from your typical office; you need to know what to say if someone is balling their eyes out. I didn`t get any of those callers this week , although I did have one guy whose brother passed away who he was estranged from for the last 20 years and he was shopping around for the least expensive cremation service he could find. He was NOT happy that he was left in charge to take care of the arrangements and cost. He shouted the information to me and then when I passed him to a funeral director to speak to he yelled at her asking why he would have to give personal information to another person and demanded to know why we were so expensive…he ended up saying something nasty and hanging up on the funeral director. We had a few people come in to pick up remains, so I learned how to sign out the remains. I also did some paperwork including registering deaths (creating death certificates) and “fraud prevention” paperwork. Identity theft is common for those who have deceased so we offer optional fraud prevention coverage. This entails contacting all the necessary agencies (government agencies, credit card companies etc.) on behalf of the family to let them know the person has died.
I had a tour of the cemetery. There are areas outlined for certain religions, the Muslims purchased one area, Jewish another, Armenians another, etc. and there was several welfare areas, meaning those who were on welfare at time of death are buried in designated areas which are paid by for the government. We took a look at the private estates area. You could choose an area on the ground that has paver stones around it, or there were small gated areas that you could buy for just yourself, double plots, families up to 4 people, or with combinations of burials and cremated remains they can hold up to 20. The prices ranged from $75,000 to $110,000. Although they are beautiful, it’s too pricey for my liking (even with my 50% discount!) I’ll be happy to have my cremated remains in a public area or scattered somewhere. They also have a large natural, beautiful pond in the cemetery where ashes can be scattered. I also got to see the crematorium which is located within the cemetery. There was one large room with two cremation ovens; they are actually pretty new looking and sleek, they are like industrial stainless steel ovens with a bar on the door you pull up (there aren’t any windows on the doors though!) Also in the room were a couple of shelves for the bodies going in next. There were a couple of bodies waiting, one was in a plywood box and then there was one I didn’t even notice until my tour guide pointed it out, just a little baby, the box was hardly bigger then a shoebox, so sad. Only one person goes in an oven at a time. Then there was a refrigerated room, I believe we counted 19 boxes in there. Mostly made out of the basic plywood but there was one I hadn’t seen before, I can’t remember what they call it but it looks like a carpeted box with decorative handles around the side, I guess this would be considered the luxury burning box. I believe they said the typical person takes 2 to 2 ½ hours to break down. I saw what the remains look like once they are removed from the oven, there are some ashes but also big chunks of bone are left and nails and metal pieces from the box. They take a magnet and remove all metal remains then put the remains in a grinder to grind it down to ash. That was basically it for the crematorium beside an office and a bathroom. There are just two staff members at our location that take care of the cremations.
The most valuable information I took in this past week was when I got to sit in on one meeting with one of our funeral directors, it gave me a much better idea of the process. This particular meeting was for what we call an “Imminent” (planning for an imminent/expecting death). It was for a family whose father is in the hospital and he’s having good days and bad days, but he could pass at any moment and they are actually going on vacation. They wanted to take care of all the paperwork so if he passed while they were away, all the arrangements are already taken care of. The funeral director was caring but brought up questions in such a way that the conversation flowed but she could get through the massive amount of paperwork as they went. The family was able to answer every question but it would be difficult for some to think of the answers especially if they were in mourning. They were asked about the father`s parents (their full names, where they were born, the mother’s maiden name etc.) It turns out the wife had passed away 3 years earlier though so we pulled out the paperwork and discovered the father purchased a double urn at the time and requested that their ashes be co-mingled. Co-mingle means the ashes would be mixed together. She currently rests in a memorial wall, so we would take them out and mix them with the father’s and put them back in the niche.
The only other thing I could recall from this week which kind of surprised me was one family who came in that was arranging a funeral; they brought 12 people, including small children. Apparently this was the fourth time they had been in and even scheduled a dress rehearsal again for the day before the service. The funeral director assured me that this was not common. The kids were totally misbehaved, the parents let them run around the funeral home, but one family member got out his guitar and was playing songs, and they were all singing and laughing. A few staff joked that they must have a huge inheritance coming for them to all be so giddy…probably true. I think we had over 10 services throughout the week, some services with receptions, some just viewings (to view the prepared body) and some just burials (no service inside, just graveside). All went very smoothly and the families were pleased with the results which proved to be the result of good planning by the funeral directors.
Tags: a day in the life, body bag, burials, cemetery, cremation, crematorium, dead, directing, embalmer, embalming, estates, estranged, Funeral, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral job, funeral profession, funeral professional, funeral service, immenent death, imminent, inheritance, memorial, mortician, mourning, passed away, remains, service, undertaker, vacation, viewing, visitations
My tour guide was one of the managers, who I shall call Guido for the sake of this post, he greeted me as soon as I got in the door and we were on our way. We started by looking at the room where the services are held. There were about 15 lines of wooden benches/pews (are they still called pews if it’s not in a church?) on either side of the aisle and a couple of nice flat screen TV’s that hung at the front for videos or picture galleries. Next we went through the meeting rooms where the funeral directors sit down with the families, they had shelves and tables with some examples of keepsake memorabilia that families can purchase to commemorate their loved ones. Then there was the room with sample urns, and coffins. They only had a couple of full size coffins, all the rest were quarter coffins – just samples. Guido explained that you can buy packages, like the “full funeral service” package, one was labelled $9,945.00. Or, the other option is you buy a la carte, “Just like at McDonalds” Guido explained… “I don’t want a value meal, I just want some nuggets and a Coke”. He said it in a soft spoken almost serious tone, I guess he was used to that tone in this particular room but I had to laugh… “Yep, I get it Guido.”
He took me through a hall of waiting rooms, one for the clergy, a small reception room for the immediate family to gather prior to a service, and the funeral overflow room. Then we went to the reception room, it was one of the nicest I’d ever seen. There was a large, beautiful mahogany fireplace and mahogany accents throughout the room. There were a few wooden tables with seating for 4 along the back of the room, as well as oversized patterned arm chairs. In the centre of the room was a long table with pretty shiny silver antique platters. Two sets of French doors opened up to a large patio with lots of greenery. There was a kitchen off to the side, I asked who they contracted for catering and Guido said all of it’s done in-house.
Next we went to an area for the cemetery sales team, managers and admin staff. I hadn’t really thought of a cemetery sales team before but they do just that, find people interested in preplanning for their own funerals and buying plots. I learned that although the cemetery and funeral service staff team up, they are actually completely separate divisions.
Afterwards we headed down a hallway where the walls changed to white and the floor was no longer nice cushy carpet but white linoleum…and very clean, like a hospital, and I knew where we were heading.
The first door opened to a garage, inside was a limo, Guido mentioned they have two but one was out, and then there was a hurse and a van. They also have a couple of golf carts to get around the cemetery and to the crematorium down the way. The next door went to another garage room and I saw a couple of 6 foot boxes on trolleys. Guido said “Those are going to the embalming room today to be prepped then taken to the crematorium.” There was also a very, very large fridge. He asked if I wanted to see inside and I agreed. He opened the door and I saw 15 white body bags on metal sheets. The bags kind of formed around the bodies. It seemed unreal, something you would see on TV. My eyes went to one bag that was unzipped on top; I could see the top of a head and a mess of orangey-red tangled hair. That made it real. Guido closed the massive door and a smell wafted past my nose, definitely an unpleasant scent…one I wasn’t prepared to take in. I briefly had a moment where I thought to myself “What if I can’t handle the smells? The smell of death when the body isn’t in a fridge anymore and the chemicals…” *shudder*
“How bizarre” I mentioned to Guido, “hard to believe I’ll be lying in a fridge one day.” “Oh we don’t think about that here, we all seem to have this mentality that it’s never going to happened to us.” he says. “What? How can you not?” I was already thinking about it.
The embalming room was next but I couldn’t go in as an embalming was taking place. After my glimpse in the fridge I figured it might be a little too much for one day anyway. I was taken to one last room and it was somewhat like a prep room before the embalming room. Guido explained that some religions, such as Muslims and Sikh’s, often perform rituals to the bodies before it’s taken in for prep and this is where it would be done. It was a sterile room, with a large stainless steel sink and a curtain.
We made our way back to the nice carpeted area with warmly painted walls and we ended our tour with a view of the funeral directors office and a couple more managers’ offices.
It was a weird feeling the first time I went to the funeral home because nobody had died, I felt like I should be sad. After meeting several of the employees, most along this tour (about 20), I felt very comfortable – there’s a sense of family here. They aren’t what most would stereotype as funeral staff either, they aren’t morbid, they are happy, smiling, sincere, and have wonderful senses of humor. Another thing I have to mention is how young everyone looks, very young. Guido shared his age with me and he seriously looked 20 years younger, he mentioned a couple of other people that I had met that were just as old. I honestly believe it has to be the embalming fluids in the air – they are preserving everyone. Forget Botox, work for a funeral home. Hmmm, I should talk to their marketing team. Anyway, it was a great day. I am going to like it here.
Tags: a day in the life, bodies, body bag, cemetery, crematorium, diary, embalmer, embalming, Funeral, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral professional, funeral service, Guido. coffins, interview, mortician, the funeral girl, undertaker
I took a tour of the funeral home this morning which I plan to write about soon, but I came home today to find an online personality test in my inbox from the International Funeral Service Association. Even though I have the job, I’m required to fill this out before I start. Anyway, I’m feeling really weird about it so I was compelled to tell you about it.
So I click to begin and it tells me that I’m going to be presented with rows of 4 words, and I need to click on the 1 word that most describes me and the 1 word that least describes me when I am at work only. Well, the choices I was presented with honestly dumbfounded me. Here is an example:
1) Life-of-the-Party 2) Argumentative 3) Uncooperative 4) Dominant
Hmmm, perhaps you can see why? In my head there was a separation: Life-of-the-Party could be seen as both positive and negative but Argumentative, Uncooperative and Dominant certainly didn’t seem to have any positive tone. One thing was for sure, none of these (most or least) suited a person in the funeral profession. I’m definitely a social, happy person at work so I chose Life-of-the-Party as most and Uncooperative as least. I had about 30 rows of these to go through and once I hit “Submit”, a message came up that the results will soon be sent to me and my employer. What I want to know is how on earth they’re going to determine what kind of employee I’m going to be?! Especially based on that one example, am I going to determined as some kind of unruly animal? I have to go back tomorrow to sign some more papers so I might bring it up, it just seems so ridiculous. I’ll keep you all posted on my results.
Tags: Funeral, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral profession, funeral professional, interview, personality, personality test, questions
So some people have asked me why the interviews took so long and what kinds of questions were asked. First I was briefly interviewed by two individuals then had interviews with them both. I was asked why I wanted to get into this career (See ABOUT) and then about my expectations. Next, they wanted to know all about me. I told them where I lived, went to school, and they pressed on for more info…what do your parents do, what are they like, do you have any siblings, what are they like, what does your husband do, what does he think of you in this profession? etc. They said it was important for them to get to know me as much as possible to get to know what kind of person I am. Then the formal interview questions came: Tell us about a time you were under a lot of pressure, what type of work environment to do you prefer to work in, tell about a time someone confided in you, what would you say to a family that looked at the cost of a funeral and said “that’s just too expensive!”, did you handle any adverse situations in your last job, have you ever faced an ethical dilemma, when did you exceed expectations? The list went on and on, and they even asked some of the same questions more than once, but they wanted me to give them another example. My favourite question had to be from John, “Let’s say there was a employee…let’s say a female, who was very opinionated, thought she knew the answer to everything, thought her way was the only and best way, and always needed to be the center of attention…how would you handle her?” I laughed and at this point we were quite comfortable in the interview and I said “John, is there somebody, let’s say a female, that you want to give me the head’s up about?” “You’re perceptive!” he says. I have to say, I even surprised myself at how well I did and they said they saw me in management in 5 years. I felt terrific but as I drove home after the first interview I couldn’t help but think about the one question specific to this profession that shouldn’t have caught me off guard but did, “Tell us about the most difficult death you’ve had to deal with.” It’s a question we rarely ask one another so it was surprising how awkward it was to give a response but as far as answers go, who’s to judge?
Tags: death, Funeral, funeral director, funeral girl, funeral profession, funeral professional, interview, interview questions, John, questions