Asklemmy

As a rule, we don't handle the unexpected well. When my grandfather died from lung cancer, it was a long, protracted ordeal involving hospice care. Everyone was prepared, nobody was surprised.

When my dad died from a massive heart attack in the middle of nowhere in Nevada, a month after retiring, it was a shock, nobody saw it coming. He didn't make it long enough for the life flight helicopter to get there. Reportedly his last words were "Oh no."

It's one thing to plan for a death, it's another to be slapped in the head with one.

I guess it is an exception.

Lots of days I do living. Only one I die.

That it's something that happens to all of us does not make it any easier to process. You still lose someone you love, sometimes very abruptly and while they could've easily lived years longer without an issue. You will never be able to speak to them, to see them in front of you, to hear their thoughts, to make new memories Witt them. Sometimes it also makes you lose a support network, a pivotal person that made your life better.

It may be normal, but he mental impact will in many cases be huge.

I've never died, I posit that I am the very first immortal human, there is no evidence to the contrary.

it’s never happened to me my whole life

Because we’re delusional.

My father survived his cancer years ago, and since last year my sister was diagnosed with it, and it's looking incurable as of now. As I mourn for them in silence I get peerpressured by the aunt Karen of the family to give more attention. But my father was much different, like vibing on the good memories and being content with how his children became adult. My sister is having emotional difficulties though, and my mother is better at this than me... But when it's my turn I'd like to stick to my father's philosophy, even thoughh it hurts, remember how good life is.

I actually saw a post to our town's community page last night that the big local funeral home holds a once a month meeting in different topics to help people discuss these matters.

The coming event is a tour of the crematory where you can see the equipment, what can be done with the cremains, and a Q and A to determine if that is something you'd want for yourself.

A previous one was green burials, which I'm really bummed that I missed!

One person commented it was morbid, but the two from the funeral home said the last crematory tour had around 100 show up.

If you search "death conversations" or "death cafe" near you, you may be able to find something similar.

Rather myopic to assume that everyone has the same experience. I’m about to go to a family member’s service, literally today, and that is not the case at all.

Humans are afraid of death. Thus we don't like to talk about it. Thus being more afraid of it. Thus treating it as an exception.

That's why I love Caitlin Doughty's YouTube channel

an exception to what?

It's easy to talk about the end of life for other things. It's harder to discuss the fact that we will end eventually.

Because many people see themselves as being the most important person, and can't deal with not existing anymore.

Can you provide examples?

From what I've seen in Canada, death is handled like a standard event:

• Most businesses, banks, and government services have fast and convenient closing out paths when someone dies. In most cases a single phonecall/visit is enough to close an account and get the appropriate statements.

• Lawyers follow an established path when handling wills. Unless there's contention, it's pretty easy to "finish" the will.

• Funeral homes do an excellent job at handling the deceased's body, providing grief counseling, running the funeral, and ensuring the cemetery accepts the remains. So long as it's preplanned, the family and friends just need to show up.

• Government policy around executing a will is generally easy to understand and work with.

• Banks will act as executors. I'm not sure if they do a good job, but it's relatively inexpensive.

• Health care providers do not try to prolong life for the elderly. From what I've seen, they are quick to prescribe end of life care.

• Palliative care is handled by empathic and helpful professionals. There could be improvements in grief counseling.

• My social group was empathic and caring. Family helped as much as possible, as did friends. I doubt this is true for everyone.

What else are you referring to, OP?

Religious societies treat sex as taboo.

Secular societies treat death as taboo.

We're not flummoxed. We're simply emotional and empathetic. We don't want people (or pets) we know and love to die, because we miss them. We can also see that, for example, a child getting murdered is an awful thing, less awful than someone dying in their bed of old age, but both are dead, and we will either miss them if we knew them as they were big parts of our lives, or we can empathize with the people who did know them even if we didn't, as we know how it feels to lose someone. People who were always in our lives, who we cared for and lived with, but are suddenly not will leave a gaping hole. It would be inhuman to not feel these things.

Death brings meaning to life. It shouldn’t be feared.