Another Reason to Write Down Final Wishes
A recent Dear Abby letter illustrates the importance of writing down what you want done with your mortal remains, as well as providing the financial means to carry out those wishes.
Will your family have the resources to pay for your final expenses? A funeral and burial can cost ten times more than cremation. Still, no matter what method of disposition you choose, costs still run into thousands of dollars. Do you have money in the bank or some sort of life insurance policy that will cover those final expenses?
Here’s the letter and Dear Abby’s wise response:
DEAR ABBY: How important are a dying person’s last wishes? My dad died recently and said that he wanted to be buried with his first wife in a state far from where we live. If his estate — or his current wife — can’t afford to comply with his request, would it be horrible to do something else?
In today’s economy most seniors don’t have any extra income. To follow Dad’s final wishes would take a sizable chunk of his estate. His wife feels it’s not important to follow his last wishes because of the cost, but it really bothers me.
Dad was in the Navy during WWII. If his wife isn’t willing to spend the money, would I still be a good guy by scattering his ashes in the ocean? I know he’d rather be in the deep than sitting on a shelf in the work shed. Please help. — DISTURBED SON IN NEVADA
DEAR DISTURBED SON: Your letter illustrates why it is important for people to have their wishes in writing. In this case, your father’s wife would have the right to his ashes, unless it was stated otherwise in black and white.
As far as granting a personal last wish, you need to use your best judgment, particularly if doing so would cause financial hardship. In this case, cremation would be a creative way to make everyone happy. Your father’s ashes could be divided into thirds, with one portion placed with his first wife, another with his second wife, and the rest scattered at sea.
I like her suggestion about divvying up cremated remains. Don’t wait until someone dies to figure out how to pay for funeral plans. Give a call if you want to discuss how final expense insurance can easily head off this kind of financial problem: 505-265-7215.
Reasons People Avoid Funeral Planning: Embalming
Embalming is one of the “ickier” aspects of funerals that keep people from considering funeral planning in advance. That’s a shame, because no state laws require embalming. It comes down to the question of viewing.
The advent of embalming, and its use during the Civil War, changed the course of funeral practice in the United States. It set the U.S. funeral industry apart from the rest of the world.
Dr. Thomas Holmes, one of the founding fathers of embalming, experimented with various fluids while working as a doctor and coroner’s assistant in New York City during the 1840s and 1850s. He’s also considered the inventor of the injection pump for the arterial method of embalming.
Embalming was first utilized broadly in the United States during the Civil War. Back then, surgeon-embalmers utilized chemical compounds, including mercury and arsenic, to preserve soldiers’ bodies long enough to ship them from the battlefield to their hometowns.
Embalming involves draining the blood and replacing it with a chemical solution that includes formaldehyde and other toxic fluids that sanitize microbes in the body. This retards, but does not stop, the process of decomposition.
Most funeral directors require embalming if the body will be put on display for viewing. It’s a misconception that this absolutely must be done. Federal Trade Commission’s Funeral Rule of 1984 dictates disclosure that embalming is not required.
Refrigeration will suffice if the viewing is just for the immediate family and for 30 minutes or less. Refrigeration can adequately preserve a body for up to four days before burial.
Both Jews and Muslims traditionally avoid embalming and bury the body within 24 hours. This practice originates in a hot desert culture before the advent of refrigeration. Without cooling, a body starts to decompose within the first 24 hours after death.
Many funeral homes have refrigeration units, especially those that offer Jewish funerals. Mortuaries that offer green burial are also likely to have refrigeration units.
The judicious use of dry ice is another option to keep a body refrigerated at a funeral home, during ground transportation, or in a private home. Care must be taken to provide plenty of fresh air in the room. Dry ice is a solid form of carbon dioxide, and without adequate ventilation it can cause asphyxiation as the dry ice evaporates.
Don’t let the fear of embalming keep you from this important aspect of planning. Funeral planning before there’s a death helps the family save money, avoid stress at a time of grief, and allows time to create a meaningful, memorable “good goodbye.”
Gail Rubin, Certified Celebrant
Gail Rubin is a Certified Celebrant, public speaker, and author of the award-winning book, A Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die. She also writes The Family Plot Blog. She provides the information, inspiration and tools for proactive, creative funeral planning and speaks regularly to groups on getting the conversation started. Sign up for a free planning form at http://AGoodGoodbye.com.
The Social Security Death Benefit
Social Security provides the grand sum of $255.00, paid either to the funeral home or next of kin, when someone dies. Why $255? That was what a funeral cost in 1937 when Social Security first started. The benefit has never been raised over more than 70 years.
At a recent book event, a man told me that he was going to let the funeral home have the $255 and leave them to figure out what to do with his lifeless carcass. He really didn’t care.
At this point, $255 will maybe get you a decent size obituary in the Albuquerque Journal for one day. A cheap funeral runs $6,000 to $10,000. Why even bother with the Social Security death benefit?
The thing is, this death benefit serves to alert Social Security that the person who has been receiving checks is deceased. When they get word to provide the death benefit for a particular Social Security recipient, that’s how the Administration will know it’s time to stop sending pension checks.
Those who might seek to continue collecting a deceased family member’s Social Security checks, illegal as that might be, might skip the $255 death benefit.
There are so many folks who can’t afford a funeral these days. That guy who couldn’t care less comes to mind. Here’s a concept: What if Social Security bumped up the death benefit to an amount closer what a funeral actually costs today?
Good Tips on Funeral Planning
You can find tons of great funeral planning information in this article by Tom Murphy of the Associated Press. This article appeared on the San Francisco Chronicle website.
Funeral planning can save money, heartache
The days of the cookie-cutter funeral are fading.
Staid remarks at a church or funeral home lectern are being supplemented with slide shows, and services are moving to golf or yacht clubs to reflect a person’s life.
Baby boomers are confronted with many more options than their parents had for planning a funeral or memorial service, and all these choices can lead to a big bill. It pays to plan ahead. Here are some tips on working through that process.
DECIDE WHAT YOU WANT: Funerals or memorial services are for the living, not the dead, funeral directors say. They help people grieve and remember the person who died. Personal touches are becoming much more common, so think about what the person liked and whether that can be worked into the service.
James Olson, a funeral home owner in Sheboygan, Wis., once arranged a service that featured wine and cheese to celebrate the life of a person who liked to entertain. Guests at another service for a woman who made quilts as gifts brought with them more than 200 of those quilts.
Aside from the service, you need to think about disposition of the body.
More often, people are choosing cremation, because it can be cheaper than a traditional funeral with burial, it makes it easier to transport or move someone’s remains and it has become more accepted in many religions. Nearly 41 percent of all U.S. deaths led to cremations last year, a big jump from about 15 percent in 1985, according to the Cremation Association of North America.
People typically store cremated remains in urns or scatter them at a beloved spot. But some are choosing to have them embedded in pottery or placed in lockets for family members to wear.
Even if opting for burial, there are more choices than just the traditional.
Green or natural burials, which involve no embalming and allow the body to decompose into the earth, are on the rise. Caskets made from recycled paper or cardboard can help this process.
Some people may even want to be buried with their pets if the cemetery permits it.
PLAN, SET ASIDE MONEY: People can spare their survivors some of these decisions and expenses by writing a plan for how they want their service to be conducted and setting aside money in a trust set up through a funeral home.
There are typically no limits to the amount that can be placed in a trust, except when a person is spending down their resources to qualify for Medicaid, said Joe Marsaglia of the Pittsburgh Institute of Mortuary Science.
The trust can cover the funeral service and, depending on the state, costs for items that fall outside it like flowers or cemetery plots. Money left in the account is usually returned to the family.
A plan can at least give family members a starting point for thinking about your service, and it may prevent quarrels over what you would want.
“Death is going to happen, and if we can face it and take care of it in advance, it’s not going to be a hardship for the survivors when the time comes,” Marsaglia said.
SHOP AROUND: Funeral costs vary widely. The average funeral cost about $6,500 in 2009, the latest figure from the National Funeral Directors Association. That doesn’t count cemetery costs, which can add several thousand dollars to the bill.
It may pay to shop around, and that’s easier to do when planning ahead. Funeral directors are required to provide an itemized list of products and services so customers can pick what they want.
A direct cremation with no visitation or funeral service costs around $2,000. Wal-Mart offers caskets and urns on its Website, including the Classic Platinum Keepsake Urn for less than $35.
Buying a casket separate from the funeral service might save money, but shipping costs can eat into that, and the customer should make certain it will be delivered in time.
IF THERE’S NO PLAN: Sometimes deaths are unexpected, but more commonly, people avoid planning for their own deaths or those of their loved ones.
When starting from scratch after someone has died, first figure out who will put together the service. Ask friends and family for recommendations. A rabbi, minister, nurse or hospice worker also may have suggestions.
“It’s not the time to open the phone book and run your finger down” the page, said Olson, a spokesman for the National Funeral Directors Association.
Crazy Things to Do With Ashes
Here’s a fun story that first appeared on the website, Neatorama. Who knew you could do all these cool things with cremated remains?
The 10 Weirdest Things You Can Do With Your Ashes
by Jill Harness
The only certain things in life are death and taxes, and since taxes will never be fun, you might as well try to make your death into something a little entertaining. While most people are laid to rest in a coffin, buried in an urn, or scattered somewhere memorable, there are plenty of other options for your remains. Here are a few of the most unique things you can choose to do with your ashes.
Incorporate Them Into Bullets
A true hunter shouldn’t let death stop them from killing more animals. Fortunately, a new company named Holy Smoke is making efforts to ensure the last remnants of your physical remains can still be used to hunt down your favorite prey by incorporating your ashes into hollow-point bullets or shotgun shells. While it’s not among the suggested uses, you could also hire a hitman to use these bullets to take out your most-hated enemy, ensuring even death can’t stop you from exacting your revenge.
Image Via celest343 [Flickr]
Press Them Into Your Favorite Record
For those people who live and breathe music, there’s no better way to be remembered than to actually become part of their favorite album. And Vinyl will allow you to press your ashes into any record you want, including your own original album. They’ll even write a song for you for an additional fee. As a bonus, you can also have your ashes incorporated into a painting that will be used as the album cover. Now that’s a rocking way to go.
Tattoo Them Into Someone’s Skin
Granted, there have not been any long-term studies about the potential risks of tattoos incorporating ashes, but plenty of people have these memorials without any side effects and ashes are generally sterile, so it’s too much of a hazard as far as we know. Even so, if you’re going to ask a loved one to get a tattoo memorializing you, you might want to make sure they’re ok with the idea first, and, of course, make sure you can find a legitimate tattoo artist that is willing to work with ashes, since many are not.
Image Via Spy On Pea [Flickr]
Melt Them Into a Diamond
If you or your spouse loves bling, then why not make plans to turn yourself into a sparkly fashion accessory after your death? This is also a good way to ensure that your spouse won’t get remarried for a long time –after all, it’s a little weird to go on a date while wearing the remains of your loved one.
Create Art With Them
Be honest, it’s a little creepy when someone has a giant portrait of a long-deceased relative in their home, but if you really want to take the feeling of unease to another level, try incorporating the ashes of the person into their memorial portrait. Of course, if your family isn’t the type to line hallways with portraits of dead family members, you’re likely to end up decorating the attic.
While there are a number of companies that offer this service, such as Memories From Ashes who did the work above, they seem to go out of business on a regular basis, so you might want to talk to some local artists if you really want to get this done.
Melt and Cut Them Into Stained Glass Designs
If you like the idea of diamonds and artwork made from ashes, but wish there was an option that was slightly less creepy, then a stained glass memorial might be the way to go. This way you can be in the home of your loved one, shining light on them, but not staring down at them or tagging along wherever they go. You’ll be still pretty, but a lot more subtle.
Shoot Them Into Space
Is your favorite song “Rocket Man” by Elton John? Then you might just be the ideal customer for Celestis, a space burial company. For only $2,500, your remains can orbit around Earth. At $10,000, you can ensure they achieve lunar orbit, but if you want to go all out, be sure to save up for the deep space package that will run you $12,500. Wondering who else will share your resting place? Well, LSD advocate Timothy Leary and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry have both has their ashes scattered in the night sky.
Burry Them In A Pringles Can
To be fair, this is a pretty strange idea for even the most hardcore junk food addict, but it was certainly an appropriate move for the inventor of the Pringles can. Fredric J Baur first created the prototype for the design in 1966 and in 2008, he was laid to rest inside an empty, original-flavor can, per his dying wish.
Image Via Roadsidepictures [Flickr]
Incorporate Them Into A Frisbee
Baur isn’t the only person to request that his final resting place incorporate his life’s work. While Edward Headrick wasn’t the inventor of the Frisbee, he was the person most responsible for the toy’s success. As a manager at Wham-O, Headrick made a number of improvements to the design and he also invented disc golf.
Before he died, Headrick requested that his kids have his ashes mixed in with a batch of Frisbees and that the proceeds from the special edition discs would be used to establish a disc golf museum. No word yet on the museum, but the Frisbees themselves became quite a popular collector’s item. These days, the two-disc collector’s set costs $200 on Amazon.
Use Them In Comic Book Ink
While plenty of comic book fans might love to have their ashes incorporated into the ink of their favorite titles, so far only one person (that we know of) has been lucky enough to have this wish made into a reality. Of course, it helped that Mark Gruenwald was an editor for Marvel Comics for a long time before he made the strange request. The reprinted version of his 1985 comic Squadron Supreme was printed in 1997 complete with ink featuring trace amounts of its creator.
If you could do anything with your ashes, what would you do? Would you pick any of the items on this list?
Funeral Planning Tips for Savvy Seniors
Jim Miller, who writes the Savvy Senior column, recently wrote about funeral planning tips, especially for those seniors with little money. His advice: compare providers, take advantage of the “Funeral Rule,” shop for goods online, consider direct cremation or burial, and figure out how you’re going to pay for your funeral.
He provided a good pro-and-con examination of pre-payment and what to look for before handing over your money. He also discussed payable on death accounts, also known as Totten trusts.
You can read the full article at the Tacoma Washington newspaper website, The News Tribune.
Send senior questions to: Savvy Senior, P.O. Box 5443, Norman, OK 73070, or savvysenior.org. Jim Miller is author of “The Savvy Senior” book.
13 Things the Funeral Director Won’t Tell You
Great funeral planning information from Joshua Slocum, executive director of the Funeral Consumers Alliance (www.Funerals.org), and funeral directors in Illinois, New Jersey, Tennessee, and Washington. You probably won’t hear funeral directors telling you:
1. Go ahead and plan your funeral, but think twice before paying in advance. You risk losing everything if the funeral home goes out of business. Instead, keep your money in a pay-on-death account at your bank.
2. If you or your spouse is an honorably discharged veteran, burial is free at a Veterans Affairs National Cemetery. This includes the grave, vault, opening and closing, marker, and setting fee. Many State Veterans Cemeteries offer free burial for veterans and, often, spouses (www.cem.va.gov).
3. You can buy caskets that are just as nice as the ones in my showroom for thousands of dollars less online from Walmart, Costco, or straight from a manufacturer.
4. On a budget or concerned about the environment? Consider a rental casket. The body stays inside the casket in a thick cardboard container, which is then removed for burial or cremation.
5. Running a funeral home without a refrigerated holding room is like running a restaurant without a walk-in cooler. But many funeral homes don’t offer one because they want you to pay for the more costly option: embalming. Most bodies can be presented very nicely without it if you have the viewing within a few days of death.
6. Some hard-sell phrases to be wary of: “Given your position in the community …,” “I’m sure you want what’s best for your mother,” and “Your mother had excellent taste. When she made arrangements for Aunt Nellie, this is what she chose.”
7. “Protective” caskets with a rubber gasket? They don’t stop decomposition. In fact, the moisture and gases they trap inside have caused caskets to explode.
8. If there’s no low-cost casket in the display room, ask to see one anyway. Some funeral homes hide them in the basement or the boiler room.
9. Ask the crematory to return the ashes in a plain metal or plastic container — not one stamped temporary container. That’s just a sleazy tactic to get you to purchase a more expensive urn.
10. Shop around. Prices at funeral homes vary wildly, with direct cremation costing $500 at one funeral home and $3,000 down the street. (Federal law requires that prices be provided over the phone.)
11. We remove pacemakers because the batteries damage our crematories.
12. If I try to sell you a package that I say will save you money, ask for the individual price list anyway. Our packages often include services you don’t want or need.
13. Yes, technically I am an undertaker or a mortician. But doesn’t funeral director have a nicer ring to it?
Joshua Slocum, executive director of the Funeral Consumers Alliance, is also coauthor of Final Rights: Reclaiming the American Way of Death.
Stop for Funeral Cortege Says Dear Abby
Today’s Dear Abby column looks at the etiquette of stopping for a funeral procession.
A reader asks: For years I have wondered about this every time I have gone to a funeral and have ridden in the procession to the cemetery.
As the procession travels to the cemetery, all cars and trucks pull over and stop. That custom strikes me as very touching. I was in another procession last week, and even the UPS truck and several semis pulled over.
My question is, is this a custom only in southern Indiana where I live, or does everyone do this? — WONDERING NEAR INDIANAPOLIS
Hearse at Hyer Cemetery
DEAR WONDERING: According to Emily Post, this consideration should be accorded regardless of where people live. She writes: “If you encounter a funeral cortege (signaled by a line of cars with headlights or flashing hazard lights on), it’s respectful to pull over to the side of the street until the cars have passed. Waiting at a green light while a cortege passes is also expected, even if someone behind you is honking to proceed.”
For additional information on rules related to funeral processions, read this Family Plot Blog post or visit Funeralwise.com‘s excellent website.
Backstage at the Crematorium
The Week, “The best of the U.S. and international media,” has an excerpt from a new book, Curtains by Tom Jokinen, in the May 7 issue. It’s in “The last word” section, and they titled the piece Backstage at the crematorium.
Jokinen writes, “I have come on a mission – to understand the rituals of death by working as a funeral-home trainee. As the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman has said, humans are the only creatures who know they’re going to die, and even worse, they know they know it, and it’s not something they can “unknow.” All any of us can do is distract ourselves, briefly, in the same way that we might mask the smell of burnt food by spraying the kitchen with Lysol. My goal in becoming a trainee is to figure out if the rituals that the funeral industry helps us perform are Lysol, or if, in fact, the way we handle death – with caskets and trinkets and stone markers – is our way of facing up, finally, to the smell.”
The excerpt includes a behind the scenes tour of life a funeral home, including taking a peek inside a retort as a cremation takes place, seeing what happens to the cremated remains when they come out of the retort, and helping dress the deceased, including one particular little old lady. He shares an interesting insight into what happens when people with jaundice are embalmed – they turn green. If the person is being put on display, then mortician’s makeup is used like paint. Jokinen describes trying to dress the corpse and having some troubles.
“Her goopy left hand is hard to hang onto, and as a result she slides more than rolls, to the edge of the gurney, where gravity’s waiting. I hug tighter, and now we’re face to green face. This must be embarrassing for her, that’s all I can think. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry she’s green, and half-naked, and in the arms of a hapless stranger when she’d rather be alive and home watching Wheel of Fortune.”
This sounds like an interesting read! Perhaps someone at Da Capo Press will send a copy my way for an online book review.
Dear Abby on Viewing and Caskets
Dear Abby recently ran a letter from a woman who wrote in about making arrangements for her ex-mother-in-law who died unexpectedly, without a will. She was very close to the woman, so she worked with her ex-husband to make funeral arrangements that they thought she would have wanted.
They decided to have Mom cremated, but had a four-hour viewing at the funeral home for the benefit of the grandchildren. Since she was going to be cremated, they did not spend hundreds of dollars on a casket just for the viewing, which they didn’t think Mom would have wanted them to do. She was displayed on a table with blankets over her body.
The funeral home received a letter from one of Mom’s co-workers who expressed the opinion that the viewing was disrespectful and in bad taste. The funeral director called to let the woman know about this letter. The woman wanted to know if what they did was inappropriate.
Dear Abby said there was nothing disrespectful or inappropriate about the way Mom’s body was displayed an applauded her for her courage to do things differently and not spend a lot of money on a casket that was to be used only for a viewing.
The first time I saw a dead body was at a funeral home where I interviewed the owner for A Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die. He took me into a small viewing room, where a little old lady was laid out for a private family viewing. She was nicely dressed, laid out on a low table, with a blanket over her legs and lower torso. She looked like she was asleep. I imagine she looked a lot like the Mom from this letter. It was a perfectly respectable scene.
I’m guessing the irate letter-writer contacted the funeral home because such viewings were not part of her cultutural experience or maybe she expected everyone to “keep up with the Joneses” to the very end, spending money for the sake of appearances. A couple of things to note:
I agree with Dear Abby that they didn’t need to spend a lot of money on a casket that was to be used only for a viewing. Options do exist for renting caskets for funerals before cremation, much less costly than buying something to be consigned to the retort.
Cremation containers can be as humble as a cardboard box, and that may be what this family chose. Putting her on display in a cardboard box would have been disrespectful. Their choice to do the display with blankets was perfectly acceptable.
I also wonder about the wisdom of the funeral home calling the bereaved to let them know someone had sent them a snarky letter about the funeral of their loved one. In this case, perhaps it would have been better to keep the information to themselves.
And lastly, don’t forget that funeral planning and wills are designed to help the family know what you want done with your body when you check out of this world. It won’t kill you to make some plans.
