I planned on getting cremated, and I hope if I am ever dead dunked my ashed get carried by the wind into the temple and smash them right it the eyes!!!
I'll be buried in a family plot next to many of my Mormon ancestors.
That doesn't bother me because those deceased people are my family. I'd rather be buried with them, than someplace else.
On the other hand, if I'm going to pre-plan my burial as I hope to do, I won't have a funeral. Just a burial. My children live overseas, and I don't want Mormon relatives fawning over my dead body. No thanks.
At my late cousin's funeral last month that was held at a Mormon church - the smell of embalming fluids was overpowering. It was awful.
It took hours following the funeral for me to shake the smell of the formaldehyde from my system having had to breathe that for the two hours or so I was in the building for the service. It seemed as though the funeral home didn't know when to stop!
If viewing the deceased's body weren't bad enough, having to suffer through breathing that god awful odor made it much worse than any funeral I remember having attended.
So I decided no funeral for me. I'll leave the way I came into this world. Without fanfare.
Amyjo, if your late cousin's body had been properly embalmed, there should have been no "overpowering" smell of embalming fluid/formaldehyde. I say this as someone who has been a licensed embalmer for many years.
It was the worst smell I've ever endured during a funeral. It was awful. It filled up the church house in fact. From the RS room where the viewing was, all the way down the hall to the kitchen, gym, and chapel where the service was later held.
It was so bad that in the RS room where the family gathered initially, I thought I was going to upchuck. No one else mentioned the foul odor. I asked several people there if it bothered them as much as it was me?
It was so bad I thought maybe the mortician had accidentally spilled a bottle on her body, and then just covered it up. He was there, in fact, throughout the service. Very cordial and helpful, going out of his way to accomodate the people there. His face was also very red and flushed, like he didn't look well himself. That may be why?!
My cousin also didn't look right the way she was made up. She could have been made to look better than they did. Very unnatural looking.
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/2017 06:56AM by Amyjo.
Amyjo, sorry for your loss but that might not had been embalming fluid you were smelling. It might had been the church building. I smell the same thing when I enter the building.
The closer to the coffin, the worse the smell was. It permeated throughout the entire building.
I was there early right before the coffin was brought in. There was no smell until they opened it.
Sounds sicko, right? It was strong, and I mean strong!
I hadn't been inside a Mormon church building in over ten years, but never noticed that smell before. I'm very sensitive to odors. But not unusually so.
That's also what I think, it was probably the building itself that smelled that way. I've been to funerals where the casket was briefly opened during the viewing, and I never smelled any embalming fluid. I will say that the way my grandpa looked, well, he resembled 45 with the bad makeup job.
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/2017 04:20PM by adoylelb.
I didn't smell embalming fluids with my parents funerals.
Or anyone else's. This is the only time.
And no, it wasn't the normal odors of a church house. It was plain as day where the foul smell was coming from.
It was sickening. After the service, and the cemetery, we came back for a meal that the RS prepared and served. The meal was okay, but since I was still nauseated from the other room - I went easy on the baked ham. :)
The odor subsided after the coffin left the building. But it stayed in my lungs for several hours, and my olfactory receptors, that was one reason I attribute to my speeding ticket. I was sickened and trying to clear my lungs of that god awful smell after driving away. I was going 20 mph over the speed limit, and driving through a speed trap on a wide open country road, with the windows down.
The cop didn't care, he was just doing his job. It didn't bode well for my impression of SE Idaho, on the other hand. There's a reason why I moved away 35 years ago.
That is a terrible experience. I might not forget it for a long time. (Sorry for a funeral joke).
It's weird that no-one else seemed to notice such an unusual and difficult situation. Or maybe they're so used to keeping mum in a ward building it was just another day of same old/same old at the old meetin' house for them?
I would be tempted to ask someone, somewhere, Amyjo what the heck was going on. If it was the funeral home, they should know that something wasn't right. If that is truly the smell of the building, yeow, something needs to be fixed.
Either way, just another tough time at a Mormon worship site.
It wasn't the smell of the bldg. I don't know why others would presume they know better what I smelled than I do.
It was formaldehyde. Others present noticed it as well. I may have been the only one in the immediate family who commented on it. No one else did other than mentioning it was the formaldehyde too.
It made me feel very nauseous. They seemed immune to it. If that is their "normal" where they are, I made a mental note not to hire that company when I pre-plan my own funeral. I'm going to be buried in the same fricking cemetery as she is.
It wasn't a normal smell, by any standards, including were it at a funeral home. It was pungent.
My mom looked better than she did, rest both their souls.
My cousin just didn't look like herself at all. When I cried out and said "That's not [cousin's name,]" they said back it was only her shell. They handled it better than I did.
The makeup was so so. There was no color to her cheeks, and her lips looked washed out and sealed shut. I wanted her to wake up, but of course that wasn't going to happen.
In the last 8 years I've been involved with seven mormon funerals all of which were done in full blown mormon style. A brutally long viewing the night before, then another viewing the next morning that is supposed to be for family only. Then the closing of the lid and a funeral style sacrament meeting in the chapel. Following a trip to the cemetery for the actual burial is a ward dinner back at the church building. A very lengthy process indeed.
When I leave this world none of that will happen if I get my way. I don't want anyone to see me like that or upset their lives for a few days by driving great distances. I especially don't want a bishop talking about the divine plan of salvation or missionary work or some other church crap. My only request is to be quickly cremated and my ashes sprinkled in a landscaped island at Home Depot. I love that store.
I dk Don. at this point what I want to do, when I leave, Is no longer care & let my family do whatever is convenient for them.. so I want to put that "no longer care" from the end of the sentence of describing my life -into- insert it- edit and pull that "No longer care" about end procedure about here. LOL
I mean whoever's nearest by will have to bury it or recyle it or burn it, and whoever's closest will do it. However can I control who it will be and what is most convenient culturally to their beliefs?
My lds bishop bro & temple matron folk who do a full on Mormon if I'm alive without my spouse & near them and eat jello & ham punch and potatoes. My spouse would do a catholic mass with his kin surrounding him getting holy incense smoked and go eat German sausage feasting at round tables. If I'm alone with Scilian relatives its probably a grave side with ____ list family names one from each gathered with a pay by rite priest and meatballs with rigatoni & wine. If I live long & everyone in my generation is dead but still in Cali my protestant kid'd do the Jesus song thing ashes or body & have auctioneer's estate sale my stuff after lifting back her oil painting off line writing & the best rocks. If I live near my Alaska kid a non denominational service & pagan party would follow. If I die far afield from all of them quick cremation & mail special delivery. If I die near my dear portugese friend without living kin a nice funeral mass & quiet parting rocking party. Everyone I know has a different style. How do you plan these things/
I've spent the whole time accommodating everybody. It depends how long you live & who're you're by next. Sort of like the wheel on the spin for letters show. & that's how it'll turn out
Most dead people I've seen look like wax dummies. The exception was my brother-in-law. He was a quadriplegic and extremely underweight. When he was alive, he looked dead, esp when he was asleep. After he died, I thought he looked just like he was sleeping. He's the only person I ever thought that about.