Life after the loss of your loved one...

Lucky if it's any consolation, a vet told me once when we were thinking of taking a trip and boarding the cats, that time is not the same for cats as it is for us. So, if you think about it. A month apart to us seems like forever but not for kitties. So, Bootsie and the other kitties will be fine. Just show them extra love. :)

Yeah Gershun,I'm keeping 2 of them for sure. 2 of them are gong to a farm this weekend with my SIL's coworker and that just leaves 1 to find a home for.It's just hard because I Love them so much and the vet said Bootsie and the other kittens will cry and look for the others for a few days and just hearing Bootsie cry once breaks my heart so I'm really dreading this.These past 64 days have been my happiest days in years and Iv'e learned so much and Iv'e actually played again,laughing and singing,even telling them bedtime stories.I will miss LuLu and Toots very much....Then Moe.They will be 9 weeks old tomarrow.

Lucky be comforted knowing that you gave the kittens a great start to their life. I know you will miss them but at least you get to keep one right. You are still keeping one of them, aren't you? :)

I lost my precious Mother 15 months ago now, Then all 3 of my pets and this past month I lost 2 very loved Aunts and now I have to say goodbye to the kittens I have come to Love so much.64 days of Love invested only to have to let go of them.I wish I didn't Love so deeply,then maybe it wouldn't hurt so much.

Dear Luckylu,

Thank you for sharing your experience with us. I know it was hard but I'm glad you made it and were able to support your cousin. Good of you to give her a beautiful book. (((hugs))) Your family is so fortunate to have you and your love and support.

I can't Thank You All enough for your kind,loving support.
Only you all "get" how awful today was for me.
I made it but it was miserable all the way through.
Seated with the family.I was on the first isle,front and center.Throughout the service I saw my Mother's casket there and her laying in it but really there were tables with my Aunt's pictures and flowers around them.
In the Family room and after the service,it was like a big party,with laughter and Frank Sinatra playing.
Nothing like my Mom's...
My cousin was holding up well with her 2 grown children beside her.I had a picture and a book I'd wrapped up and I gave it to my cousin and left.
I'm SO glad it's over.
Again,Thank you for caring all~

Dear Luckylu,

How did it go? I hope you are okay. Thinking of you.

Hugs to you luckylu....hang in there.

Luckylu, After the service, please take some time for yourself.
You are amazing, don't know how you do it all.

Dear Luckylu,

Big hugs. I know it will be tough day. I use to go other people's funeral at the same place we had my dad's service. I never imagined that one day I would have my dad's service there. I'm with you. I haven't had to go back yet, but I too would dread it. Thinking of you. I know you will do the best you can.

Lucky, focus tightly on your cousin and you'll be okay. It'll feel eerie, and sharp at first, but just consciously concentrate on what's going on right now. And if you can, give yourself a private five minutes somewhere to sit and have a little think. Hugs.

(((((hugs))))) luckylu... You're such a trooper. I'll be wishing you well.

Tomorrow, I have to go back to the funeral home where I last saw Mother and her beautiful little face 14 months ago for a first time and see and be with all the same people who were at Mother's service.I'm really dreading it and I have to be strong to help my cousin through it.I'll be so glad when it's over.

I'm sorry Veronica,but I have racked my brain and I don't know why you say I'm going to know all about catheters...................???

No worries, Veronica. I think it's ridiculous in the extreme that I have to have some slip of paper proving that I have the authority to transport my parents' ashes 600 miles to their resting place. Honestly, what are the chances that I'm going to get stopped and my car searched?? I'm not crossing any international or even state borders.

Dad's ashes were transported in a ziploc bag and packed in a small cooler with a locking lid in the back of my van when we took them "home". I guess the cops would have gotten a shock if they opened it, expecting to find food.

Sensitivity and laughter after the loss of a loved one are "Life after the loss of a loved one". So is being offended by others a part of life. I rarely go to a person to say that I was offended or hurt by what they said, but that is just me.
Thank you, Luckylu, for starting this thread! I really think it is helping others get in touch with their feelings of loss, especially the humor!

The body will unstiffen again quite soon enough. And anyway, what's more important, sensitivity towards relatives in the immediate aftermath of a death or the convenience of funeral directors? I'm sure the nurse meant well but if she couldn't place the denture properly she ought to have put it discreetly away with the patient's effects.

Mind you, I'd have laughed myself sick if that had been me. Macabre humour gets to me like nothing else.

Gershun you do to need to apologize for calling the nurse dumb she may have been but at the very least once she saw how you Mom looked she could have waited till the family had said their final goodbyes. There are plenty of dumb and inexperienced nurses around. If you look at their name tags many hospitals put the # of years the nurse has been qualified after the RN. If there are no #s she passed her exams in the past year. RN4 means they have been on the job 4 years. Not every facility does that and many turn over their name tags. Our closest teaching hospital makes them pin them on so they are easily readable.

Luckylu I am afraid you will get experienced in this catheter business
far quicker than you want. At least it is easier than changing wet diapers and paying for them.

My niece shouldn't have been driving at 14 when she hit the tree and it killed her and her friend....Everyday since,her Mother,my ex SIL talks to her ashes.It's been 20 years now.

Sorry that was not very tasteful but the erase button would not work

You could mix them in a bag of fertilizer and the cops would never know!!!!!!!!!!

Now here's an interesting fact. I have to have a piece of paper that allows me to transport Mom's ashes to their final resting place, in case I get stopped by the police and they notice the ashes are in the vehicle. Seriously....how ridiculous is that. I'm not even crossing state lines. Same thing happened with Dad - I had to make sure I had this scrap of paper with official writing on it that allowed me to transport my own parent's ashes 600 miles to where we were placing them.

Yes, I say hello to the birds, squirrels, neighborhood dogs and cats. Just not the ashes of my dead loved ones. But hey, to each his own.

I confess, sometimes I talk to the birds and squirrels.

Gershun,
Keep on apologizing for having an opinion and the rest of everyone will have to do that too. Sorry, that's my opinion and I am not ashamed.

That law about keeping the ashes for eternity seems comforting to me somehow. Don't know why.

I apologize for calling that nurse dumb then. I had no idea. As it stood we were planning on cremation so it would not have mattered anyhow. My Mom had requested cremation and I know she would not have wanted any of us to keep the ashes. She was a strong believer in Christ and that what we were was not a body but a spirit.

I'm sorry if I sounded disrespectful. I know that probably a lot of people take comfort in keeping their loved one's ashes and that they become symbolic of their loved ones so therefore they talk to them. It's just not something I would do personally.

Many hospitals have a chapel where family can sit after a loved one has passed. As a hospice nurse I always stayed with the family until the Funeral Home came to pick the loved one up. Most of the funeral homes had a quilt that they lay over the body on the gurney and I felt that made a huge difference and made the farewell more acceptable.
The dumb nurse was actually not so dumb as she appeared. the Funeral Directors like the teeth to be put in as soon as possible before the body stiffens.

My mother was cremated and the crematorium spread the ashes on the flower beds outside the building. The ashes were not offered and I personally had no desire to keep them. My FIL was cremated and the funeral home kept the ashes and they were buried with MIL.

Like everything else when a loved one dies the grieving process is different for everyone and that includes the disposal of the ashes. Some people spread them in a favorite place or waterway, others do keep them on the mantlepiece and take comfort in talking to them every day. Others never pick them up from the funeral home and by law the funeral has to keep them for eternity. On director told me when he took over his business there were lots of long forgotten urns in the basement and the law does not allow them to be disposed of.

I think I told you all what happened the night my Mom died. The hospital phoned me to say she had "expired". First of all I hate that way of phrasing it. Like she was a carton of milk or something. But I digress..........

So, I phoned my brother. He picked me up and we went to the hospital. None of the other siblings wanted to go. We walk in and bro says"I'm warning you, this won't be pretty" Well, I'd just been to see her four hrs. previous and I was sure she wouldn't have metamorphized in four hours.

Well, we walk into her room and the dumb nurses there had put her dentures into her mouth. There is no other way to describe it but that she looked like Mr. Ed the horse. Ghastly............!! I don't know whose idea that was but my brother's first reaction was to start laughing hysterically. Then I joined in. I couldn't help it. Then my sister calls me on my cell phone crying her heart out and I'm trying to stop laughing. Oh my God............what a mess. We've always been the type of family that laughs at inappropriate moments so my Mom would have appreciated it I'm sure.

They told us we had half an hour to be with her cause they needed the room. Nice eh? Then we went to the front desk to ask about them transporting her to the funeral home. We wanted to make sure we were all on the same page cause when my brother died that all turned into a shitstorm. So, we are standing there talking to the clueless nurse at the desk and another nurse comes running over and says "What's wrong? Is she not breathing?" Picture me rolling my eyes..........

Don't get me wrong, I totally support nurses but in this case it was dumb and dumber.

But, I have always felt like it was good that my bro started to laugh cause otherwise I would probably have become hysterical and made a scene.
I try not to even think about them transporting my Mom to the morgue and all that other horrible stuff. As CM said, Mom wasn't in there anymore. Not to be morbid but when you look into the eyes of someone who has died you can tell that what made them who they were is not there anymore.

Yes, exactly, CM! There are many people who simply keep the ashes, never bury or spread them. And with the "new" Catholic requirements not to spread them anywhere, not even in water, and not to keep them in your home, but to bury them....geez. Mom and Dad were Catholics, but we kids are not - only one of us attends church on the regular and it's not a Catholic church. No offense to the Catholics here, but there was abuse in our childhood and church was tied into it - so none of us feel any ties to the Catholic church. Long story.

I don't particularly care what the church thinks - Mom wanted her ashes disposed of in a certain way, and she told us all through our lives that if we didn't do it, she'd come back and haunt every single one of us. LOL Trust me, I think she'd definitely try. Mom had a lifelong love affair with a lake where she grew up, and that's where her ashes are going. We placed Dad's ashes there when he passed, and Mom's will be released in the same place - that's all there is to it.

As far as the hospital ER goes, there was some issue with the coroner not getting Mom's body picked up right away, they were busy or something, so she remained in the hospital morgue for some days before they got to her - her autopsy was not performed for almost a week. That was something else I objected to, but had to finally accept, because of the circumstances of her death. But it just broke my heart to think of her body undergoing that sort of violation after she'd been through so much. But because she was in a nursing home and her death was very sudden, plus she suffered a fall with severe facial/head injuries at the time of her death, there had to be an autopsy to confirm cause of death to ensure there was no wrongdoing on the part of the NH. (There wasn't - cause of death was heart disease and kidney failure, which we already knew.) I still haven't ordered a copy of the autopsy report...just haven't been able to bring myself to do it. I know I need to, and will try to get it done soon, because siblings are wanting it too - but my stomach just knots up every time I think of it. I'm also ordering a copy of the report from the EMTs that revived her so we have a full picture of what happened, though I pretty much know the answer - it was a repeat of what happened here at home when she took that bad fall - her heart just stopped and this time, there was no bringing it back. Just going to be hard to read it in black and white, clinical terms.