Celebration of Life Pastor

[sunshine702]

So my husband's family gathered last night over dinner to talk with the pastor about the organizing the Celebration of Life Ceremony for my father in law.  This is my brother in laws's fairly new pastor so he needed stories and photos as he had not met G.  It went great.

But boy do I have a weird feeling.  I am going through this knowing my brother and I will have to do this for our parents and I have so much anger and relief about their death.  Also there is this feeling that whatever I do is wrong - this has been from my mother since birth.  So while everyone in my husband's family felt confident "that is what G would have wanted ". I do not have that one bit.  Everything I chose has always been dead wrong.  I will not want to speak and I know they would want to have praises sung.   Endless recognition both of them.

Question for this community- How have the funeral plans gone with the PD parent or spouse passed?  Any  help : ideas for getting through it?  Tips / tricks?  I am now DREADING this!

[sunshine702]

Clearly not my father in law's - I think that will be beautiful but my own parents.   Sigh

[monamurre]

I've buried both parents in the past 5 years. The two experience of death could not have been different.

I don't think my father was a PD but he was a difficult man and we didn't have a great relationship. However, when he died suddenly in an accident there was a lot of shock and grief. My siblings and I hosted a celebration of life several weeks later and if felt very, very healing. A lot of his friends from different phases of life came out, a huge portion of his second wife's family came. It was exhausting but I think we all felt some companionship in our grieving and some closure.

When my mom died, rather predictably after a bought with terminal cancer, I felt more relief than grief. She has been shunning me for the last 4 months of her life and generally make a difficult situation much worse at every turn. I have a mountain of work to do dealing with the hoarder property she left so I've been kicking the can down the road about a memorial. I leaning towards not having one at all. Two of her siblings haven't reached out to me at all since her death (despite being in contact before) and very few friends of hers have reached out either. In short, no one is waiting with baited breath for this memorial. I think at this point it would be more of a performance than an authentic part of the grieving process.

As far as "doing things wrong".....well your parent will be dead, so to hell with what they would have wanted, you'll never have to hear about it from them. Funerals are for the living, so do what you need for your, for your family, for the community and don't worry about the deceased. I get that feeling of wanting to honor their wishes, etc. But you know that there is no winning with PD's so don't twist yourself into knots on this one. In my more cynical moments I have a good laugh about all the things I "didn't do right" in the last few months of my mom's life. All those things to complain about! It was probably the greatest gift I ever gave her.

[SunnyMeadow]

The celebration of life gathering can be anything you want it to be. Due to circumstances of moving and my mother dumping/discarding everybody she knew, I didn't have one for either of my parents. They died 3½ weeks apart and no one expected one or asked about one. I spread their combined ashes in a beautiful spot and that was it.

So you don't have to have a formal service or ceremony if you don't want one. My FIL was a normal guy and his wife and children didn't have anything formal after he died. In a few months, they are all gathering at the one year anniversary of his death to reminisce and share stories. This way everything isn't so raw and they can really share and gather to remember him.

You and your brother get to decide what you do. As monamurre wrote "But you know that there is no winning with PD's so don't twist yourself into knots on this one". So, so true. Don't worry about a service. I don't think they are as expected as they once were. Used to be it would be a LONG 2 or 3 day event. 1 or 2 nights of wake, church and burial. Now, thankfully! it's been shortened up or nothing at all.  I always had it in my mind, even decades ago that I was going to do what their money could provide as far as burial and service. They spent like crazy while living and didn't leave much for death services.

[sunshine702]

This has been a week long BIG thing with everyone coming out and bringing food.  Planning some of the stuff.  They have a big Catholic family so a service was always a thing but M is upset with the Catholics for several years so it will be a non denominational preacher and a funeral home and wake one and wake 2.

That is a relief.  Yeah I realize I am a very private person and this big stuff is so daunting if I had to do it.  Also I barley speak to Golden Child Brother and he barely speaks to me so it would be stressful.  Narc Mom's doing. 

You can just cremate them and grieve in bed?  That is what I have done for my beloved doggies.  Hmm that sound better for me. 

I guess like a wedding.  Some people do the big church thing but some people do a private ceremony and only invite one or two people.  If anyone.