A Brief History of Headstones
It’s that time of year! “Graveyards” are popping up in neighborhoods and front yards all across this great land: tombstones askew, phalanges and femurs poking up through the...
Your Future Client, Planning Her Own Funeral Party
I’ve been writing on deathcare matters from a layperson’s perspective for a while now. I’ve delved into graphic, unsavory aspects including trauma and decomposition and the actual biological...
Miscarriage and Death Care Part Two: Unique Needs of Families
Circumstances – social and psychological – being what they are, handling matters for families who are navigating loss of this sort may place new demands on deathcare professionals....
Miscarriages and Death Care Part One: Practical Matters
26% of all pregnancies will end in miscarriage. In the US alone, that’s at least 500,000 naturally lost pregnancies every year. A lot of parents experience such lost...
Radiation Exposure in Deathcare
When imagining a scenario which includes radioactive human remains, you probably aren’t envisioning much in the way of deathcare – the topic carries a kind of Armageddon-ish feeling...
Rewired by Loss: Grief Is Essentially a Brain Injury
That’s right – a brain injury. A number of scientific studies reveal that an emotional disturbance, such as that caused by the experience of grieving a loved one,...
Modern Mummification
Mummification was long ago made famous – and rightly so – by the highly visible King Tut set. As a method of conveyance to the afterlife, it’s got...
Deathcare Challenges in Cases of Violent Death
Auto accidents, random acts of violence, suicides and other traumatic deaths create unique challenges for funeral homes. Sudden, traumatic, and unexpected (or, as in the case of suicide,...
Breaking Down the Bones
Bones are sort of death’s calling card, aren’t they? And it doesn’t really matter whose bone, or which bone, or where it is, even – any bone is...
Protecting Trans Identity After Death
The rights of the LGBTQ+ community are advancing in positive ways, even if it seems that for every two steps forward, there’s one step back. Progress is slow,...