Do you think about your mortality?

My girlfriend and I recently discussed the issue of how to handle things if one of us becomes unable to make our own decisions. Since we're not legally married, and since because of my past experience and where I am in life now I'm really not interested in involving "the law" in something so personal, we decided to fill out power of attorney forms and the like so we can each make decisions for the other. It's rather easy for us because we both know we won't be around forever and we both want to live as long as we can.
 
sallylou said:
I'm at the place in my life where I'm dealing with the mortality of parents and parent figures. I really wish that I could talk to them about it. It's always the elephant in the room. Sometimes, my MIL talks about me inheriting her silverware and such. I want to talk about what really matters (not stuff).

I think about my own mortality. I almost didn't make it as a newborn, and that really influences how I look at my life. I feel grateful for having so much.
Click to expand...

I hate thinking about what will happen when my parents pass away. I hope not for a long long time. Having said that, my parents have been pretty open about this topic. They have brought up their will at some point and seem to have things laid out pretty logically. I haven't seen the will and really do not care to. but talking about death in my family is not taboo, just not a very common topic.
 
Up until I was about...20 years old, I was terrified of dying. Now, not as much, though I do think about it.

I think about it particularly, because I don't have children, and I don't intend to (NOT that having children guarantees that you will have someone to look after you in your old age, and not that that is a reason to have children.) I often think about what will happen to me when I'm very old or otherwise unable to care for myself. If my finances improve, I'm thinking about taking out a long term care insurance policy. I don't think I can afford to right now.

My boyfriend and I intend to be together for the long haul, but you never know what will happen.

I think about my parents' mortality a lot, and that is upsetting to me. My mom and I are pretty close, and she has had a lot of health issues in recent years. It's definitely upsetting, but I've had a few conversations with her, and I think things are pretty well in order.

I'm not afraid of dying now, so much as I am of being alone and unable to care for myself. I hope that makes sense.

I intend to set up my will soon.

Jen M.
 
Hubby and I have been talking in the last couple of days. MIL is finally beginning to take stock and is working to make sure that we will inherit without too many problems and losing too much to the "legal eagles". My mother has decided to make sure all of her affairs are in order. (They are, but she doesn't remember doing it) I think finding out that my Great Aunt died with no family there really shocked both mother and MIL into getting things together. Hubby and I are also beginning to make our plans as well.

One thing he and I can't agree on, is cremation or not. I say yes, he says no. I have been trying to let him know of the costs involved and so far, the only thing we have is cemetery plots, but they are in Missouri and we are not willing to be buried there. I will see if my brother wants them. He is still there.
 
Wow, I'm not sure I'm ready to make all those plans even though I know I should.
 
Cheetah said:
Wow, I'm not sure I'm ready to make all those plans even though I know I should.
Click to expand...

Well - considering the fact that we are having property put into our name that has no payments waiting. When MIL is gone, we will have a total of 4 properties coming to us. the 2 here, one in Fort Pierce, FL, and one somewhere in NC. MIL also admitted to me that she has some savings that she has not told hubby about. She did not lose as much as she said in the banking meltdown and such.

Also, hubby has heart issues. Nothing serious and he is getting better, but still., an enlarged aorta is not good. Around here, it doesn't take much and you're gone. There are drive-by shooting, idiots on the road and all kinds of things. Not saying it's worse here than other places, but geez! Just today, I was almost hit my 4 different cars and I wasn't even on the road, I was on the sidewalk. We had a situation in the courthouse and a lot of us were rushed into a closed room, since 2 guys came in with automatic weapons. They were apprehended without incident. Then, I had a massive choking incident on a meatball while sitting at dinner. That makes one very nervous, if you catch my drift.
 
Careful on those meatballs! I have a very low gag threshold and have to be careful about chewing and swallowing.

GF wants to be cremated. I think I do, too. I definitely don't want any kind of religious burial. In fact, I want my funeral to be a party. I don't want people standing around crying. I want people to remember all the good things about me and have a good time, because if I were alive, that's what I'd want them to be doing.

The United States has a bug up its ass about funerals, because everyone is trying to sell something even when you're dead. In much of the world, people simply bury their relatives wherever, usually on their property if they have their own property. There's nothing unsanitary about it. Assuming GF and I are still together when we're old (and I hope we are), if she goes first, I'm certainly gonna try to give her a nice funeral with an open pyre somewhere private with her friends around. And me, well, I want that party.
 
Cheetah said:
Wow, I'm not sure I'm ready to make all those plans even though I know I should.
Click to expand...

It's pretty simple to do - when you make your living will, you also make arrangements for your funeral at the same time if you want to. In Canada, it's minimum 15,000 for a funeral of which I've already saved and put asides because I don't want anyone else to have to bear that financial burden.

One thing for sure, I don't want a traditional funeral in a church - just a cremation and for my loved ones to gather and remember me to my sons - that's really important to me. It meant the world to me to learn all kinds of things about my Mom and Dad at their memorials and I want my sons to have the same meaningful experience at mine.
 
DeafCaroline said:
It's pretty simple to do - when you make your living will, you also make arrangements for your funeral at the same time if you want to. In Canada, it's minimum 15,000 for a funeral of which I've already saved and put asides because I don't want anyone else to have to bear that financial burden.

One thing for sure, I don't want a traditional funeral in a church - just a cremation and for my loved ones to gather and remember me to my sons - that's really important to me. It meant the world to me to learn all kinds of things about my Mom and Dad at their memorials and I want my sons to have the same meaningful experience at mine.
Click to expand...

$15,000 being the minimum for a funeral. For a burial (caskets), I can easily believe that it can balloon up from nothing to in the range of $15,000. For a cremation, it's much, much cheaper.

From what I know, cremation itself costs around $700 and up and the funeral with everything included (obituary, viewing, flowers, services, death certificate, transportation, etc) may vary from $1,500 to $3,000. Probably something to do with the fact that it usually costs at least a thousand for a cheap casket while you would pay only $150 for an urn.
 
Burials at sea are a natural option for interment because it is a logical solution to the physics of diminishing resources of real property. The average price of a casket - not to mention a funeral - costs almost as much as my first house! Today, the average American funeral costs about $15,000. Burial at sea is about up to 70% less expensive than conventional burials! This makes sound financial sense to those who find the cost of dying prohibitive.
Click to expand...
Burial at sea | Nature's Passage
 
I want no funeral, either. Have a party, and get rid of my remains in the greenest way possible. Keep the land for the living, not a park for the dead and their boxes.
 
We are trying to talk hubby into doing what a neighbor has been doing. Her late hubbies(2 or 3) are cremated and buried in a special rose garden in her yard. She also has a son's ashes there.
 
Personally, I don't want cremation. The idea of somebody sticking me in a oven and cooking me after I'm dead, makes me uncomfortable. And Perhaps I'm being anachronistic in believing the a proper burial or crypt is nice way of leaving something tangible of me left behind.

I know I'm considered strange for thinking that cemeteries are interesting remnants of people who once lived. When I think about it, my archaeology classes study people of the past, and if we didn't have those remnants, what could we learn about those who came before us?
 
cmdrwhitewolf said:
I know I'm considered strange for thinking that cemeteries are interesting remnants of people who once lived. When I think about it, my archaeology classes study people of the past, and if we didn't have those remnants, what could we learn about those who came before us?
Click to expand...

Well, thank god for historical documents and records. They have assisted me in researching my family tree.
 
Banjo said:
$15,000 being the minimum for a funeral. For a burial (caskets), I can easily believe that it can balloon up from nothing to in the range of $15,000. For a cremation, it's much, much cheaper.

From what I know, cremation itself costs around $700 and up and the funeral with everything included (obituary, viewing, flowers, services, death certificate, transportation, etc) may vary from $1,500 to $3,000. Probably something to do with the fact that it usually costs at least a thousand for a cheap casket while you would pay only $150 for an urn.
Click to expand...

I am factoring in cost of inflation, who knows how much these things will cost in 5, 10, 15, 20 years from now so I'd rather be safe and make sure I've enough put away.
 
DeafCaroline said:
I am factoring in cost of inflation, who knows how much these things will cost in 5, 10, 15, 20 years from now so I'd rather be safe and make sure I've enough put away.
Click to expand...

You make an excellent point, I didn't think of the inflation.
 
mbrek said:
I want no funeral, either. Have a party, and get rid of my remains in the greenest way possible. Keep the land for the living, not a park for the dead and their boxes.
Click to expand...

Ok. You said "greenest way" and the body farm is definitely a green way of going but here's another "green way" and that is to compost your body.
:shock:

Think of the operation as a kind of corpse disassembly line. The dearly departed are first supercooled in liquid nitrogen to about minus 196°C, then shattered into very small pieces on a vibration table. “We wanted to make the body unrecognizable without using any kind of an instrument that you would see in a kitchen or garage,” [Wiigh-Mäsak] explains.

Next a vacuum is used to evaporate moisture while a metal separator, traditionally used by the food processing industry to remove stray foreign objects from meat products, shuffles aside fillings, crowns, titanium hips, and so on. (You can put that sandwich down now.) Finally, the vaguely pink crumbs are deposited in a large box made of corn or potato starch.

Surviving family members bury the box in shallow topsoil and plant a tree or shrub on top. With the exception of perhaps a few broken remnants of plastic pacemaker, in a matter of months nothing is left but memories and some lush greenery.
Click to expand...




Composting Your Body: The Greenest Burial
 
Back
Top