A MORTICIAN Answers Your MORBID Questions...

[00:00:00]It's storming outside. Oh my goodness.

[00:00:03]Okay, first the gray one.

[00:00:07]I don't know what that does, but I hope it helps you. Nope, you can't eat that.

[00:00:10]Oh, this thing brings me such joy.

[00:00:15]Marker. Morbid Monday. Best day of the week. Kachchow. Oh, that's wrong.

[00:00:20]Am I recording? Hello, fellow mortals.

[00:00:23]If you're new here, hi. I'm Lauren the Mortician. Yes, a real mortician. A little about me. I actually grew up in a funeral home. Funeral service has been my family's business for generations.

[00:00:34]I'm a third generation funeral director.

[00:00:36]My grandma had a flower shop, worked with flowers. She's since retired. My dad has a twin brother who is also a funeral director. I have another uncle who's no longer in the profession.

[00:00:46]Honestly, it's just one giant family affair. My dad and my grandpa actually made history because they were the first father and son mortician team to attend and graduate mortuary school together from the University of Minnesota's mortuary science program. Then quite a few years later I graduated from the same program. And here's the part that still blows my mind. Like I lived it, but it's still pretty cool to me. I actually had two of the same professors that taught my dad and my grandpa.

[00:01:15]Professor Ellis, Dr. Ellis and I even had Mr. Matthews. Somebody tell me, is he still living? That man was absolutely hilarious. And the fact that one professor or multiple professors taught three generations of my family is just wild. But honestly, that's funeral service in a nutshell. People don't realize how incredibly small this profession is. Everybody knows everybody and before long, everyone's worked with everyone else. I grew up around death. I grew up in the funeral homes. So death has just always felt normal to me. It wasn't until I got older that I realized it wasn't normal for everyone else. I'll never forget asking my dad to come to my elementary school for career day. I think I was in third grade, maybe. I don't remember. But I remember asking him if he'd come and tell my class about what he did for a living. He said no.

[00:02:06]Not because he was embarrassed of what he did, but because he didn't want to traumatize a classroom full of children.

[00:02:13]And I remember thinking, I'm like, "Wait, why would you traumatize them?"

[00:02:16]That was probably the first time I realized most people don't grow up talking about death, living with death, the same way that I did. Then you get older and people ask what you're going to major in, and I'd say, "I'm going to mortuary school." And they just kind of stare at you. Or one time I was at a nursing home to bring somebody who had died into our care, and one of the residents stopped me, smiled, and asked, "Oh, are you one of the new nurses?" I said, "Actually, I'm the local mortician. You would have thought I told her I was the grim reaper himself.

[00:02:48]People look at you like you're the strange one." And over the years, that's what I've realized. It's not that death is strange. It's that talking about death makes people uncomfortable. Maybe it's because we don't know what to say.

[00:03:00]Maybe it's because we're afraid we'll say the wrong thing. Maybe it's because we've been taught to avoid the conversation altogether. But here's the thing. Death is one of the only guarantees we have in life, and I don't think it has to be so scary to talk about it. That's honestly why these Q&A videos are my favorite. I don't do them every week, but these are the videos that remind me why I started sharing this profession online in the first place. I love answering the questions you're almost embarrassed to ask, or the things you've wondered about at 2:00 in the morning, the movie myths, the internet rumors, now debunking AI. Never thought that would be on the checklist here. current events and the questions that make you think, am I weird for wondering that? Trust me, in this corner of the internet, you're in good company.

[00:03:44]So, welcome back to another morbid Monday. Let's answer some of your morbid questions. But before we do, it's just another morbid Monday. Wo wo wo. Wish it was Friday. Death, dying, and decay. Wo wo wo. Morbid Mondays are the best day. Cha cha cha. Cue the intro.

[00:04:18]Question number one, how does decomposition differ between an imbalmed body and an unimbalmed body if everything else is exactly the same?

[00:04:27]This is such a good question because one of the biggest misconceptions about imbalming is that it somehow preserves someone forever. Spoiler alert, it doesn't. Inbalming's job is to slow decomposition, not stop it. Think of it like hitting the pause button instead of the stop button. Let's imagine we have two people. They're the exact same age, the same height and weight, died the exact same way, were buried on the same day, in the same cemetery in identical caskets inside identical burial vaults.

[00:04:58]The only difference, one was imbalmed, one wasn't. The moment both people die, decomposition begins. Our own cells start breaking down and the bacteria that naturally live inside of our intestines begin spreading throughout the body. Those bacteria are some of the biggest drivers of decomposition. The unimbalmed person is essentially left to that natural process. Those bacteria continue multiplying, gases begin forming, tissues begin breaking down, and decomposition progresses as nature intended. The imbalmed person is different. During imbalming, we remove the blood and we replace it with a preservative solution, inbalming fluid.

[00:05:39]That solution disinfects tissues, slows bacterial growth, and chemically preserves many of the body's proteins.

[00:05:47]So, if you checked on both people a few weeks later, the imbalmed individual would definitely most likely still be much better preserved. If you were to check again several months later, the difference would still be noticeable.

[00:06:02]Years later, you would definitely be able to tell which body had been inbalmed and which hadn't. without getting too graphic. But here's the important part. If you dug up both graves decades later, neither person would still look the way they did at the funeral. The inbalmed person wouldn't look alive or like they were sleeping anymore. The unimbalmed person wouldn't simply be gone. They would just be at different stages of the exact same destination. Eventually, both bodies continue decomposing because inbalming isn't stronger than biology forever. And while we're busting myths, a sealed casket does not stop decomposition. A burial vault does not stop decomposition. People think a burial vault is there to preserve the body, but it's actually there to keep the ground from sinking and to support the weight of the cemetery equipment. Nature is incredibly patient. Whether you're imbalmed or not, biology is still going to do what biology does. Inbalming simply gives us time. Time for families to gather, time for visitations, time for loved ones to say goodbye. It changes when decomposition happens. It doesn't change that it happened. I really answered that without answering it.

[00:07:13]How does decomposition differ between an imbalmed body and an unembalmed body? I mean, one's going to decompose and one's not, but the imbalmed body isn't going to last forever. Okay, I'm going to say I answered it. Got to watch out for those guidelines on YouTube, too.

[00:07:25]Question. This is a sensitive question, but we need to talk about it. A loved one unal alived themselves in my home.

[00:07:32]There was debris throughout the room afterward and I was left to clean it all up myself. Why didn't anyone help me?

[00:07:39]First of all, this absolutely broke my heart to read. And I can answer the why, but I also want to say that answering the why doesn't mean I think that's how it should feel for families. The reality is that when police officers, firefighters, the medical examiner, or the funeral home arrive at a scene, every one of us has a very specific job.

[00:08:00]Law enforcement documents and investigates. The medical examiner investigates the death if it's under their jurisdiction. The funeral home's responsibility is caring for and transporting the person who died. None of those agencies are actually responsible for cleaning the scene. Now, do we sometimes help if we can?

[00:08:21]Absolutely. I've personally stayed behind and cleaned as much as I physically could. I've scraped brain tissue off of a ceiling. I've helped wipe down surfaces. I've picked up things that no family should ever have to see. But that's a courtesy. It's not something every funeral director can do and it's not something every department allows because sometimes there are biohazard regulations, liability concerns, time constraints, or simply another family waiting for us to come care for their loved one. And unfortunately, a proper cleanup isn't as simple as wiping things down. I wish it was. A traumatic death scene often requires specialized biohazard remediation. Drywall may need to be removed. Flooring may need to come up.

[00:09:08]Furniture may not be salvageable. Every affected surface has to be cleaned and disinfected safely. That's why there are companies whose entire job is trauma scene cleanup. But what makes me sad about your story isn't that the funeral home didn't clean it. It's that it doesn't sound like anyone told you what your options were. Someone should have said, "Hey, there are companies that do this every day. Here's their card.

[00:09:33]Here's their number. here's their website. Even if insurance ultimately had to be involved, at least you would have known that there was help available to you. And I think that's the part that failed you. And for that, I am truly very sorry. I also want to say something to anyone listening who may be struggling. You matter. This is the sign you were looking for to stay a little longer. And I love you. All right. Next question. Could someone be buried with their dog if they both died in the same accident? The short answer is sometimes, but usually not. And here's why.

[00:10:07]Legally, in most places, human remains and animal remains are handled under completely different laws. Funeral homes are licensed to care for people.

[00:10:16]Veterinary clinics and pet crematories are licensed to care for animals. So, placing an entire dog into someone's casket usually isn't something that's allowed. Some states prohibit it outright, and even when it isn't specifically prohibited by law, many cemeteries and funeral homes have policies against it. Now, if the dog had already been cremated, that's a different story. I've had tons of families place a small urn of their pets cremated remains in the casket in the foot end of the casket with their loved one. I had a little old lady, she had like 50 cats. The family came in with 50 little urns and they put it in the foot end of her casket. It was great. I love to be a part of that. But let's shift really quick to the real funeral director answer for this question. If you're talking about a national cemetery or a cemetery with really strict rules, they're going to tell you no, you can't bury the dog with the human. Even if they're ashes, you can't do it. And we have to respect those policies. I even asked Fort Snelling National Cemetery one time. There was a guy he wanted to be buried with a pet earn cemetery told me no and we had to respect that unfortunately I felt bad for the family but if you're talking about a little hometown cemetery little small one that's a whole different world whole different I can get them to say yes to a lot more things than the big ones. Now I do want to say this really quickly. I have always believed that the last few moments when the casket is open before we close it, those moments belong to the family. If you can get what I'm about to lay down, I'll get everyone where they need to be. make sure they have the privacy they deserve. And then I'll step back. Sometimes as the funeral director, I'll walk to the other side of the room.

[00:11:55]Sometimes I'll literally turn around.

[00:11:58]Those few minutes that they get with their loved one aren't about me. They're about having one last goodbye. And when they're ready, they'll let me know. I come back over. I close the lid on the casket. I lock it. And we can continue to the cemetery with the burial. Because at some point, I'm not just a funeral director anymore. I'm just another human being standing beside someone who's going through literally the worst days of their life. I make sure they have the privacy they deserve because some moments aren't meant for me. So, what they choose to say, what they choose to leave behind in the casket during those final private moments. That's between them, their loved one, and God. And honestly, I think that's how it should be. So, if they wanted to slip a blanket in there with them or maybe a little ern, I knew nothing about it. I just locked the lid on the casket and I did my job and I went home at the end of the day and I slept really well if you get what I'm saying. Anyways, this actually reminds me I have a story of another funeral director who told me years ago, it wasn't me, but it was a story from a colleague that I'll never forget. A man and his dog were both killed in the same accident. It was super super sad. The medical examiner's office took both of them for examination and later the funeral home came to pick up the gentleman because the family had chosen cremation. The funeral director got all the proper authorization paperwork, brought him back to the funeral home, and proceeded with the cremation. A few days later, the family came back to pick up the urn. They were so grateful. They kept thanking the funeral director and saying, "It was so thoughtful of you to cremate his dog with him. That's exactly what he would have wanted." The funeral director just froze. What dog?

[00:13:32]Apparently, when the medical examiner released the gentleman, his dog had been placed inside the same body bag at the foot end. The funeral home had no idea because they hadn't opened the body bag before the cremation. That's a no no.

[00:13:43]You should always do that. But anyways, his dog and the man were cremated together before anybody panics. That's not how it's supposed to happen, like ever. Human remains and animal remains are handled under different laws and different authorizations. So, that's absolutely not standard practice. You can't cremate pets in a machine meant for just people. You're not supposed to.

[00:14:03]But I have to admit, part of me likes to think that maybe somehow that's exactly how he would have wanted to leave this world. As a funeral director, my brain says, "Oh no, that's a paperwork nightmare." But the human in me hears that story and I just think maybe they were never supposed to be apart together forever. Question: Have you ever prepared someone and found something that made you contact the medical examiner or the police? Short answer is yes. And if I've told you this story before, forgive me because it's probably the best example that I have. Years ago, I was called to a home on a reservation to bring a little old lady into our care. Tribal police had already been there. The medical examiner had already responded. She had a very extensive medical history. And based on everything they knew at the time, the doctor was comfortable signing the death certificate. So, she was released directly to the funeral home. No autopsy. When I walked into the house, there was there was blood everywhere.

[00:14:56]I'm talking the kitchen, the living room, the bathroom. I remember standing there thinking, "What on earth happened here?" It honestly looked like CSI, some sort of episode out of a horrific crime scene. The medical examiner explained that they believed she was actively dying and kept getting up and falling down and getting up and falling down over and over and over again throughout almost the whole house and unfortunately was leaving blood behind as she moved about. I thought, "Okay, they've investigated this. It's not my job to second guess the medical examiner. So, I brought her back to the funeral home, imbalmed her, and went home for the night. The next morning, I came into work. Yes, with my cup of coffee. I know, I know you're not supposed to have coffee in the prep room. Me and my caffeine have a very codependent relationship. Okay, don't judge me. But anyways, I walked in just to see how she had firmed up overnight, and I stopped because overnight her entire body had become covered in bruises. Her arms, her legs, her torso. bruises that simply were not visible the night before. Now, here's a little mortuary science lesson because I think this part is fascinating. Bruises don't always show up right away after someone dies. Did you know that as the body changes after death and even after imbalming, blood that's already leaked into the tissues can become more visible? So, sometimes bruises that were barely there or not noticeable at all suddenly become very obvious hours later or in this case overnight. That doesn't mean the bruises happened after death. It means they didn't become visible until after death.

[00:16:28]But because these bruises were so extensive and they shocked me and they weren't documented, I wasn't comfortable just assuming everything was okay. I still felt weird about it, honestly. So, I immediately picked up the phone, called the medical examiner, I explained what I was seeing, and asked if they wanted me to photograph everything.

[00:16:45]asked if they wanted to come on down, but they actually asked me to notify tribal police, which I did because this is something people don't realize. But funeral directors, we are mandated reporters. So, if something doesn't make sense or if we discover something after someone arrives at the funeral home, we don't just shrug our shoulders and keep inbalming. We stop and we make the phone call. Now, nobody ended up coming back to the funeral home to photograph her, which honestly surprised me to this day still. So, I offered to document everything for myself and then I sent the photographs to the medical examiner's office so they could be included with her case file. That's what I did. I even let her family know what I had found because a part of me had to because we had to accommodate with longer sleeves, kind of cover up a lot of those bruises cuz they have open casket funerals as a part of their family religious practice. I don't think me finding those bruises changed anything about the investigation.

[00:17:36]Unfortunately, that's not my role. I'm not a medical examiner. My role isn't to solve the mystery. My role is to notice when something doesn't add up, report it, and let the people whose job it is to investigate take it from there. I think people assume that once someone arrives at the funeral home, the investigation is over, but sometimes we're just one more set of trained eyes.

[00:17:54]I wish that story would have ended a little differently. I wish there would have been more urgency with it. But there's a lot of you listening right now that are not going to like the answer to that question that I just came up with.

[00:18:02]But it's the truth. It's what happened.

[00:18:04]The son made me feel weird, but I couldn't do anymore for her. So that's that. Lauren, as a mortician, have you ever lost it during a funeral service?

[00:18:13]Absolutely. And honestly, if you don't have a heart, I don't think this is the right profession for you. This job requires an unbelievable amount of compassion. One thing I always thought was so strange in mortuary school was that they actually taught us not to cry in front of families. The reasoning was that we're supposed to be the steady one, the rock. It's not our time to grieve. It's our job to hold everything together so the family doesn't feel like they have to care for us. And I totally understand that. But we're still human.

[00:18:41]I'm still human. Sometimes tears don't ask for permission. They just happen.

[00:18:46]For me, it's not always me crying over the person who died. It's the people that are left behind that does it for me. I'll never forget a funeral for a young mother. She died in a car accident. Her children survived. and watching those little kids stand at their mom's casket and hearing them cry, knowing they were saying goodbye to their mother. I'm going to cry now. As a mom myself, that absolutely broke me.

[00:19:11]And to this day, I can still see them standing there and I can still hear them crying. Those moments stay with you.

[00:19:18]Babies and children are also the hardest cases for me personally. Always have been. Every funeral director has cases they will carry with them forever. Those are mine. Before I perform a cremation for a baby or a child, I will always stop for a second. I will say a little prayer. I will read them a little story.

[00:19:36]I tell them that they were loved. I treat them the way I would want someone to treat my own children if the roles were reversed. And yes, sometimes I cry, not because I'm making the loss about me, but because I think the day that we stop feeling something is the day we should not be doing this job. People ask me all the time, Lauren, how do you do this job? Like, how do you not bring it home with you? How do you get through it? It's really the question. And the truth is, sometimes I do. I take it home with me. I take it home with me all the time. There are days where I get in the car after a service and I just sit there for a minute and breathe. There are children I will never forget their little faces. There are parents I will never forget. There are families whose cries I hear when I close my own eyes at nighttime. And on those days, it really does feel like a piece of your heart just goes along with them. Like a piece of me dies every time. Just a little piece. But then I have to remind myself why I chose this profession. Those families didn't need someone who could fix what happened. They needed someone who would just simply show up and help them. Someone who would care. Someone who would carry them through one of the hardest days of their lives with dignity and compassion. I can't change what happened. My God, do I wish I could. I can't bring their loved one back, but I can make sure they're treated with respect and love. I can make sure they're cared for. I can make sure their family never has to wonder whether their person was treated with kindness, dignity, and love. When I walk through those funeral home doors, I remind myself that those families need me.

[00:21:14]That's how I do this job. They need me emotionally, physically, practically.

[00:21:18]They need someone who knows what to do when they don't. So even on the hardest days, even on the days when it feels like that little part of my heart can't take anymore, I will still always show up because helping people on the worst day of their lives isn't just what I do, it's who I am. And if I had to choose all over again, I would still choose this profession. Because even on the hardest days, I know that I made someone's impossible day just a little bit more bearable. And to me, that's worth every tear. Not going to cry, but it's worth it. Okay, moving on. We're done crying. There's a reason I don't answer that question all the time because I'm sweating and I'm crying at the same time. Like, what? Okay, anyways. Okay, really quick. I wanted to revisit something from last week's morbid Monday, which was really a morbid Friday, but anyways, because I asked you all for your theories, and one of you sent me this comment that absolutely sent me down a rabbit hole. Last week, somebody asked why caskets traditionally open left hand side for a viewing, so left to right. My theory is because in Western culture we naturally read left to right. Well, maybe not naturally, but they make it natural. Well, Mirati 9's husband had a completely different theory, and I thought it was fascinating. So, I want to read it with you. He suggested that it may actually have more to do with the engineering of early caskets than anything else, which back in the 1800s, especially during the Wild West era, people were often laid out much more upright for a public viewing than we see today. If that's true, you wouldn't want the entire lid open because gravity is going to do what gravity does. So, the lower half of the casket stayed closed to help support the body while the upper half was displayed.

[00:22:55]Then, because most people are right-handed, the hinges and the hardware would have naturally been placed on the right side, meaning the viewing side would be seen and open on the left. Now, I don't know if that's actually like the historical reason. I haven't found anything definitive that says, "Yep, this is exactly why." But I have to admit, it's a very clever theory. And then, of course, my morbid little brain went somewhere completely different. Now, I want to know, what were funerals actually like in the Wild, Wild West? In the Wild, Wild West? When did people start doing half couch caskets? Half couch? What am I from, Texas now? What did funeral homes even look like? If they existed, were people involved out on the Great Frontier? How did they transport the people? I kind of want to make another morbid Monday called death in the wild wild west. I'll throw on a cowboy hat and we'll yeehaw our way through funeral history together. That sounds like a great topic idea. Anyways, this is naturally how things happen in my brain. I just wanted to share that with you. So, if you have any old family stories, historical articles, or maybe your great great grandpa really was a cowboy, then send them my way. Maybe they did cowboy funerals. I don't know. Because apparently you have all discovered my weakness. Historical funeral rabbit holes. All right, fellow mortals. That's all I've got for you this week. I cannot tell you how good it feels to be back doing a morbid Monday on a Monday.

[00:24:11]Assuming Hannah had enough time to edit this. If this somehow comes out on a Tuesday, that's my fault. Hannah is wonderful. I probably handed this to her at the very last possible second because, you know, life. As always, thank you guys for hanging out with me, asking the weird questions, sharing your stories, and making this one of my favorite corners of the internet we've made together. If you have a question you're dying to know, leave it down in the comments. If I miss it, just keep asking it. The weirder the better. I read way more of your comments than I probably should. And apparently you're all really good at sending me down historical rabbit holes. I love it. And who knows, maybe next morbid Monday we'll all throw on cowboy hats and take a trip back to the Wild West. Until then, happy Morbid Monday and also with you. Or may Morbid Monday be with you and also with you. Without further ado, here's your mango kisses. I love you guys. Hold on. Wait. Come here.

[00:24:58]>> She was sleeping below my chair. You're supposed to kiss them.

[00:25:03]Oh, those are great kisses. Say love you. Bye.

[00:25:09]Cha cha cha. Okay.