CREMATION OPTIONS

In his presentation, Vanderlyn Pine spoke about the increasing need for stricter personnel management system in the funeral homes where there previously was none. “Traditionally, funeral service has had the old medieval apprentice model,” said Pine, “one person, the boss, knows everything and is never wrong and the need for a personnel manual is irrelevant because everyone else is a slave to the owner,” said pine, president of American Funeral Consultants in New Paltz, N.Y.

Of course, this scenario has had to change with the changing market. Said Pine, “25-35 percent of your gross revenue is consumed by personnel issues.” And to that the core product of the funeral home, which is the service, and personnel becomes “your face, your future.” He explained how a lot of funeral home owners fail to grasp the fact that what they bring to the public, first and foremost, is knowledge and information, and that the future of the funeral home is dependent on this information, much more so than it is on merchandise. Therefore, “you must take seriously the importance of teaching your employees.” Many issues come up when employees are asked what they value about their jobs among the top issues are the work itself, which in the funeral home is the satisfaction of helping people; job security; salary; opportunity to use skills; relationship with the employer and fellow employees; fringe benefits; and hours.

That said, not every employee will have the same top issue which, explained Pine, is generations working together, each with its own history and needs. Pine quoted from the book, “Generations: The History of America’s Future,” by William Strauss and Neil Howe. Strauss and Howe describe the various cohorts, or generational groups, and what they have in common. Pine extrapolated this information for the work force, specifically those working in the funeral industry. It is certainly plausible for an 80-year-old part-time worker, part of the GI Generation born between 1904-1925, to be working alongside a 20-year-old recent graduate, a member of the Millennial Generation, born in 1985. And in between, the workforce includes those of the Silent Generation, born between the mid-1920s and the mis-1940s; the Baby Boomers, born between 1945 and 1964; and the Generation Xers, born between 1965 and 1985. Each of these cohorts has slightly different values, and this can sometimes be a point of contention in the workforce. For example, when comes to fringe benefits, the GI Generation may value the chance to be of service to the people while the Silent Generation values most its job security. Baby Boomers want to be successful while Generation Xers want to work hard but also might value most their days off. Employers need to understand that these differences exist and should be able to embrace the assets and limitations of each group.

Administration With funeral serviceS being so multi-generational and with the industry broadening itself outside the traditional family employees, there needs to be a stricter administrative process, said Pine. Gone are the days of the medieval apprentice method of employment. Today there needs to be a flow of authority throughout the organization. In addition, there should be clear rules about who can access records as well as a policy about the use of the firm’s properties, including cell phone use at work and company charge cards. To outline these issues, a policy manual is essential. A good policy manual is easy to understand and must be reviewed every year. Although this type of manual is important to have, it is just as important to make sure the manual is not the be all, end all. Some issues will not be answered by the manual and a good employer will be able to think through issues and find solutions. Just as employers are looking for employees they can trust,
so too are employees seeking that trust in their employers. “Employers must live up to the promises they make,” said Pine. Good employer-employee relationships are based on a complete and open understanding of conditions of employment, probationary periods, work schedules, compensation, benefits, absentee policies and provisions for termination of employment.

The Future of the Workplace “The workforce is changing,” said Pine. Many more minorities and women are entering funeral service. Labor legislation will become more protective and more demanding in the future, and employers will have an increasing “social responsibility to your employees as well as your clients.” Pine encouraged funeral home managers by walking around. “Walk around and see what’s going on. Try to find someone doing something right and reward them.”

Want more information? To contact Cremation Options, simply call 1-877-989-9090. At any time of day or night, you will be able to speak with one of our trained, sympathetic and understanding representatives.

Cremation, funeral careers in funeral industry, funeral homes, personnel

The promotional materials for the National Funeral Directors Association’s 124th Annual Convention & International Exposition dubbed the event with the slogan, “Chicago Style.” While the convention was held in the Windy City, the theme shifted in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to speak more about “local heroes.”

After Christine Pepper, NFDA’s chief executive officer, shared a message from President Bush that read,

“I appreciate NFDA members for promoting high standards in your industry. Your efforts demonstrate your dedication to your profession and reflect the compassionate spirit of our nation,” she noted how the association membership, nonmembers and suppliers rose to the occasion to assist in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. “Many NFDA members, nonmembers and the entire funeral service community rose to the occasion, selflessly volunteering their time, supplies, money and even their homes,” she said. “I am truly proud of our NFDA members, our staff and the entire funeral service community for the inspiring example you have set in the face of this latest challenge.” During his address to the general session, NFDA President Doggett Whitaker shared some of his thoughts, both pre-Katrina and after. “[Before Katrina] I was thinking about some of our past years, and how relatively calm this year had been, not that there hadn’t been some bumps in the road during the year, but nothing that seemed overly demanding,” said Whitaker, whose legacy as president will be having presided over the association’s response to the devastation. “And then Katrina and Rita have certainly changed this perspective. They have brought my presidency to a monumental close for me personally. “I was privileged to travel to Mississippi and Louisiana after the hurricane, representing NFDA to meet and work with some of the funeral directors in those states. I have seen unbelievable destruction. But I have also seen unbelievable reserve on the part of many funeral directors reaching out to fellow funeral directors supporting each other,” he added. Whitaker described one incident while helping out at one of the funeral homes in Biloxi, Mississippi. A woman came in with her daughter to make arrangements for her husband who had been killed in Katrina. “They [the family] were on the first floor and saw the water rising in their home and went upstairs,” Whitaker said. “It was the woman, her husband, her best friend and three dogs. As they looked out the window of the second story of this building, the water was reaching the window.” Seeing the rising water, the family ran to the back of the house. The woman, her friend and three dogs jumped on to the back porch, which then became separated from the house. “As she looked back, she saw the roof of her house pushing her husband under the water,” Whitaker said. “She told us that she thought he was dead before the water took him away.” The woman and her friend escaped by jumping on some debris that floated by and taking shelter in a tree. The two climbed onto the tree as the dogs floated away. The woman didn’t know exactly how long she was in the tree, but she guessed it was about two-and-one-half hours. When they were finally rescued from the tree, they didn’t know where they were. There weren’t any landmarks because everything had been destroyed. “But the dogs found them and came back to her,” Whitaker said. When the woman came to make the arrangements for her husband, funeral director Bubba Lang introduced Doggett and Christy Whitaker to her. “She didn’t know who we were but she thanked us for being there and for funeral service taking care of people like her in such a delicate situation,” Whitaker said. She told Lang, “I thank you for what you’re doing for me. I know you will take care of my husband when he is found but I have to leave to survive.” Whitaker said that the woman gave Lang a hug and she walked out the door. As she left, Lang turned to Whitaker and said, “Hurricanes are the great equalizer. They do not discriminate between the rich or the poor, black or white, educated or uneducated. They devastate us all.” “This experience has affected me personally,” Whitaker said. “Those things I used to worry about seem less significant today.” Whitaker then asked all those in attendance who had come from Louisiana and Mississippi, and those who had traveled to the stricken areas to come forward and receive wristbands inscribed with the words, “local hero.” “The blue bands unite your fellow funeral directors who care about you and your communities,” he said. “These words were chosen to describe how proud we are of you for the regard and responsibility you have shown so notably and demonstrated so well while
representing funeral service in the midst of tragedy.” The theme of local heroes continued to the convention’s closing session. Following the lead of Whitaker and Bob Biggins, who succeeded Whitaker as NFDA president at the conclusion of the convention, several funeral directors who are based in the Gulf region, traveled to Chicago to share their experiences. Without any fanfare or introduction, Whitaker took the stage for the final session and told the assembly that this would be a difficult presentation to make, unscripted and from the heart. “It’s good to be among friends,” he said. As the Whitakers drove into Gulfport, they passed caravan after caravan of military vehicles and utility trucks. “The closer we got to the gulf, the greater the damage to the trees, to the homes and to the cities,” Whitaker said, recounting his trip. “There were long lines for water and food, and there were extremely long lines for gasoline.” The destruction he saw in Gulfport and Biloxi was virtually beyond description.”Entire neighborhoods were gone, just piles of rubble on a square,” he said. “People were walking around the rubble just trying to find something that was theirs. “As we drove by and we had to stop as the military was directing us, I looked out of the car window and there was a pile of scrap,” Whitaker added. “In that pile was a DVD, a videotape, a scrapbook and a child’s pair of shoes. I didn’t know if it belonged to one family or different families. Standing near one of the funeral homes that had been destroyed, we knew that there had to be somebody nearby that was dead because the smell of death was acutely present.” What he did see in Mississippi and Louisiana were funeral directors living in funeral homes, in forensic centers and trailers. Some had lost their personal homes, their businesses, their cars, their clothes. Some had also lost friends and family.

“But they were still at work taking care of others who needed their help, but they were also looking after each other,” Whitaker said. It was his mission to go into these areas to see how funeral directors were faring and what their greatest needs were both personally and for their businesses, as well as to let them know that funeral directors across the country were there for them. Whitaker stayed in Mississippi for three and a half days and then drove into Lafayette, La., for three more days. “It was not easy to leave either state at week’s end,” he said. “I wanted to stay and work alongside these people. I had become part of it.” Whitaker was followed to the stage by Biggins, who spearheaded NFDA’s volunteer efforts. “While Doggett and Christy were in the Gulf Coast, Doggett asked me to coordinate volunteer efforts with our NFDA staff in Brookfield, Wis.,” Biggins said. “Every day during this crisis we met via teleconference at 9:30 a.m., never once finishing our discussions before noon. Our mission and our vision was to reach out and help. Our mission and vision was to what we as funeral directors do best, that is to step up in crisis, step up to serve our fellow funeral directors so that they can best serve the living while caring for the dead.” Biggins called the volunteer response “overwhelming.” NFDA members, nonmembers and suppliers across the country participated in the effort. “I am so proud of the efforts of NFDA,” Biggins said. “I am so proud of our staff and what they did, giving of themselves.”

One of the stories of selflessness that Biggins shared with attendees was the story of Chad Riemann, president of the Mississippi Funeral Directors Association. Riemann’s wife, Heather, was pregnant with their third child. She went into premature labor as Katrina was bearing down on the Gulf Coast. Riemann took his wife and toddler twins to Jackson, Miss., some 200 miles away from their home, where she delivered a baby girl named Emma. “Once Chad knew that Emma, Heather and his twins were all alright, he got in his car and returned to Gulfport and Biloxi,” Biggins said. “He left a newborn baby, toddler twins and his wife and put his life on hold to care for those who had lost life. Ladies and gentlemen, that’s what we do. We put our lives on hold to help others.” Later Biggins said he felt the need to go to the gulf to help the volunteers. “[Doggett] tried to talk me out of it,” Biggins said. “But I just went and I did what I had to do.” Once the volunteers began to arrive in the Gulfport area, they rolled up their sleeves to help families. “They sleep on visitation room floors, they slept on chapel seats,” Biggins said. “Unless you have been there you cannot imagine what had taken place,” he added, “which is what I wanted to talk about with you today. “I was asked, ‘when do you think things will be back to normal there?” “I thought for a moment and my response was a simple one,” Biggins said. “As far as funeral service is concerned, it’s back to normal and it wasn’t because we continued to do what we do. People who had lost their own homes reached out to serve families. A gentleman who had a brand new baby delivered in the midst of this mayhem, returned to serve. Funeral service never missed a beat. The structures, the infrastructures and the other things that were so impacted, I don’t know if they will ever return to normal. I pray that they will. Funeral service stood tall.”

Want to learn more about cremation services and how they honor local heroes in their time of need? To contact Cremation Options, simply call 1-877-989-9090. At any time of day or night, you will be able to speak with one of our trained, sympathetic and understanding representatives.

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Recently after an uncle’s funeral, I strode along a ridge among the graves of my ancestors. Many of my great aunts and uncles, my grandparents and close friends of the family are buried in the same section of a cemetery in Chicago. Lately I’d been thinking that burial plots were a waste of good ground and that I didn’t really care what happened to me when I died-the less fuss the better. But as I walked among my people I felt something I’ve never felt so strongly before-my connection to them, and their connection to the future through me. I came to appreciate the rituals and traditions that surround the funerals in our family, and I began to think of how I might want my passing to be marked. I realized these “last rites” could matter greatly to me and they were worth my time and thought. Yet many of us are not quite sure how to proceed.

WORKING YOUR WAY THROUGH

Making funeral arrangements has a lot in common with preparing for a baptism, bar mitzvah, wedding, or significant anniversary. Like these other milestones, a person’s passing is a major event in the lives of loved ones. But because the details surrounding a death occur at a time of tremendous stress, it makes sense to make as many arrangements in advance as you can. The better you plan, the less likely the stress of the moment and the crush of details-not to mention the shock of your loss-will overwhelm you and the occasion will turn out as you hope. Many people would rather not think about death and funeral arrangements. But there are strong emotional, social and financial reasons to make funeral arrangements in advance. Here are a few suggestions.

EXPLORE ALL YOUR OPTIONS

Though every culture has its traditional set of funeral rituals, cremation rites and practices no two funerals are exactly alike. Nor should they be. Funeral rites ought to reflect the life and values o the individual who has died, and the survivors he or she has left behind. By acting in advance you can think through the available choices to find the options that are right for you. Will you choose interment, cremation, or entombment in a mausoleum? Are there special visitation arrangements that need to be accommodated? Will you have a religious service and if so who will officiate? If you act in advance you can have many of your questions answered. You can read and research, inquire with friends as well as funeral professionals, and challenge assumptions you may have. Many people carry around erroneous notions about what is and isn’t allowed at funerals. When making advance funeral arrangements-for yourself or a loved one for whom you’re responsible-you’ll be called upon to make many significant decisions, But you cannot exercise choice wisely if you don’t know what your options are. By acting in advance of need, you’re in the best position to examine questions in depth, give them significant thought, consult with others whose feelings you need to consider, and come to decisions with which you can be satisfied.

HAVE IT YOUR WAY

Would you like a certain song sung at the funeral, or a meaningful poem or scripture passage read? Will you want to be buried in the town where you now live, or buried near loved ones in your home town? How much do you want to spend on a casket? Do you want a longtime friend or family member to give a eulogy? The list goes on. Funerals are for the living and in memory of the deceased. Funerals are not for the edification of the preacher, the exclusive domain of the funeral director or to fulfill someone else’s idea of decorum and appropriateness. If you want a specific thing to happen at your funeral the only way to be sure it will happen is to make your wishes clear in advance best of all, in writing. Arrange it now. You can always change it later.

ENLIST THE HELP OF A PROFESSIONAL PARTNER

A good first step is to talk with a funeral director you trust. If you don’t have a family funeral director, spend some time selecting one who’s right for you. Funeral directors say the number one service they offer is active listening to help the bereaved make decisions that are appropriate for them. What you’re looking for is someone who will truly listen and respond to your needs and wishes. You might begin by making a list of three funeral directors and interviewing each by phone. After a follow-up visit with the one(s) you feel most comfortable with, choose the one who is the most open and instills the most confidence in you. Turn to someone who will listen first advise second. A good funeral director can handle a myriad of paperwork, mountains of official forms, and an array of details-all as you would have them handled. When a loved one dies, the survivors are bound to be very vulnerable. Emotions will run strong, and handling even the simplest details can be an enormous challenge. At such a time, a professional partner who can handle the arrangements according to your wishes will free up survivors to enter into the grieving process. A competent and caring funeral director can carry out your hopes and desires for the funeral ceremonies and do so with respect, dignity and within your means. There are a number of details you may want to review in advance with a funeral director: what’s on your grave marker, whether you want to indicate a charity as a recipient of memorial donations; who you’d like to have as pall bearers: whether to have a ceremony in a church, at the graveside, or in the home of a friend weeks after your death. You can even indicate what you would like mentioned in your obituary.

KEEP COSTS REASONABLE AND CLEAR

Society puts a cloak of silence around death, so many of us are uninformed about the arrangements that need to be made at the time of death. When making funeral arrangements, it’s essential that you leave no question unasked or unanswered. It’s important to find the right balance between providing the appropriate kind of sendoff and keeping costs within the limits you can afford. Set up a fact-finding appointment with your funeral director, cemetery director or other service provider. Ask to have a cost sheet sent in advance so you can prepare your questions. Funeral professionals provide a service and should be paid for that service. But those paying for that service should know in advance what services are being provided, what the full costs are, and what other options are available. Feel free to ask for additional options on caskets, embalming, and other services. Question charges you don’t understand. If after the explanation you remain uncertain, call another funeral
director or your state’s funeral directors’ association to verify that the charge is appropriate. Practically speaking attending to a loved one’s funeral arrangements in advance may find you in a better situation to handle the finances. This is especially true if the loved one may be heading to a nursing home where the cost of care may totally deplete family savings, leaving little or nothing with which to pay for the funeral.

SAVE YOUR SURVIVORS ADDED BURDENS

My father worked for Catholic cemeteries in Chicago for 42 years. He began his career in sales. He was responsible for setting up a pre- need sales program in the early 1950’s. Often when he would arrive at a home to discuss advance funeral arrangements, people would be reluctant to even think about the day such arrangements would be needed. Through the years however countless family members have come up to my father thanking him for the time and effort he took with their family years before. In their time of mourning details were already in place and decisions already made. They were grateful that when the hour had arrived they were found prepared.

TAKE HEART

Anyone who has suddenly been responsible for handling the details of a death where no pre- arrangements have been made knows the overwhelming number of decisions that are involved. At a time of loss, confusion reigns. We can feel pulled in many directions at once, especially if we’re uncertain what the deceased would have wanted. Making your funeral arrangements in advance is one last wonderful gift you can give the love ones who will be left behind. By freeing them from the burden of many details, you give them time to do the work of grieving and caring for one another. Meanwhile, the rites surrounding your funeral can be a statement of your values and the meaning you found in life and death.

Remember, Cremation Options is here to help you all day, every day with your funeral and cremation needs. We’re open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To contact us, simply call 1-877-989-9090. At any time of day or night, you will be able to speak with one of our trained, sympathetic and understanding representatives.

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Cremation jewelry was designed as a miniature cremation urn with a hollow chamber to hold a bit of ashes from a loved one’s cremation. The original idea was to allow one or more family members to keep a physical part of their loved one close at heart, regardless of how the rest of the cremated remains would be disposed of or how many family members wanted to share the ashes. The ash pendant could then be worn as an urn pendant or displayed beneath a jeweler’s glass dome to create a personal memorial.

For any number of reasons, however, jewelry for ashes doesn’t appeal to some people. Some are opposed to cremation in general, while others just don’t like the idea of reserving cremated remains in the form of jewelry. Perhaps you belong to a church that prohibits the practice of cremation, or maybe your religion has strict rules about the disposition of ashes. Even so, cremation jewelry still affords an opportunity to honor your loved one in a unique and personal way.

Cremation jewelry isn’t just jewelry for ashes. The hollow chamber in every urn pendant can accommodate any small keepsake to remind you of your loved one. Following are some of the mementoes people choose to save in their cremation necklaces.

A Lock of Hair
A lock of a loved one’s hair is a special keepsake indeed. If you’re a parent, you may have kept a snip of hair from your child’s first haircut to remind you of the tiny baby you once held in your arms. And lovers throughout history have kept wisps of each other’s hair to help them feel close when they were apart. The hair of fallen soldiers was fashioned into the memorial jewelry that was popular during the Civil War. Place a lock of your loved one’s hair in your urn pendant for safekeeping.

Soil
The time-honored practice of “paying respects” to a deceased loved one with regular visits to his or her grave is less common today, as fewer and fewer family members are centrally located in the home town. Whether you live near your loved one’s burial place or far away, you can use your cremation jewelry to save a few grains of earth from the grave site.

Funeral Flowers
The outpouring of sympathy following the death of a loved one often includes floral gifts in a variety of colors, species, and arrangements. Flowers are a fragrant reminder of the nature of life - rich, beautiful, and fleeting. By drying some of the flowers after the funeral, you can preserve their colorful beauty. Once the flowers are dry, you can crumble a pinch of the petals into the chamber of your cremation keepsake pendant.

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Remember, Cremation Options is here to help you all day, every day with your funeral and cremation needs. We’re open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To contact us, simply call 1-877-989-9090. At any time of day or night, you will be able to speak with one of our trained, sympathetic and understanding representatives.

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If you are in the middle of grieving the loss of someone close to you, you don’t need a booklet to tell you that you are going through a difficult time. You don’t need someone else to tell you that your pain may at times feel overwhelming. Yet precisely because you are having a difficult time it is likely that you are not getting everything you need to help you move through this season of grief. And you may not even be aware of the kinds of things you have a right to experience and express and to expect of others during this difficult time.

Grieving well is an active process and it takes a lot of work. Here are some things you can consider your “rights” as you do the work of grieving.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE YOUR TIME

Things move quickly in our society from fast food to instant internet access. Grieving however takes time. Some people need more time than others to honor the process of grieving-lots more time. If you are one of those people take that time. You may have to tend to responsibilities at work and to family members or perhaps you have to deal with settling the affairs of the loved one who has died. But you still are a person in grief. Don’t feel obliged to “get over it” just because others don’t understand or share your loss or because they mistakenly believe that you should be able to get on with your life in a time frame that is convenient for them.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO EXPRESS YOUR EMOTIONS

There is no one right way to grieve. And the process of grieving involves a wide variety of experiences and emotions that my include depression, anxiety, anger, disappointment and more. Professionals who specialize in working with grieving people suggest that it is helpful to have someone who can truly listen to you as you tell the stories of your loss. This can be a good friend, a counselor, or pastoral minister-anyone who has the ability to give you the full attention you need at this time. You may also want to express yourself in writing or music, or by creating some kind of tribute to the one who has died. Whatever your loss, you may notice feelings of anger surfacing from time to time, or even quite frequently. It is perfectly normal to feel this way, especially if your loss was sudden or the result of violence or if you have unfinished business with the one who has died. Sometimes we just feel cheated out of more time with our loved one. In any case you may be confused about what to do with your anger. When it comes to expressing anger, many of us lack good role models. We may have been told that anger is not “nice” and that we should stuff it. Or perhaps we’ve seen what badly expressed anger and rage can do to people (broken relationships, domestic violence, road rage, etc.) and have concluded that it might be better not to give our own anger too much attention. Yet ignoring anger doesn’t make it go away, at least not for long. You owe it to your spiritual and mental health to look for ways and places to express your anger that are safe and appropriate both for you and for others. Sometimes writing your feelings out in letter or journal format is a good option. Other times talking with a friend or a counselor is the way to go. Some people find it helpful to physically release the energy of their anger through vigorous exercise or by doing some manual labor. Whatever option you choose, most people find they feel much better when they get the anger out in a healthy, non destructive way rather than hold it in.

“Hope is hearing the melody of the future; faith is dancing to it today.”

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF

A grieving person is more likely than others to become ill because of the toll the stress places on the body. Do your very best to take care of yourself by getting plenty of rest, eating well and exercising. Treat yourself to a massage or a soak in a hot bathtub. Keep fresh flowers in your house and drink plenty of water or herbal teas. Avoid medicating your pain with pills or heavy drinking. Not only will your body become more stressed by drinking or using drugs, you will only postpone working through your loss until a later date, as well as create a whole new set of problems.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE TIME OUT

You have a right to-and very likely a need for -time to yourself and by yourself. This time may be difficult to come by if you are parenting children or if you have a demanding job. Get creative. After her father’s death, June decided to get up a half-hour earlier than she previously had in order to carve time out from her busy life as a homemaker and mother. She used the time to pray, to cry and to write out her feelings in a journal in order to honor the tremendous loss she had experienced. At some point you may feel the need to “take some time off” from your grieving. Go to a movie, hike in the woods, take a vacation. It’s OK and even helpful to care for yourself in this way. You are probably feeling out of balance, so taking a little breather may be just what you need. It doesn’t mean that you have forgotten your loved one and it is not “disrespectful” to the one who has died, to take some time out to rejuvenate. This is especially important if you were a caretaker during your loved one’s illness.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO EXPECT SUPPORT

Although your experience of grieving is uniquely yours, you do not have to go through it alone. Grief shared with others can actually bring people closer together. Accept offers of help from family and friends. Call a grief counselor at a funeral home or cremation services. If you don’t have much of an appetite right now, freeze the food that people drop off and warm it up when you are hungry and don’t feel like cooking. Let someone run errands for you and even do some cleaning if they offer. If you belong to a faith community you may have some built in support through a prayer group or support group. Let your community know what you need. Most of the time people are eager to help.

YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO HEAL AND TO TRUST AGAIN

You may feel as if that place inside you that aches for your loved one will never be the same again. And you are right about that. You will never be the same. But you can head from the pain of your loss. And you have a right to that healing. People sometimes feel guilty when they begin to feel better, mistakenly believing that if they give their pain, they give up their connection to the one who has died. But in reality you will always be connected to our dear ones. Those who have been a part of you will always be a part of you. Healing from the pain of your loss will allow you to treasure your memories with more smiles and fewer tears. You’ve been hurt, deeply. Perhaps the loss you have suffered was previously unimaginable to you. You are grieving, and may be wondering if you will ever feel “normal” or be able to believe that life is good again. Yet her you are in the process of surviving that loss. You can do it—really. Take inspiration from people you know who have made their way through grief and loss. Read stories or watch films about people who have not only survived but grown stronger and more compassionate as a result of deciding to believe in the power of hope, goodness and love. Look to spiritual traditions that point to the power of life and love which transcends all death. Notice that winter always precedes spring. Pray from that place deep inside you that hasn’t forgotten the truth that life is ultimately good and worthy of your trust.

Remember, Cremation Options is here to help you all day, every day with your funeral and cremation needs. We’re open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To contact us, simply call 1-877-989-9090. At any time of day or night, you will be able to speak with one of our trained, sympathetic and understanding representatives.

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