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Make Way for Family Lead Funerals

11/30/2016

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When you stop and think about it, going to see a funeral director to plan a funeral seems a bit odd.  We troop off to some person who does not know our loved ones and allow him or her to tell us how to have the funeral. We have enshrined the death care industry as the “go to people” when someone has died.  North American society tends to be transient and not everyone has a spiritual community anymore, so having an industry that will take care of the end of life “details” does fill a need we have.  Many of us do not spend our lives in one town or city.  Many of us have not done so for generations.  Having an industry that aids people when someone they love has died looks like a very good business to get into.   Sales drive our current conventional death care industry, and that is the problem.  I am not saying that all workers in the conventional death care workers are terrible people or that the workers in the alternative death care industry are angels.  What I am saying is the conventional industry runs on sales.   The death care industry is a 20 billion a year industry.  It did not get that way providing simple, and gentle ways to care for the dead.  It got that way through sales and high profit margins. These are not family lead funerals - these are profit led funerals.
 
People are beginning to look at the death care industry.  People are beginning to make new choices.  Family lead funerals must return as the standard in planning funerals and burial. Of course this can look different for each circumstance.  A family lead funeral is any funeral where the family leads the planning and takes into consideration the unique story of the person being remembered.  People must educate themselves on their rights as consumers.  People must begin to speak openly with their families and find service providers who can help them with details.  Read this blog. Find a death doula even if you live in a state that force consumers to hire a funeral director. Start asking questions.  I can assure you the knowledge you gain will reward you in many ways.  We need to return to family lead funerals.  We need to give the power back to consumers.  We need to stop thinking of the conventional death care workers as the authority on the subject.  We need to reclaim our families and our stories.  In the end, the families are the ones who know the person and know what is the best way to give honor to the loved one’s memory.

#funeralplanning, #homefunerals, #greenburial, #endoflifedecisions, #preplanning


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Entering the Holiday Season

11/23/2016

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Tomorrow we celebrate Thanksgiving.  I love Thanksgiving. As a nation we gather together to celebrate that for which we are thankful. We gather in groups – family or friends becoming family, our spiritual family, or feeding those in need.   Sometimes these groups might be tense.  Sometimes we gather in small groups.  Sometimes we are alone.  Sometimes we gather on foreign shores.  Thanksgiving is a powerful holiday – giving us the opportunity to reflect on our year and recall the good things we have in our lives.  Sometimes our year has not been smooth.  Sometimes the past year has been very rough and filled with heartache, pain and loss in terms that seem almost unimaginable.  Sometimes the year has been so difficult that the day of Thanksgiving seems almost as if the universe is mocking us.  Maybe we do not know how to reach out to others in the pain we are facing.  For those of us who are not facing these kinds of hardships ought to have our eyes open to those who do, and lighten their load.  Invite them to share of your bounty be that monetary or the depth of love you have in your hearts.  Sometimes our treasure is not gold, but still is precious to share with those in need.
 
Thanksgiving also marks the entrance of the great holiday season.  Media messages of all kinds bombard us with images of idealized holiday feasts or events. These images should never be used as a measuring stick of how a certain holiday must be celebrated.  We must remember that these holidays are for us to reflect on what we truly believe in our hearts and that usually does not always translate well into movies or commercials. We must remember the hardship of those who are in grief this season.  Remember people we love can sometimes die at times we least expect – even on major holidays that are meant to be joyful.  Well, maybe we should look at grief and grieving and know that maybe we never “get over” our loss, but we might come to live with it in new ways.  Seeing the grief in someone else, might remind us of our own grief.  Remember grief is not a contagious disease, although we all have experienced or will experience it. We should be able to look at grief and know that it is a process of learning to live without someone we love, We should be gentle with those in our lives who might find this a more difficult process than others. As we enter the holiday season maybe we need to look to those we know who are facing grief.  Allow them the space and freedom to grieve, as they must in their own ways.  In this season where many of us celebrate the triumph of light over darkness, let us try to shed light on those we love who might be struggling in the depths of grief.
 

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Be a Tree II - A Response to the Bios Urn

11/16/2016

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Not too long ago I received an email from a member of the support department at Bios Urn.  Naturally, I was tickled that someone from Bios Urn had read one of my posts.  It’s nice to know that someone in the conventional death care industry is paying attention.  This person wondered why I was concerned with the Green Burial Council giving Bios Urn an endorsement.   I suppose my last post on the topic might not have been clear.  Let me clarify for those who might wonder the same thing. 
 
In the first place  I think the notion of providing folks with an easy solution to their concerns about what to do with cremains is admirable.  The notion of becoming a tree resonates with many folks.  I think many people desire to return to this earth in one form or another.  Certainly the poetic notion of becoming a tree is a beautiful one.  I also firmly believe that people have a right to produce a good product and make money doing so. Having said all this, I do have a few issues with the product.
 
In the first place, cremains are not capable of nurturing a plant.  Cremains must be mixed with organic material if a family wishes to use the cremains in a garden or to plant a tree.  Bios Urn does not address this truth.  One need only look at the diagrams of the urns to see that the growth of the seed or plant begins in the organic material portion of the urn.  The only way to become a tree is to be buried naturally and have a tree planted on your grave. Cremains are only encapsulated by the roots of the tree which take nutrients from the soil around them – not from cremains.
 
The Bios Incube, a new urn, uses smart technology including an app for customers to track the progress of the plant.  In my book we have gone far beyond a green solution if we now must use a computer and sensors to grow a tree.  I know this product was developed for city dwellers.  I know it was developed to help.  I am sure it has helped those who have used this product.  Anyone has every right to choose this product, but it should not be considered a green product.  Where have we gone that we would need so much technology to grow a seedling?  It seems like so much effort given to something that should not be so complicated.  It also seems an odd product created by a company, which markets with the byline: “Let’s convert cemeteries to forests.  How is an apartment tree planting memorial forests?  I do not know.  Bios Urn seems to have shifted in its focus.
 
Anyone can make their own seedling-cremains kit themselves. You need organic material – compost, cremains, the plant you wish to use, and ground or proper container in which to plant.  The problem is that when someone we love dies, sometimes we cannot think as clearly as we might otherwise.  Finding an inexpensive solution, which comes as a kit might be a solution worth considering.  Bios Urn is not the only urn maker, which markets to those who choose cremation and wish to be a tree or a part of the garden.  Check out the Living Urn.  Even if we become a tree, in the end they die like we do and go back to the earth.  We cannot escape from the circle of life.

#biosurn, #beatree, #endoflife, #preplanningfuneral, #greenburial
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Moving Forward

11/9/2016

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This post will not address death or the death care industry.  Last night we as a nation had a divisive election.  I feel I must address this instead.  Many of us are in pain and have started a grieving process.  Be kind to those we know who are in shock today. Let us remember that we are more alike than we are different.  Most of us want the same things in life, but we differ in how to accomplish them.  Let us put aside the marketing of both parties and see one another not as liberal or conservative, but as people - Americans.  Let us come together and begin to listen and speak with open hearts and minds. Let us remember who we are.  Most of all let us remember the words of Abraham Lincoln, “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see right, let us strive to finish with work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds…”

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Disrupt the Death Care Industry

11/2/2016

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Change in the death care industry in the North America takes time and effort.  The topic is not an easy one to raise, even with our closest friends and family.  I recall when I began this journey, how I would shut down conversations by talking about the neat new shroud or burial pod or that cool woolen coffin I had just seen.  Needless to say, it took a few stunted conversations to teach me that not everyone finds this kind of thing interesting.  By the way those cool burial pod and woolen coffins are available in the UK.  We can get them here, but if you consider the cost of jet fuel – environmentally and expenditure wise, they really are not as green as options we make in our own back yard.  Sure they are great because they return to the earth, but local is better when choosing a natural or green burial.  We need only look at cremation to know that the industry can change to give us hope that death care industry  can be more responsive to consumers.
 
In 1958 the rate of those who chose cremation was 3.6%.  In 2015 the rate in the US was 48% - 63% in Canada.  Why the dramatic change?  North America is a culture of transient people.  We no longer are born and die in the same community.  Many of us have lived in a variety of places, making the “traditional” family plot something of the past.  In 1960, the price of the average funeral was $700.  That was still a steep price for the time - about $5000 today.  Today’s average cost of a “traditional” funeral is about $7000. We are paying more today for the same service. In ten states, citizens are required to hire the private death care industry funeral directors who can by law charge whatever they determine to be as a basic price before you add any services.  These costs of course do not cover burial.  That is another different story.   The point is that the death care industry increases costs, and people choose the lesser-priced option – cremation.  (Direct cremation can range from $500- $4000.)
 
What does all this say to those of us working to change the death care industry?  It tells us we can indeed change the industry.   Even the average citizen can help change the industry by shopping around, asking questions.  Know your rights, and stand by them. If a funeral director or a family service counselor tells you something is a law – have them show you the law.  If the funeral home of cemetery is not following the law or shading the law, contact the Funeral Consumers Alliance.  They know how to handle the death care industry when it does not treat the consumer right.  Use a death doula, even in states that require you to hire a funeral director.  Funeral directors might need to be hired, but you can still use the alternative death care industry.  Doing this will help forge relationships between the two sides of the industry.  Who knows what can come from people having to work together?  Make “nontraditional” choices in your plans.  If you must use a “traditional” cemetery and a vault, invert the vault and have a natural body.  All these little things disrupt thought.  Talk with our friends about your experiences with the industry and what you might have done differently that made all the difference. You might have to learn how to time these conversations, but people do want to talk about it because the current industry had done so much wrong.  Hire someone in the alternative death care industry, like the Midwest Green Burial Society, to speak to your community about your rights and death care options.  Make plans to have someone make your coffin or shroud. Once we make a step outside the box of “tradition” we might just find ourselves doing great things, changing minds and ultimately changing the industry as a whole.


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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. 

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