Revising Your Death Care Plan

Once we make our death plans, we must revisit this plan from time to time. As human, we should expect that we will change our minds on a few things, and death care might be one of them.  Once or twice a year I take my plan out, give it a good look over and revise what needs revising.  I do not pretend that this process is fun or easy. Who likes to imagine one’s death?  I do not. Making a death care plan is an act of love for those who must do the work. I make and revise my death care plan because I know how hard it is to be the family trying to figure out what to do at the time of death.  Having to decide what to do when someone you love dies and not have a clue as to what to do is about a million times more difficult to do than sitting down and making a plan. Keep your plan simple. 


Things to Include:


Who

1. Spiritual Director
2. Funeral Director ( if needed
3. Death Doula
4. Cater the meal
5. In charge of music
6. In charge of photos or memorial
7. Master of Ceremony for the memorial gathering?

What

1. Kind of death do we want to have – include medical power of attorney and your views of life and death.   
2. Kind of funeral or memorial do you want to have?
3. Opinions on grave markers
4. Kinds of flowers?  No Flowers?  Donations?
5. Information do you want included in your story
6. Kind of container: Coffin, Urn, or Shroud
7. Kind of party
8. Included in your party

Where

1. Include contact information for the above information
2. To find financial, legal  and military documents
3. To find any cemetery or funeral prepaid information
4. Do you want to be buried or scattered etc…
5. The location of your memorial and/or gathering

This is not an exhaustive list.  Each of us has specific ideas on death and death care.  This is only meant as a suggestion.


To make a death care plan, you will need to do your homework.  You need to know your rights.  You need to have a clear idea of what you want as a memorial. You will have to talk to those closest to you. Most of all, you have to take your ego out of the process.  You have to know that at your time of death; perhaps your family will not have the strength to complete a complicated plan.  You have to find ways for your family to create a space for them to grieve.  Give them ideas of what they can do and those things you do not ever want.  Be clear, but be flexible. 


Once you have created your plan, make sure your next of kin knows where to find the plan.  I suggest not only telling one person, I suggest you let someone outside the family either hold a copy and/ or know where to find the information.  If people move away, you might want to find another person closer to where you live who can fulfill this act.  Really, anything and everything can happen, having a few people know what where to find the plan only helps when the time comes to enact the plan.