How do you feel about death and dead bodies?

Wait, does your drivers license say "Oregon donor"?

 

It's really difficult to deal with death and dying regularly and not acquire coping skills. Sometimes those skills include dark humor or simply an apparent lack of sympathy. Those skills are often misunderstood by family members and the public.
--- merged: Aug 3, 2011 11:24 AM ---

You would hate the newspapers here. It's common for them to publish graphic photos of vehicle accident victims and those of violent crime. I remember shortly after moving here I went on my morning walk and saw a picture on the front page of the local newspaper of a wrecked car with a body hanging out the window. I thought "gee that's look like my friends car. " There was so much blood and the body in such poor shape I thought it was likely a local young man and not my friend who was a lady and a very petite blond. Got home and another friend called to tell me my friend had died in a car accident the night before.

 

I wrote a big entry....but forgot about the downtime, so it got losted.

Long story short: My parents are dead. I was around their dead bodies. I was sad, but it didn't weird me out. They were both cremated. I was a weird kid who was interested in serial killers and forensic science so don't think I'd ever be weirded out if I happened to find a mutilated body in the woods. I don't want that to happen, but I think I could handle it.

I don't fear death. It's inevitable. I can't decide if I want to donate my body to a body farm for scientists to use to study decomposition or just get cremated. I don't want to be buried. I have a long list of where to scatter little bits of my ashes. I will have a Celebration of Life party...not a funeral. Don't wear black. Drink a beer and do a shot of Jager.

 

Personally I am pretty afraid of death (or most accurately the thought of the non survival of the soul)

Even these crazy end of the world predictions, although intellectually I dont hold any stock in them, scare me at some level in my gut.

I have seen someone killed (I was a passenger on a bus that knocked down and killed a woman who was Christmas shopping) and I had a sister who died. This probably will make me sound very cold or like an asshole, but although both are unpleasant things - I couldnt say either haunted me.

The woman who got hit on the bus... it struck me as very sad (imaging what happened to the presents she had bought and was carrying when she got hit, if the people they were intended got them still, and how it would feel), but it didnt hit me in the guts so to speak

My sister... I was 5 at the time and she was a baby. I didnt really understand it and although I think about the potential person she could have been sometimes, I find it hard to connect the idea of her with a real personality.

 

I don't know how one can feel about death except that it's inevitable.
Dead bodies? I'm glad there are people willing to be morticians.
Those in the open caskets (the only kind of funeral I've been to) looked okay to me.
I don't think we should be wasting land with remembrance. I hope they just burn me. Better yet, throw me in the woods & let me rot. I might be able to arrange that by myself. Once the person is gone, what contained it doesn't matter to me.

 

I don't think there is anyone who isn't uneasy with the idea of dying. There are only two things we don't (and can't) really know about our lives. The creation of our life and the end of it.

There are any number of reasons why we feel uneasy about death and not all have to do with fear. Some have to do with leaving people, others with not finishing things, still others with the unknown, etc.

Personally, I am not currently looking forward to the end of my life. I have things I'd like to do, people I'd like to spend time with and, frankly, I like living (despite the trouble it can bring). Though we really don't know, I am of the belief that when I die, there will be nothing but the cessation of life. I will cease to be. I am okay with this. I cope in two ways: 1) Denial, 2) that my kids will live on.

 

Looking forward to being with my old dogs. Buried or cremated, I want their ashes with me - only those already dead of course. There is more the worry of leaving loved ones behind - because I wont be there to worry and help and more. The dogs have a plan of action in place. I want my dogs to see me dead, to know they have not been abandoned again - all rescues you see. I have seen how they accept that a former companion is now just a bag of old meat.
I kept the dead dog in the salad drawer for a couple of days, until the cremetorium man was due to pick up at the vets. I prefered to have here here safe rather than alone in a chest freezer or something. We took our time saying our goodbyes - I dont think that should be hurried.
--- merged: Aug 4, 2011 11:35 AM ---
edit - meant to say 'help any more' and the dead dog was a her here.

 

I have no problem with death or dead bodies. I've touched dead bodies, and have had to authorise a couple of DNR orders. It's not fun, but it's something that has to be done.

We had a closed coffin for my father... after several years of cirrhosis he was only a shadow of his healthy self. An old friend of his wanted to see him anyway, so we asked everyone to leave while we opened the casket. Only he and the family stayed... but my girlfriend saw that everyone was gone and what was happening, she almost freaked... she ran from the room. Later she said it wouldn't have bothered her if the coffin had been open, but it was the opening of it that bothered her.

 

Didn't there used to be rules about showing pictures of dead bodies in the media, at least in the US? I think I remember a picture in Time Magazine, also of Katrina aftermath, that surprised me for showing a dead body.

 

I just hope I die in my sleep or am killed instantly. I dread the idea of KNOWING I'm about to die more than death itself. It's why the thought drowning or bleeding out makes my skin crawl

 

I'm ok with death and dead bodies. Still don't like funerals... I will be donating my body to science when I die, but cannot be an organ donor, due to an issue with a disease ( noncontagious ) I contracted a few years ago.

I'm thinking about getting some kind of laminated joke card implanted in my belly cavity, so the med students can have a laugh. Probably a fart joke

 

Well, my uncles and I worked as wrecker drivers for a couple years and dead bodys have never bothered me, but especially after doing that. I feel that they should be respected, I mean after all they probably have someone that cares about them.

But also, I %100 agree with Derwood.
I know death is inevitable, and that's just something we have to deal with.
But, the idea of a slow painful death scares me..... Alot!

 

After having worked in law enforcement as an accident investigator for quite some time I can honestly say that after a while you sort of become immune to it having a lot of affect on you. Children, especially young children in accidents always got to me more than did adults. I really can't say I have a real problem with death so long as their still warm - if they've been there for a while I'll pass if I have the opportunity. As one gets older the idea of impending death seems to be a lot more predominant than it was when I was a kid (of course as a kid you think your Superman). Like Derwood - I hope when it comes that I don't see it coming!

 

I have had to give it some thought. I need to write my will as should you all. Liquor dealer - you on the downward slide too then? Where years start getting shorter, soon naps will be getting longer. Make the old bastard with the sycle wait. Go to Stringfellows, get pole danced to death.

 

Most people are overly sensitive since death is not a day to day occurrence. I have worked in emergency medicine and been around dying people in the past (It was usually pretty clean deaths though....stroke or M.I....never trauma.) I won't shy away from the dead and I make it a point to go to and take my young son to funerals since it will be a part of everyone's life sooner or later. I even had them not cremate my grandmother's body until I got into town so I could see it. It was just a closure thing for me.

 

It's hard to work in healthcare in an emergency/combat medicine focus without becoming desensitized to death. Death only really affects me when it's sudden, and someone I knew. Even then, it's the loss of the person, not the physical body that bothers me. On the other hand, I have been in the aftermath of a vehicle bombing in a populated area in Iraq, and no matter how jaded you are, the mass death and immensity of life lost can be jarring.