Funerals are cathartic for survivors?

In My Humble Opinion
41

For my parents and my brother we/I had a viewing open to the public and the graveside ceremony was private [family only. I had a sort of random distant cousin show up for my dad’s graveside service, well also a Navy funeral detail, a bagpiper and the Marines sent a musician for Taps - it was a joke between my Navy husband and my Army dad =) The piper was a family tradition from the Scots side.]

Oddly, the ‘wake’ or post funeral food fest was held at the American Legion [my dad was the chapter pres for years and mom was in the auxiliary as well] We/I paid for the food, a couple kegs and a dozen or so bottles of wine, and some assorted booze and it ran for about an hour after the graveside service. I basically used Wegman’s Grocery deli for the catering source [around a thousand or so bucks for the food, about the same for the booze] and random people brought food as well. Think of it as modern ‘funeral meats’. Cost was about the same for all three people.

42

All the funerals I have been to have had an open casket viewing. My great grandmother, my four grandparents, my best friend, and most recently, my father.

My great grandmother, I was too young to really have much feeling about it. I barely knew her. My grandparents I had a bit more grief over, I knew them well enough, but they weren’t really a part of my daily life.

For them, going to the funeral was a duty as a family member. I don’t know that I go anything out of them, but I’m sure that others appreciated me being there.

When it came to my friend, the funeral was a bit more emotional for me. I went with a few friends that knew him, though I knew him the best, and I remember being stopped at the door to the viewing room by a wave of anguish. As my friends filed in, I had to peel off and go down the hall to the bathroom for a bit to compose myself before I could return. When I was ready, I went up to the casket, and spent some time just looking at him. I knew this was the last time I’d ever see him, so I just took some time to be with him, to remember what he looked like. I also slipped a ticket to a movie we had been planning on seeing into his casket. The funeral is for family, so I sat and listened to his siblings talk about him and their relationship with him. I learned some things I didn’t know about him, and also learned that I was closer to him than most of his family was.

I don’t know that I had really internalized his death until the funeral, it did provide a sense of closure of sorts, though for weeks, I still expected at any time to hear my front door open and his booming voice come up the stairs announcing his presence.

My father’s funeral was the one I was most involved in, both as far as planning and participation. During the viewing, the well-wishing got a bit tiresome, a whole bunch of people that I don’t know coming up and telling me that they are sorry for my loss. People he’d worked with or went to church with. I’m sure that they felt a loss as well, and I graciously accepted their condolences, even though I didn’t really get anything out of it myself.

Even though I saw him less than half an hour after he passed at the hospital, seeing him again at the viewing did provide a bit of peace. They did a good job. I wouldn’t say he looked like he was sleeping, but he certainly looked much more peaceful than when he was at the hospital with a bunch of tubes sticking out of him. It also gave me the opportunity to finally win our long running game of “gotcha last.”

I’m sure that some people got comfort out of the blathering of the pastor, but since I don’t believe in any of that stuff, as far I was concerned, he may as well have been talking about unicorns and fairies.

My closure came from giving a eulogy, sharing my thoughts and memories of my father with those who knew him, which I wrote and delivered in such a way to have those in attendance alternating between laughter and tears, and I honestly think people got a lot more out of my words than that of the pastor.

Anyway, funerals are for the living, not the dead, and they are for those who do get closure or some sort of catharsis from them, not for those who don’t. If someone doesn’t get anything from giving a final farewell to the deceased, that’s fine, just don’t let that interfere with anyone to whom it does.

43

I’m in full agreement with the OP. Funerals with open coffins (I even hate the word casket) are creepy. I personally don’t need to see a dead body to know the person is gone. The body isn’t the person anymore. When I go to funerals that include viewing, I don’t view anymore. In the past when I was much younger and did see the body, it only gave me nightmares. I couldn’t sleep at night. Just walking into a funeral home stresses me out.

My son had cancer and when we got to the point when we knew he would not win the battle, he had only two wishes. He didn’t want to die in the hospital and he didn’t want anyone looking at him when he was dead. He died at home and was cremated. His ashes were at his celebration of life. That was 7 years ago and there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t remember waking up that morning and seeing him in the hospital bed that hospice provided. I knew he was dead immediately. I touched his hand and then never looked at him again. To me, that wasn’t him anymore. I went into another part of the house when the funeral home came to take his body. My husband stayed with him, but I could not do it.

His celebration of life was amazing. We had pictures, a video and hundreds of people came. His friends toasted him with a bottle of wine, the high school hockey team came in their jerseys (he was a standout player during his high school days). We cried and laughed and were so supported by our/his family and friends. It was a sad day but it was also an uplifting day. He had lived through 2-1/2 years of sickness, pain and fear and we all lived it with him. It was good to let that part go and keep the good 27 years of his life in our memories.

44

Seeing my mother looking somewhat normal and at peace made saying goodbye a whole lot easier. I am glad my final memory of her is not the shriveled person that had just a 6 month battle dying of cancer. The last 4 family members to pass were all cremated, the services for them just seemed so cold and impersonal. Saying goodbye to a wood box that is going to sit on a mantle or closet shelf just isn’t the same.

45

Raises hand.

My sister needed to not see our parents’ bodies. I needed to see them. People vary.

– we didn’t have a viewing; Jews don’t really do that. But intimates had the option for private viewing. I’d been with my mother when she died, and sat with the body a while after; but I seemed to also need to be sure that the right body was in that coffin. I wasn’t with my father, and it didn’t really sink in that he was dead until I saw the body.

And even aside from that issue: funeral gatherings are a recognition by the community – of whatever size community – that the person has died; that their life was important; and that their survivors are grieving. This recognition is very often important to the survivors.

Must be. I had no idea that some graveside services are open casket at the graveyard. TIL.

The rabbi said at my father’s funeral: There are three ways to mourn. You can cry, you can shout, you can laugh.

Many people use all three.

I think that would be utterly awful.

Touching the cold body – embalmed or not – is part of what makes me sure that they’re dead. Thinking in whatever portion of my head that they might still be alive and were buried that way – that’s nightmare fuel.

46

My grandmother was an identical twin, but she had a stroke when I was about five years old, which changed her appearance and prematurely aged her. She pre-deceased her sister by more than ten years. When Aunt Gert died, I went to the funeral, which had an open casket. I can still remember the physical feeling of shock I felt seeing her. It was my grandmother! It wasn’t my grandmother! By the time she died, Aunt Gert had caught up with how my grandmother had looked. It was very freaky.

A co-worker of mine died unexpectedly. He was ethnically Chinese (but was born and grew up in Malayasia) and had a Buddhist funeral. At the end of the ceremony, the mourners file up to the altar and say a phrase (which we were given ahead of time) and bow three times, then exit. Everybody did it except one guy who was a born-again Christian. Ok. If it offended your religious sensibilities, but he made more of a fuss than he needed to. Never really liked him, though, so it wasn’t something that changed how I thought about him. It was a very sad funeral. The deceased was only 50 and was a super nice guy. Always helpful and cheerful. His kids were relatively young, too – 16 and 12 IIRC. RIP, Danny.

47

What does the OP feel about funeral strippers?

48

The purpose of a funeral is to help people work through the stages of grief. Shock, denial, anger, bargaining, etc.

Sometimes it’s really hard to accept the reality that the person is gone, they’re not coming back, and we need to figure out how to go on without them. Even when your mind knows they’re gone, the heart has trouble really accepting it. The funeral, or whatever ritual you like, is not a fix-all for grief, but it helps push things in the right direction.

49

If the next of kin don’t need a shoulder to cry on, being there doesn’t hurt.

If the next of kin do need a shoulder to cry on, being there might help.

50

I think the operative word in the thread title and OP is “cathartic.” In some cultures/subcultures, there’s a lot of wailing and sobbing at a funeral, and it really is cathartic. We live in a society that largely frowns on displays of grief and expects mourners to get over it and get back to work within a few days. It’s cruel and unhealthy. Catharsis would be so much better.

51

I’m ok with it as long as I’m not the one who has to make it rain.

52

And a funeral for a stripper would probably make sense to be open casket.

53

The hard part is getting the dollar bills to stay on her eyes.

54

This can be especially true if that person was away for an extended period already.
When my brother died, it took the military about 6 months to identify and return him to us. It was a closed casket funeral, no viewing. Took years for me to fully understand and accept on a fundamental level. Then it was like a brick to the head and the wife came home to find me balling my eyes out. I hadn’t actually seen him in two years before his death.

55

My dad’s a funeral director – want me to ask him if this can be done? :smile:

56

I’m fortunate to have never suffered a truly devastating loss. My grandparents are all dead along with various other relatives, but it was their time and we weren’t unusually close. I went to an open-casket funeral for one, a closed-casket funeral for another, a no-casket celebration of life for a third, and no funeral at all for the rest. I feel like going to some kind of event gave me some greater sense of closure than not going, but the specifics of the event didn’t make much difference.

Probably the death that hit me the hardest was a college professor of mine. He was one of those life-changing teachers they make sappy movies about, and he died suddenly in middle age from a heart attack brought on by shoveling snow mere months after I’d finished TAing for him. I didn’t go to the actual funeral, but I did attend a celebration of life for him on campus. The auditorium was packed with the students whose lives he’d touched, and several of them gave heartfelt speeches. I found it incredibly moving and healing, like I was able to get one last gulp of the breath of fresh air he represented before he was gone forever.

57

I’m glad you found joy in life, Mangetout.

58

The OP should really check out a traditional Irish Wake sometime. My great uncles sat their Mother (my great-grandmother) up at the head of the table and poured her a glass of whiskey. ROFL! Its always a raucous party. My Grandfather used to say that you could halve the population growth in Ireland by banning the Wakes.

In all seriousness though, we sit up with our dead, something we share with the Jewish and Maori traditions, among others. It was really tough for me when my Grandmother died, and the hospital morgue wouldn’t let me stay with her. I felt like I was shirking my duty when I went home to sleep after visiting hours.

I remember a great NPR story (This American life perhaps?) about a man whose college job was sitting up with Jewish corpses at night. I think maybe there was a conflict between religious duties for the Sabbath vs sitting with the deceased, which required the help of a “goy” to resolve. I wish I could find it.

The Indonesians have the most extreme version of this:

59

The death vigil used to be quite common in many rural areas of the United States.

There was an urban legend about a hunchback who died. His shoulders were chained down so they would be able to close the lid of the coffin. During the vigil, late at night, the nails pulled loose, terrifying the guy who was keeping watch.

Ray Stevens wrote a song about it.

60

Buddhists sit with the dead body for three days. I know this because when someone was murdered at the (American) Zen Buddhist monastery I was living at, we took it in turns to sit in the morgue, 24 hours a day.