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If We Remember Who We Are

10/25/2017

The death care industry makes me a bit crazy. I know that some who work in the industry do care for families and do good work. What gets to me quite frankly is that the industry conveys the sense that THEY are the experts in the situation. No one else can know about death care more than the death care workers. Who can blame them? The death care industry saw a need and capitalized on it. As a result our society has lost the basic knowledge of death care. Most of us do not understand what it takes to care for the dead. Most of us have come to rely on the industry to tell us what needs to be done at the time of death. Most of us think we need embalming or cremation and to suggest otherwise makes us appear uncivilized or perhaps a bit crazy. Most of us do not know our basic rights we have facing the death care industry. Most of us do not want to know the truth about what happens to our bodies after death. Who can blame anyone for this? It’s not pretty.

The industry has taken advantage of our discomfort. Funeral directors would like nothing more than to make the market place where they would not face competition from other care givers, and in ten states they have succeeded. We have lost so much to this industry, but we have allowed this. Those in the death care industry suppress knowledge, and in many cases give out wrong or misleading information. I have sat with many funeral directors who have told me things I know to be false. I have had people tell me stories of a funeral director and how they were pressured into paying for something or changing their plans because the directors who told them they needed to so something when in fact they did not. The funeral directors were just trying to make a better sale for themselves - not serve their client’s needs. When I look around and see evidence that we are beginning to turn away from the conventional industry and seeking other ways of caring for our beloved dead, I am pleased. I know we have far to go, and the work of restoring family rights is a difficult one. What industry who has guaranteed clients would want to give them back? We can change the nature of market place, little by little. We can if we look at our fears honestly, start speaking about death and doing our own research. We can change the market place if we remember who we are and have the desire to change.

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Miscarriage and Infant Loss

10/18/2017

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October is miscarriage and infant loss month. Today let us take time to remember the women and men who have lost little ones – sometimes before they got a chance to meet them. The grief of those who have lost so very young ones often takes place silently and sometimes behind closed doors. Those of us who have lost very young ones know that we remember them when those around us either do not know of the loss we carry or have forgotten the loss. Today, pause and remember that we live closely with those who have lost pregnancies and very young children not long born. If we allow ourselves a moment to feel what it might be like to anticipate, carry a child only to lose the child before or soon after birth, maybe then perhaps we can begin feel with them – even a little bit- how devastating it might feel. If we can do this, perhaps we can in a small way understand why it might take time to even begin to heal from the loss.

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The Way We Do Business

10/11/2017

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In 2016 82% of people walked into only one funeral home before they chose who would perform the final care of their loved one’s body. A year later the statistic lowers to 74%. While the numbers look better, the number of people who do not bother checking local death care resources one boggles the mind. Funeral planning for someone who we love can be uncomfortable and sometimes painful, so we can understand why people do not want to shop around for their end of life needs. When we take into consideration the amount of money at stake, we really should take more care and check out a few local funeral homes before we sit down, make a plan and hand over our hard earned money. Funeral directors know that if you walk through their door you are most likely going to purchase goods and services from them, and not research the local market. For those in the industry, the game is getting people in door in the first place. They need to establish and maintain relationships of their customers because they know that those customers will refer their family and friends to them, and thus their business grows.
Through my training and funeral shopping, I have come across the attitude time and time again that if the service provider would show the consumer the value in the services or goods, then price will not matter to clients. They really believe this. They believe that if they can tell a good story about how lovely the funeral will be you will hire them. They believe that making a sale is all in the way they frame the experience they hope you will buy into. What they do not know is that price does matter to those who have done their research. Researching provides us with the best defense against the sales techniques the death care industry uses, and the public’s tendency to not shop around. We can decide what kind of end of life rite we each want. We can frame our own idea of the funeral we want for ourselves, and find a provider who will work with our idea, and not a worn out idea of the past. To achieve this, we must look into the local market and shop around. We must take a different approach if we intend to achieve a different outcome.
With the hard work of those in the alternative death care industry the numbers of those who do not research local funeral providers have dropped. Our culture is shifting when it comes to death care. People are now more open about the topic of death and are more willing to learn what they can. We are beginning to take back the death rituals from the funeral homes. Sometimes we can follow our tradition. Sometimes we can make up our own. Sometimes we can to do both. Once we start to change the way we do business with the death care industry, they will have to change the way they deal with the consumer. We can do it. We have already begun.

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Ten Minutes

10/4/2017

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Nine minutes of shooting continued after they received the first 911 call in Las Vegas Sunday night. This does not take into consideration the length of time before the calls were made. It could have been as long as ten minutes. Ten minutes is a long time. Ten minutes of people screaming and running for their lives – trapped in the open – being shot like fish in a barrel. If you doubt that sit in silence for ten minutes. Feel the magnitude. How have we come to such a place where someone like him lives in our society and no one thinks anything is wrong until he begins to calculate and bring to fruition an act of such brutality and destruction? People say gun control. Perhaps, but gun control does not change the heart of a human. It only hinders the manner in which he or she can destroy another human being. We have created a society in which this can happen. If each of us cannot look at ourselves individually and say how can I change the world in which I live, we will continue to see loss of lives on a similar scale. Until we value human life, deaths like this will happen. Until we teach our children that we are all the same, and that we are all valuable, we will wake up to another morning of weeping and terror.

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Caroline Vuyadinov

I graduated from St. Vladamir's Orthodox Theological Seminary in Crestwood, New York with a Master of Divinity. I trained as a chaplain following graduation and worked with a wide variety of people.

When I moved to Canada, I began work in a women's halfway house in Hamilton, Ontario which worked with women in conflict with the law on a federal level. I became the program manager and loved working alongside the women, creating their plans for their reintegration back to the community. I also worked as a liaison with the parole board, parole officers and other community service providers.

Upon my return to the United States, I worked in the Death Care Industry as a Family Service Counselor, which lead me to become a green burial advocate. I co-founded Midwest Green Burial Society with Juliann Salinas. I speak to community groups and have developed practical seminars for a variety of audiences. I have been interviewed on a national podcast and was featured on a WGN spot dealing with green burial.

If We Remember Who We Are

Miscarriage and Infant Loss

The Way We Do Business

Ten Minutes

Caroline Vuyadinov

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