Seeing Somebody Dead...would You?

[Brokenone]

I'm sorry for posting this because it is so horrible but I would like some advice. Mods feel free to move to a different area if I have posted in the wrong place.

I lost my step daughter just after the new year. She died in an accident in New Zealand and it was awful trying to deal with the grief and arrange all the formalities and get her body back to the uk. I'm still grieving now, i'm very unpredictable...i'm numb one minute and then I feel unbearable pain the next.

Before we buried her I decided not to see the body. I went into the funeral parlour and managed to hold her hand but I never once looked at her face. I was terrified of what I would see and so I didn't look, I wanted to remember her how she was before. However, I am now feeling regret because I didn't look.

My nan is about to die. She is in the last stages of alzeimers and the nursing home phoned us all today and asked us to come quickly. I decided I wouldn't go because I feared how she would look but now I feel incredible guilt for not going. At this moment in time she is still alive but we have been told she will definately not make the end of the weekend.

My question is this...have any of you ever viewed the deceased in their casket? Is it better to remember them how they were or does seeing them in death provide comfort and closure. I am scared that if I see her she will look *different*...others have described seeing dead people very traumatic and surreal and I don't know what I should do.

If I see her dead will that be the image that stays with me forever? Will that be printed on my eyelids for years to come? Am I better not going?

[snowman]

To be honest it's a tricky one. I saw my father at the morgue and it is the lasting memory I have. However every now and then I question if he really died but then remember I saw him dead. I believe it's personal and you do what's best for YOU. Ignore others opinions and listen to your heart. A friend of mine lost her mum recently and asked the same question. I gave her the same answer.

My thoughts are with you at this difficult time.

[Brokenone]

To be honest it's a tricky one. I saw my father at the morgue and it is the lasting memory I have. However every now and then I question if he really died but then remember I saw him dead. I believe it's personal and you do what's best for YOU. Ignore others opinions and listen to your heart. A friend of mine lost her mum recently and asked the same question. I gave her the same answer.

My thoughts are with you at this difficult time.

Thank you for replying hun. I guess i'm wondering if seeing her would help me to accept she is gone and if it would also help me to say my goodbye. I'm trying not to listen to others opinions but in the past many friends have viewed their loved ones and I know most of them wish they hadn't. I saw my partner in death but I was with her when she passed and I held her hand and then I later helped make her up so she looked nice. It wasn't such a shock then because I stayed with her to the very very end.

I feel torn because I fear I will regret going but I may also regret not going if that makes sense.

[Jinxsta]

My heart goes out to you, and there's nothing I or anyone can say to make things better, but just know that we on the forum are here for you.

In response to your question, I think it maybe different for each individual, but personally I was 10 when my Nan died and I was very very close to her, my mum left the decision up to me whether I wanted to see her in her casket, I decided I wanted to and yes that final image of her has stuck my mind, and the touch...what she felt like, that image does flash in my mind quite alot, the only thing that gets me through is knowing that, that wasn't her that was just her shell so to speak, her spirit and actual being had left. I do think if i had chance to go back, I wouldn't want to see her like that, would rather my last memory of her be one where she was alive.

XxX

[Brokenone]

Thanks for being so honest about something so personal hun. I know that nobody can tell me what to do but I just want to know how others have dealt with losing someone. I think (deep down) that I want to remember her how she was...I don't want that last image of her to appear whenever I close my eyes or think of her.

The thing with me is I do tend to go over things in my mind and i'm pretty certain I will replay that final image of her time and time again. I think I know what I want to do, I hope my family will understand that I don't feel I can face seeing her like that.

[Marchmadness]

Hey -

This is a hard question to answer only cause everyones experience will be different.

For myself I know that I needed to see my mom. I couldnt wait to go and see her

again, she was ill for a long time and fought really hard. So going there was hard

and seeing her was hard but for myself I wanted and needed to. I am sorry for your

loss.

Marchmadness

[Brokenone]

Thank you Marchmadness :hug2:

[bena.baby]

Hi, sorry you're having such a hard time. I basically agree with everyone else, that it's really personal. I lost my gran, and I was very close to her, and I just couldn't see her. I knew it would upset me too much, and I already had so many lovely memories of her that I didn't feel the need to see her again. On the negative side, I didn't accept her death for a long time (which also had a lot to do with leaving home just before her death I suppose) and maybe seeing her would have helped that.

Something that helped me a little was writing her a letter and my aunt put it in the coffin with her. It made me feel better to have got all my thoughts out, and to have them close to her somehow.

My thoughts are with you x

[Rael]

im really sorry about your nan and it is a very difficult thing to know what to do for the best.

i went to see two people, close to both, and seeing them was incredibly difficult and the images do flit into my mind sometimes (i have odd reactions to death so this doesnt bother me but many people it will) but there was a sense of closure.

my best friend died last year and we couldnt see him (autopsy taking a long long time they couldnt determine cause of death etc). i went to the funeral and all that but its not sunk in the way it did before. i wake up and go to call him because i dont realize he is dead, ive had no....proof i suppose. i do wish i could have seen him because at the moment i slip often into thinking he is still alive, i have seen him and heard him.

everyone reacts differently to things, and i guess deep down you know how you will react better than i do, one thing i will say is dont pick what you do based on what family or friends etc say you should do, do what is best for you only.

we will be here to support you whatever you decide

xxx

[Brokenone]

Hi, sorry you're having such a hard time. I basically agree with everyone else, that it's really personal. I lost my gran, and I was very close to her, and I just couldn't see her. I knew it would upset me too much, and I already had so many lovely memories of her that I didn't feel the need to see her again. On the negative side, I didn't accept her death for a long time (which also had a lot to do with leaving home just before her death I suppose) and maybe seeing her would have helped that.

Something that helped me a little was writing her a letter and my aunt put it in the coffin with her. It made me feel better to have got all my thoughts out, and to have them close to her somehow.

My thoughts are with you x

Thank you. The letter idea sounds good. I have already put down some words somewhere so maybe I could do that. x

[Brokenone]

im really sorry about your nan and it is a very difficult thing to know what to do for the best.

i went to see two people, close to both, and seeing them was incredibly difficult and the images do flit into my mind sometimes (i have odd reactions to death so this doesnt bother me but many people it will) but there was a sense of closure.

my best friend died last year and we couldnt see him (autopsy taking a long long time they couldnt determine cause of death etc). i went to the funeral and all that but its not sunk in the way it did before. i wake up and go to call him because i dont realize he is dead, ive had no....proof i suppose. i do wish i could have seen him because at the moment i slip often into thinking he is still alive, i have seen him and heard him.

everyone reacts differently to things, and i guess deep down you know how you will react better than i do, one thing i will say is dont pick what you do based on what family or friends etc say you should do, do what is best for you only.

we will be here to support you whatever you decide

xxx

I guess I know how I may react and that is what worries me. I'm already grieving for my step daughter and so I'm not sure how this will effect me too. I tend to replay things in my mind over and over again and I don't want to do that with a memory of my nan in her coffin.

I am worried what friends and family will say but I know I need to do what is right for me.

Thanks for your words hun, really appreciated xxl

[AveMaria]

Sorry you are going through this, losing a loved one is so hard! Like everyone else said, it is a very personal decision and can be hard to make. When my grandpa died, whom I was very very close to, I didn't stare at him in the coffin or anything, but I knelt by the coffin and said my goodbyes to him. I let him know how much I loved him and did my prayers for god to take care of him for me. I needed that closure to get to say my goodbye and to see that his spirit was gone, but that they would put his body in the cemetary with a monument that I could visit to still feel close to him. I found it helpful in the grieving process, and I didn't feel that it became how I remembered him. I remember how I felt not anything about how he looked. Best wishes!

xxx

[wooza]

Hi, Such a sad time for you...

I agree with Bena Baby... I would write a letter and have someone put it close to your nan. If you do decide to go you can leave it yourself.....it will still say all the things you can't when your upset. Your nan will always have a little something of you with her. It can be traumatic seeing a person in the coffin.... but also sometimes they look so at peace... you have to do whats best for you.... which ever is the less painful for you.

Take care

W

[hummm_mabbe]

Hullo

I dunno if anyone has said this, and maybe you have already explored it yourself, but it sounds like you might be suffering from symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which can be helped with certain therapies. CBT is meant to be good ...

I know this doesnt answer your question, but it may mean that you can finally feel better and get rid of those terrible swings between feeling horrible and numb.

:hug2:

[walker]

it is your choice but a hard one

i saw mother - in - law

my legs gave way

shocked to the core

and after

i had images of my children in that place

i am not sure i will do it again

it is a hard time for you

i am sorry

[yorkiegal73]

It's a really personal issue. My mum died in Madeira so it took several weeks for her body to be transported back to the UK. My dad suggested it would be better if I didn't go and see her because to put it bluntly, she would have started to deteriorate. I always regretted not going, as we'd had a bad relationship and I needed some closure.

My gran died in a nursing home a couple of years ago. I got a phone call from Dad to say she was on her way out. I walked into her room expecting her to be alive still, and instead found her dead. That image stayed with me for about a year and still makes me shudder a little when I think back on it. However, she was in her nineties and her death was a release.

I worked in a nursing home for a couple of years so I've seen quite a few bodies, and also helped to lay them out. It's my opinion that once the person has died, there is nothing left. Just a shell. If they have a spirit it has gone elsewhere by then. I've sat with people who are dying and felt the same each time. I only regret not seeing my mum because I felt it difficult to consider her dead, and she often 'comes back' as part of my psychosis.

I think you should go by how you feel when it happens. For some people it is a comfort. The death of an elderly person is very different to that of a child.

[.scarred.]

I personally think that to start with, you do see nothing but how they were when they were already dead. However, as time goes on, memories of the person when they were healthy come back and things get easier because you were there all through their life and death for as long as you could be there.

Not veryone feels the same way about it though. Some of the people I know said that they couldnt see them in any other way other than how they were when they were dead.

I'm sorry if that wasnt too helpful..

[Paris]

I have seen several dead people from being a nurse, never gets any easier. I saw my grandad when I was 14 and that gave me closure, I held my fiance when he died and saw him after. im comfortable around dead people, i think its an inddvidual choice to be honest, have to say tho, my fiance haunts me in muy dreams but im glad i sawy him

im sorry you are going through this but we are to listen to anytime you want to talk

Paris

[Brokenone]

Thank you so much for your replies. I did decide to go to the nursing home in the end and it was horrific seeing her struggling so much. In the end we requested a doctor to come and he made her more comfortable by giving her a sedative injection. She suddenly went very calm, didn't struggle anymore with her breathing and the terrible *noises* stopped. She fell into a sleep and passed about half an hour later.

I'm glad I went now because although it was very hard seeing her struggle and hearing those terrrible noises in her throat...in the end she did go peacefully. I was able to hold her hand just before she went and tell her how much I loved her.

Regarding seeing her in her casket...i'm still not sure. I have said my goodbye now and at that point she was still *warm* to the touch...although her appearcnce was still quite shocking.

Thanks guys for taking the time to reply. I just needed to vent and get my feelings out xxxx

[Rael]

im sorry it happened but im glad you were able to hold her hand and tell her how much you loved her. i do hope that being there will give you closure, having said goodbye.

xxx

[Paris]

hugs hun you are so brave

[AveMaria]

I am glad you were able to say your goodbyes and get closure. Whatever decision you make about seeing her in the casket will be the right one for you, best wishes and I am sorry for your loss.

xxx