Category: Grief

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8 simple words to say when when someone you love is grieving

By Tim Lawrence

8 simple words to say when when someone you love is grieving

I’m listening to a man tell a story. A woman he knows was in a devastating car accident, and now she lives in a state of near-permanent pain; a paraplegic, many of her hopes stolen.

I’ve heard it a million times before, but it never stops shocking me: He tells her that he thinks the tragedy had led to positive changes in her life. He utters the words that are nothing less than emotional, spiritual, and psychological violence:

“Everything happens for a reason.”

He tells her that this was something that had to happen in order for her to grow. But that’s the kind of bullshit that destroys lives. And it’s categorically untrue.

After all these years working with people in pain as an advisor and adversity strategist, it still amazes me that these myths persist despite the fact that they’re nothing more than platitudes cloaked as sophistication. And worst of all, they keep us from doing the one thing we must do when our lives are turned upside down: grieve.

Here’s the reality: As my mentor Megan Devine has so beautifully said: ‘Some things in life cannot be fixed. They can only be carried.’

Grief is brutally painful. Grief does not only occur when someone dies. When relationships fall apart, you grieve. When opportunities are shattered, you grieve. When illnesses wreck you, you grieve.

Losing a child cannot be fixed. Being diagnosed with a debilitating illness cannot be fixed. Facing the betrayal of your closest confidante cannot be fixed. These things can only be carried.

Let me be clear: If you’ve faced a tragedy and someone tells you in any way that your tragedy was meant to be, happened for a reason, will make you a better person, or that taking responsibility for it will fix it, you have every right to remove them from your life.

Yes, devastation can lead to growth, but it often doesn’t. It often destroys lives — in part because we’ve replaced grieving with advice. With platitudes.

I now live an extraordinary life. I’ve been deeply blessed by the opportunities I’ve had and the radically unconventional life I’ve built for myself.

But loss has not in and of itself made me a better person. In fact, in some ways it’s hardened me.

While loss has made me acutely aware and empathetic of the pains of others, it’s also made me more inclined to hide. I have a more cynical view of human nature and a greater impatience with people who are unfamiliar with what loss does to people.

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Above all, I’ve been left with a pervasive survivor’s guilt that has haunted me all my life. In short, my pain has never gone away, I’ve just learned to channel it into my work with others. But to say that my losses somehow had to happen in order for my gifts to grow would be to trample on the memories of all those I lost too young, all those who suffered needlessly, and all those who faced the same trials I did but who did not make it.

I’m simply not going to do that. I’m not going to assume that God ordained me for life instead of all the others, just so that I could do what I do now. And I’m certainly not going to pretend that I’ve made it simply because I was strong enough, that I became “successful” because I “took responsibility.”

I think people tell others to take responsibility when they don’t want to understand.

Understanding is harder than posturing. Telling someone to “take responsibility” for their loss is a form of benevolent masturbation. It’s the inverse of inspirational porn: It’s sanctimonious porn.

Personal responsibility implies that there’s something to take responsibility for. You don’t take responsibility for being raped or losing your child. You take responsibility for how you choose to live in the wake of the horrors that confront you, but you don’t choose whether you grieve. We’re not that smart or powerful. When hell visits us, we don’t get to escape grieving.

This is why all the platitudes and focus on “fixes” are so dangerous: by unleashing them on those we claim to love, we deny them the right to grieve.

In so doing, we deny them the right to be human. We steal a bit of their freedom precisely when they’re standing at the intersection of their greatest fragility and despair.

The irony is that the only thing that even can be “responsible” amid loss is grieving.

I’ve grieved many times in my life. I’ve been overwhelmed with shame so strong it nearly killed me. The ones who helped — the only ones who helped — were those who were simply there.

I am here — I have lived — because they chose to love me. They loved me in their silence, in their willingness to suffer with me and alongside me. They loved me in their desire to be as uncomfortable, as destroyed, as I was, if only for a week, an hour, even just a few minutes. Most people have no idea how utterly powerful this is.

Healing and transformation can occur. But not if you’re not allowed to grieve. Because grief itself is not an obstacle.

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The obstacles come later. The choices as to how to live, how to carry what we have lost, how to weave a new mosaic for ourselves? Those come in the wake of grief.

Yet our culture treats grief like a problem to be solved or an illness to be healed. We’ve done everything we can to avoid, ignore, or transform grief. So that now, when you’re faced with tragedy, you usually find that you’re no longer surrounded by people — you’re surrounded by platitudes.

So what do we offer instead of “everything happens for a reason”?

The last thing a person devastated by grief needs is advice. Their world has been shattered. Inviting someone — anyone — into their world is an act of great risk. To try to fix, rationalize, or wash away their pain only deepens their terror.

Instead, the most powerful thing you can do is acknowledge. To literally say the words:

I acknowledge your pain. I’m here with you.

Note that I said with you, not for you. For implies that you’re going to do something. That’s not for you to enact. But to stand with your loved one, to suffer with them, to do everything but something is incredibly powerful.

There is no greater act for others than acknowledgment.

And that requires no training, no special skills — just the willingness to be present and to stay present, as long as is necessary.

Be there. Only be there. Don’t leave when you feel uncomfortable or when you feel like you’re not doing anything. In fact, it’s when you feel uncomfortable and like you’re not doing anything that you must stay.

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Because it’s in those places — in the shadows of horror we rarely allow ourselves to enter — where the beginnings of healing are found. This healing is found when we have others who are willing to enter that space alongside us. Every grieving person on earth needs these people.

I beg you, be one of these people.

You are more needed than you will ever know. And when you find yourself in need of those people, find them. I guarantee they are there.

Everyone else can go.

Complete Article HERE!

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Personal Rituals Can Help You Deal with Grief

By Thorin Klosowski

grief

Grief, whether it’s losing someone we love, the end of a relationship, or whatever else, is a complicated emotion. While we all tend to deal with grief in different ways, The Atlantic points to research that shows just how much personal rituals can help you deal with your grief.

Coping with grief is tough and most of us tend to turn to rituals to deal with it. These rituals could be something as simple as listening to a specific song in the morning or going to a hairdresser at a scheduled time each month. After a series of different studies and questionnaires, researchers think that these rituals add a feeling of control back once it’s lost:

One of the most common responses to loss is feeling like the world is out of control. Day to day, most people go about their lives thinking they are in command. They decide what they do, whom they see, and where they go. And death—a familiar part of life in the past, when diseases were untreatable and public parks were cemeteries—is now remote, for the most part unseen, and often unthought of. So the sudden death of a loved one can shock and stun. The bereaved can be overcome by a helplessness that is otherwise foreign to their lives. As Didion writes in The Year of Magical Thinking: “Everything’s going along as usual and then all shit breaks loose.”

When Norton and Gino probed deeper into the emotional and mental lives of their research subjects, they found that rituals help people overcome grief by counteracting the turbulence and chaos that follows loss. Rituals, which are deliberately-controlled gestures, trigger a very specific feeling in mourners—the feeling of being in control of their lives. After people did a ritual or wrote about doing one, they were more likely to report thinking that “things were in check” and less likely to feel “helpless,” “powerless,” and “out of control.”

We’ve talked about developing personal rituals before, and from the sound of it, in times of grief it’s really important to keep up those rituals.

Complete Article HERE!

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Her secret history: I discovered my mother’s digital life after her death

The contents of my mom’s laptop were like a breadcrumb trail: her interests, her hopes and her plans for the future, even those that would never come true

‘I wondered about the clues I found: were they hints for how I should live my life? Suggestions for places I should go? Ideas to discover?’
‘I wondered about the clues I found: were they hints for how I should live my life? Suggestions for places I should go? Ideas to discover?’

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Not long after my mother died in 2014, less than eight months after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, my dad and I performed a ritual familiar to anyone who has lost someone they love: we went through her closet to decide what to hold on to. We kept her favorite pieces, like the cozy purple cardigan in which her scent still lingered, a few items of jewelry and her scarves.

A few months later, my father gave me her laptop. I needed a new computer and was grateful to have it. But its contents – photos from trips, a draft of her thesis from divinity school, Van Morrison albums in her iTunes – kept pulling me down rabbit holes. Whenever I sat down to do some work, I’d find myself lost in her files, searching for ways to feel close to her again.

Her computer activity was like a breadcrumb trail through her inner life: her interests, her hopes and her plans for the future, even those that would never come true.

The bookmarks in her Safari browser served as a compass on a journey into my mother’s mind. She used them like sticky notes, saving articles to return to, museum exhibitions to attend and beautiful hotels to visit. She bookmarked things like EssentialVermeer.com, a Wikipedia entry for Theological aesthetics, How to Dress Like a Parisian, and endless recommended reading lists.

As I scrolled through them, I wondered about these clues: were they hints for how I should live my life? Suggestions for places I should go? Ideas to discover? The very first bookmark was “Resources for a Spiritual Journey.” Was that a little nudge from her? I explored each site methodically, not wanting to miss a word or a photograph, just in case I overlooked something from my mom: here’s what you need to know, here’s what I really loved, here’s how much I loved you.

Of course, not all bookmarks were treasure troves. Her health insurance company, for example, and some links no longer work. One took me to the old site of the Opera National de Paris. “You are looking for something?” the 404 error message read in broken English. “Yeah, my mom,” I think. “You seen her?”

Each bookmark corresponded to a time in her life. I pinpointed when she moved to London (places to stay in Cornwall and upcoming shows at the Tate) and when I got married (my wedding website). And there, toward the end of the list, a YouTube video of Kenneth Branagh delivering the St Crispin’s Day Speech from Henry V marked when cancer entered her life: my little brother sent it to the family when her chemo began, preparing us for the battle ahead.

A month later, she sent us Mel Gibson’s “Freedom” speech from Braveheart. I clicked on the bookmark and re-watched Gibson in his blue face paint, yelling: “They may take our lives, but they may never take our freedom!” That was my mom, the William Wallace of chemo: our fearless chief, bravely leading us into a gruesome battle.

But walking in mom’s online footsteps was also like crossing a field riddled with landmines. Without warning something would trigger my grief and my heart was ripped open again. The most painful were those that came just before the cancer battle speeches, before she knew she was sick. There, plain as day, were her plans and hopes for a future she thought stretched out before her.

“15 Ideas for a Children’s Discovery Garden,” read one bookmark from not long ago. This was my mom looking for ways to make her house magical for her grandchildren. At the time she had just one, my one-year-old daughter Maeve, and I could see that being a grandmother was going to be the defining role of the rest of her life.

Recently, I stumbled upon her bookmark of a CS Lewis quote: “We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words – to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it.”

This is what my mom sought throughout her life, and was more successful than most at finding it. For me, the quote also evokes the day she died and how I’ve come to understand her death. She died on 15 December 2014, eight months after she was diagnosed.

The days and weeks in late November and early December that preceded my mother’s death had been dark, overcast and cold. The grim scenery seemed to reflect the sorrow and fear that had overtaken my family. I kept taking photos at twilight of the dark silhouettes of tree branches set against the purple sky.

But the day my mom died was different. I came downstairs early that morning to relieve my older brother who had kept vigil by her bed all night. I sat alone with her as sunlight flooded in through the windows, filtering through the pink orchids that lined the windowsill.

As I sat there, I remembered what my mom had told me about the day I was born. The hospital had been busy that August morning but soon after she gave birth to me, my mom and I were left in a room alone. When she told the story, she always emphasized how wonderful it was to be on our own, just the two of us, how peacefully we slept. That’s how I started my life.

And that’s how the last day of my mom’s life began: just the two of us. I held her hand and watched her labored breathing. Looking at her, I thought about how I must have slept on her chest as a baby, taking in her warmth and feeling so safe in her arms.

That afternoon, my mother took her final breath. My two brothers and I left my father sobbing next to her hospital bed, which had been set up in the living room, and sat next to each other on a bench outside, watching the day’s final rays of sunlight bathe the front yard. After days and weeks of grim winter darkness, the scenery was radiant.

I couldn’t help but think my mom had become part of the beauty around us. The light seemed more intense, the beauty more vibrant because she was there in it. I was surprised that such a feeling of peace could be felt in the midst of that horrifying loss. I still cling to it and try to revive it in my memory.

My mom’s very last bookmark is for the Phillips House at Mass General Hospital, a place where she could get medical care and maybe spend her final days. The bookmark signifies to me that it was an idea she wanted to return to – an option to consider.

But her decline accelerated so fast. She died in hospice care at her home on Martha’s Vineyard.

The next bookmark is mine. I created it eight months after she died. It just says “Life Begins,” and it’s for the program for expectant mothers at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, where my son was born 14 months after my mom died.

When I first noticed these bookmarks back-to-back it took my breath away, like I’d stumbled on an essential clue to some mystery. Sitting right there was my mom’s disappearance from the world and then my son’s miraculous entry.

I’ve kept adding my own bookmarks to my mother’s list: 99 “essential” restaurants in Brooklyn, 25 weekend getaways from New York City, places where Maeve could maybe take dance lessons. Now my daydreams and thoughts for the future are piled onto my mom’s. From my mom’s happy life to its tragic ending to me trying to figure out how to be a person in the world without her, it’s all there.

Complete Article HERE!

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Duck, Death and the Tulip: An Uncommonly Tender Illustrated Meditation on the Cycle of Life

“When you’re dead, the pond will be gone, too — at least for you.”001

BY MARIA POPOVA

“Death is our friend precisely because it brings us into absolute and passionate presence with all that is here, that is natural, that is love,” Rilke wrote in contemplatinghow befriending our mortality can help us feel more alive. Nearly a century later, John Updike echoed this sentiment: “Each day, we wake slightly altered, and the person we were yesterday is dead. So why, one could say, be afraid of death, when death comes all the time?” And yet however poetic this notion might be, it remains one of the hardest for us to befriend and reconcile with our irrepressible impulse for aliveness. How, then, are those only just plunging into the lush river of life to confront the prospect of its flow’s cessation?

The German children’s book author and illustrator Wolf Erlbruch offers a wonderfully warm and assuring answer in Duck, Death and the Tulip (public library) — a marvelous addition to the handful of intelligent and imaginative children’s books about death and loss.

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One day, Duck turns around to find Death standing behind her. Terrified, she asks whether he has come to take her, but he remarks rather matter-of-factly that he has been there her entire life.

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At first chilled by the notion of Death’s lifelong proximity, Duck slowly, cautiously, curiously acquaints herself with him.

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Death gave her a friendly smile.

Actually he was nice (if you forgot for a moment who he was).
Really quite nice.

With great economy of words and minimalist yet enormously expressive illustrations, Erlbruch conveys the quiet ease that develops between the two as they relax into an unlikely camaraderie.

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Duck suggests they go to the pond together, and although Death has always dreaded that, he reluctantly agrees. But the water is too much for him.

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“Are you cold?” Duck asked. “Shall I warm you a little?”
Nobody had ever offered to do that for Death.

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They awake together in the morning and Duck is overjoyed to discover that she is not dead. Here, Erlbruch injects the lightheartedness always necessary for keeping the profound from slipping into the overly sentimental:

She poked Death in the ribs. “I’m not dead!” she quacked, utterly delighted.

“I’m pleased for you,” Death said, stretching.

“And if I’d died?”

“Then I wouldn’t have been able to sleep in,” Death yawned.

That wasn’t a nice thing to say, thought Duck.

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But since any friendship is woven of “a continued, mutual forgiveness,” Duck eventually metabolizes her hurt feelings and the two find their way into a conversation about the common mythologies of the afterlife central to our human delusion of immortality:

“Some ducks say you become an angel and sit on a cloud, looking over the earth.”

“Quite possibly.” Death rose to his feet. “You have the wings already.”

“Some ducks say that deep in the earth there’s a place where you’ll be roasted if you haven’t been good.”

“You ducks come up with some amazing stories, but who knows.”

“So you don’t know either,” Duck snapped.

Death just looked at her.

Having failed to resolve the existential perplexity of nonexistence, they return to the simple satisfactions of living and decide to climb a tree.

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They could see the pond far below. There it lay. So still. And so lonely.

“That’s what it will be like when I’m dead,” Duck thought. “The pond alone, without me.”

Death sometimes read minds. “When you’re dead, the pond will be gone, too — at least for you.”

“Are you sure?” Duck was astonished.

“As sure as can be,” Death said.

“That’s a comfort. I won’t have to mourn over it when…”

“…when you’re dead.” Death finished the sentence. He wasn’t coy about the subject.

As summer winds down, the two friends visit the pond less and less, and sit quietly in the grass together more and more. When autumn arrives, Duck feels the chill in her feathers for the first time, perhaps in the way that one suddenly feels old one day — the unannounced arrival of a chilling new awareness of one’s finitude, wedged between an unredeemable yesterday and an inevitable tomorrow.

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“I’m cold,” she said one evening. “Will you warm me a little?”

Snowflakes drifted down.

Something had happened. Death looked at the duck.

She’d stopped breathing. She lay quite still.

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Stroking her disheveled feathers back into a temporary perfection, Death picks Duck up and carries her tenderly to the river, then lays her on the water and releases her into its unstoppable flow, watching wistfully as she floats away. It’s the visual counterpart to that unforgettable line from Elizabeth Alexander’s sublime memoir:“Perhaps tragedies are only tragedies in the presence of love, which confers meaning to loss.”

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For a long time he watched her.

When she was lost to sight, he was almost a little moved.

“But that’s life,” thought Death.

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As the river spills off the book and we turn to the last page, we see Death surrounded by other animals — a subtle reminder that he will escort the fox and the rabbit and you and me down the river of life, just as he did Duck. And perhaps that’s okay.

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Complement the immeasurably beautiful and poetic Duck, Death and the Tulip with the Danish masterpiece Cry, Heart, But Never Break and Oliver Jeffers’s The Heart and the Bottle, then revisit a Zen master’s explanation of death and the life-force to a child.

Complete Article HERE!

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Rosemary, That’s For Remembrance

By Sarah Elizabeth Troop

cinderella-at-her-mothers-grave

For many there are no brunches, no flowers, no cakes, no surprise gift planning with other family members in secret on Mother’s Day. Instead, there are those who silently endure the day in pain and mourning for many reasons – the death of a mother, the death of a child, the woman who cannot conceive although she desperately tries and time is not on her side, the mother whose child is missing – all members of a secret club no one wants to join.

You may not be aware of it, but I’m willing to bet someone you know – likely someone you care very deeply for – falls into one of these categories. So, if you are one of the lucky ones – you have a mom you can call to tell her you love her, or a child to hold instead of a grave to visit on Mother’s Day, I’m asking you to please take a moment to reach out to your friends and loved ones this Mother’s Day and help them remember.

rosemary

Rosemary is an herb that has long been associated with remembrance and death. Since ancient Roman times when the herb was used in burial rites for this reason, to several accounts of funerals in England where mourners traditionally tossed bouquets of rosemary on top of coffins. In this respect, rosemary is probably best associated with Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5; “Ophelia in her madness names plants that were known for their capacity to ease pain, particularly inwardly felt pain” [1] – “There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance; pray, love, remember.” 

rosemary bread

As human beings we have always honored important events and occasions with food and I want to honor your losses, your memories and your feelings of grief on this day, too. Here is a tea bread, you can take to a friend or make for yourself, incorporating rosemary with apples and lemon.

Rosemary, For Remembrance Bread

(Adapted from Nigella Lawson)

Apple mixture:

  •  1 large apple – Pink Lady or Fiji is what I use
  • 1 small sprig plus 1 or 2 long sprigs of rosemary
  • 2 teaspoons granulated or Baker’s sugar
  • juice and zest of 1 lemon
  • 1 tablespoon butter

Cake batter base:

  • 2 sticks of softened butter
  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar plus more for sprinkling over top or casting sugar if you have that
  • 3 eggs
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder

 

Preheat oven to 325˚F. Butter or grease a loaf pan.

Peel, core, and chop the apple and put in a saucepan with the small sprig of rosemary, the 2 teaspoons of sugar, the lemon zest and juice, and 1 tablespoon butter. Cook on low heat for approximately 10 minutes until the apple is soft. Set aside to cool, removing the rosemary sprig once the mixture has cooled.

Put the cooled apple mixture into a food processor and puree. Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. Cream together the butter, sugar and eggs. Combine the butter mixture with the dry ingredients then pour into your prepared pan and smooth the top. Sprinkle the surface with about 1-2 tablespoons of granulated or casting sugar and then lay the rosemary down along the center.

Bake the cake for 45 minutes, checking at the 35-minute mark to see how it’s going. When your cake tester comes out clean, remove from oven and cool. I refrigerated mine once it was cooled, although if you can’t wait, I’m sure it’s good warm as well!

Complete Article HERE!

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Executive Producing Your Own Goodbye

My father-in-law was a planner his entire life. The end was no exception.

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Hollywood film industry producers or directors in a sound stage
Hollywood film industry producers or directors in a sound stage

We’re better at welcoming new life into this world than we are at saying goodbye. But some point we all end up on the off ramp, regardless of whether we choose to realize it.

But before we hit the exit, there are a few important things to consider: the body, the obituary, the service, and the afterparty. And my father-in-law, Hank, taught all of us how it’s done.

Hank died last January at 92. In December, two doctors declined to operate on his leaky heart valve. They didn’t think he’d survive. So we had a wistful but wonderful Christmas with him as he furniture-walked around the house, grabbing at table and counter tops with labored breathing until he finally settled in on the TV room couch.

Fortunately for all of us, Hank was an engineer and a planner. Years earlier we’d received a blue folder filled with notes on what to do in the event of his death.

He sent us these thoughts in the year 2000. He re-sent them in 2008, complete with an addendum from his wife called “When We Drop Dead.”

First was the body. Yale Medical School was supposed to get it. He left us the phone number and a name. This is actually more complicated than it sounds. You have to die in Connecticut. Yale has to receive the body quickly. And you need an authentic death certificate before they’ll take the body away.

Next, the obituary. Hank kindly provided the name and number of the New Haven Register obit section. And The New York Times’. My husband wrote it. That’s hard to do when you’re grieving. If at all possible, might I recommend writing an obituary in advance, when your head is clear and you have time to check the facts.

There are two kinds of obituaries: paid and unpaid. The paid have a just the facts, ma’am format. My husband wrote this long, heart-tugging piece about his dad’s rags-to-riches story of working hard and rising through the ranks until he was head of a manufacturing company. How his dad had never thought of going to college until a friend off-handedly told him, “Hey, you’re pretty smart. You should.” How he trained in World War II to be a dive bomber pilot (a profession in which half the men died). How when he was 13, he watched his own father drop dead of a heart attack while placing a star on top of the Christmas tree.

It was a lovely obituary. It was WAY too long. My husband eventually wrote a shorter, more bloodless, just the facts one for the paid section but it made him sad. His dad had been a prominent local philanthropist in New Haven. He’d given to hospitals, universities and schools.

Onto the service. I’m a comedian. Twice before he died, Hank asked me to host his memorial service. I said, “But Grandpa, I’ve never emceed a funeral.” He said, “Jane, it’s not a funeral. It’s a celebration of life. I want people to have fun. Tell them how I loved Scott Joplin and Broadway musicals like Oklahoma and South Pacific. How every year we went to the Messiah sing along at Yale because I loved classical music. And keep it to 90 minutes.”

I emceed. His two sons spoke—one at the beginning of the service and one at the end. So did all four grandchildren, who wanted to share stories about the great guy they knew: how he windsurfed until he was 85, let them drive as kids in his beat-up station wagon as they sat in his lap—unbeknownst to Grandma or their parents. Three representatives from his favorite organizations spoke. And two Scott Joplin piano interludes and one soprano singing Handel’s Messiah were woven into the program.

The obit that had been too long? That went into the program. The grandchildren put a copy on every seat.

The New Haven Register sent a reporter and a photographer. So much of New Haven showed up that it became the next day’s front-page story.

It would have been enough. But ever the planner, Hank had one last idea: the after party. At the end of the service, Charlie Salerno and the Clamdiggers their festive red-striped jackets playing Hank’s all-time favorite song, “When The Saints Go Marching In!” He had left us their card—the brass section marched to the stage and led a procession out the hall and directly toward the two bars that he’d drawn in his notes.

Hank was a terrific planner in life. And he did a bang-up job executive producing how we managed the time right after his death. If only he could have done that for others, he’d certainly have found a great second career.

Complete Article HERE!

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The new trend is ‘fun-erals’ with a rise in personalised ceremonies

By Amy Molloy

Memeroial candles might be a thing of the past.
Memeroial candles might be a thing of the past.

I DON’T know where my first husband is buried. That might sound odd — especially as I attended the funeral in a cemetery somewhere in Dublin — but I have total amnesia when it comes to the exact location, and most of the service.

I remember I wore a white dress I bought at a charity shop; I remember it was cloudy and the cemetery was next to a school soccer pitch where a match was playing.

I’m sure it was a beautiful funeral and I’m grateful to my late husband’s family for arranging it at a time when I was incapable of even brushing my teeth. But I felt no connection to the occasion, even though I was the widow.

During the traditional service, I tuned out and focused on the sounds of the soccer match and the ecstatic cheers of the children as they scored goals against each other. To me, their enthusiastic celebrations were more representative of my husband than a cold, grey cemetery. And I’m not the only mourner to feel this way.

Traditionally, how we commemorate death is dictated by dogma — you must wear black, look sombre and serve curled-up sandwiches. Increasingly, however, modern mourners want a more personalised service that reflects their loved one’s true character — even if it goes against social and religious etiquette.

‘You must wear black, look sombre and serve curled-up sandwiches.’
‘You must wear black, look sombre and serve curled-up sandwiches.’

It used to only be celebrities who had flamboyant farewells (the funeral wishes of Joan Rivers included a wind machine near her casket so that her hair was “blowing just like Beyoncé’s”).

But these days, “fun-erals” aren’t just for performers with deep pockets.

The National Funeral Directors Association has highlighted a rise in personalised ceremonies, including a heightened interest in eco-friendly options.

In Australia, you can order a casket made from handwoven willow, be laid to rest in a coffin made from 100 per cent biodegradable cardboard, or even have your ashes buried in an “organic eco pod” which sprouts into a tree.

Another survey by funeral services company The Co-operative Funeralcare in the UK found 54 per cent of people would prefer their funeral be a “celebration of life”, and 48 per cent would like to incorporate their favourite “hobby, colour, football team or music”.

We want choices — even in death — rather than a cookie-cutter approach to commiseration. And now an Australian funeral home, set to launch this month, is taking “imaginative mourning” one step further.

The House, a Sydney-based service founded by friends Morna Seres, Kylee Stevens and Christian Willis, will offer “memory services” as opposed to traditional funerals.

What’s the difference? First of all, location. Instead of churches, chapels or other traditional places, services will be held at unique venues around the city, including dance studios and art galleries, who have agreed to hold private events — with a casket as part of the decor.

Instead of churches and chapels, funerals are being held in art galleries.
Instead of churches and chapels, funerals are being held in art galleries.

Unusually, the three entrepreneurs have no previous experience of funeral care, instead coming from careers in art, fashion and styling. But they believe the funeral industry needs an injection of creativity. “I was stimulated [to start the business] by my own father’s funeral,” says Seres. “He wasn’t religious, so we didn’t want it to be in a church or chapel. The only other option we were offered was a graveside burial. It was a rainy day and the sound system didn’t work in the open. It just didn’t feel like a true reflection of who he was.”

The idea was further encouraged by the funeral of a mutual friend, where Seres and Stevens were both struck by the impersonal experience.

“From the service to the sensory elements surrounding the day, it just didn’t feel relevant to my friend or their family,” says Stevens. “Coming from a background in the fashion industry, I started thinking about how the design process could be applied to how we say goodbye.”

Funerals can feel like bleak occasions — for obvious reasons — but do they really need to be? The House believes a funeral should be a “transitional experience” for attendees, using art, design and “sensory experiences” to help with the grieving process.

This could include setting up an art exhibition or photos and videos. Instead of sitting on rows of chairs like a conference, they encourage mourners to move around the coffin, chatting freely instead of feeling confined by tradition.

‘Funerals can feel like bleak occasions — for obvious reasons.’
‘Funerals can feel like bleak occasions — for obvious reasons.’

They may be onto something.

A survey by the not-for-profit organisation Include a Charity found that Australians would prefer their funeral to be a “more casual send-off”. When questioned about their ideal ceremony, 71 per cent said they’d like their loved ones to wear bright colours and 98 per cent said laughing at a funeral was an appropriate way to remember someone.

We’re also breaking out of the mindset that a funeral has to be uncomfortable for attendees — and it’s all about the small touches. Some people even said they’d like “a barista to serve good coffee” at their service.

Instead of traditional hymns, people are also opting for modern music (Green Day’sTime Of Your Life is a popular choice, apparently). I have a friend who, when his 22-year-old brother died, organised a silent disco by the graveside — imagine spotting a crowd of mourners with headphones on, dancing in silence.

Then there’s the debate around digital documentation. Many funeral parlours now offer webcams so that overseas relatives can tune into a service.

When 13-year-old YouTube star Caleb Logan Bratayley died last October, more than 47,000 people tuned into watch a live-stream of his funeral on Periscope. On YouTube there is a GoPro video of a Buddhist funeral shot from a drone flying above it. Insensitive? That’s just a matter of opinion.

Ceremonies should honour a loved one’s memory.
Ceremonies should honour a loved one’s memory.

“Many ceremonies, like weddings and birthdays, have evolved from a traditional style of celebration to a reflection of an individual’s personality,” says psychologist Barbara Jensen. “This is now also true of funerals, although the change has happened at a slower rate because death is still very much taboo in our society. The important thing to remember here is that there is no right or wrong way to do things, and this is important if a funeral is going to be healing for the attendees.”

This type of healing, however, costs. How much will a multi-sensory, personalised funeral reduce a next-of-kin’s inheritance? The House says it can match the average cost of a funeral in Australia (from $4000 for a basic cremation, according to government finance website moneysmart.gov.au).

“Our cost does vary on the requirements of the individual,” says Seres. “But it is important to us that, if someone walks through our door and doesn’t have a lot of money, we’re still able to service them.”

Final costs can also be reduced by enlisting family and friends to help with certain elements.

The danger is that personalised funerals could go the same way as children’s birthday parties, becoming just another pressure. A decade ago, kids were content with jelly, ice-cream and pass-the-parcel, but now a parent feels like a failure if they don’t hire a full petting zoo and the cast of a Disney musical.

Ceremonies that honour a loved one’s memory, though, as well as providing friends and family with closure, are a wonderful farewell.

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