Drinks with my sister, or, In which I get hit on by the waitress

Last night my sister and daughter and I went out for some beers (not for my daughter, she had water). There’s a little town just a little ways away from the city I live in, and they have a pizza place with tons of beers on tap and even more bottled, and my sister and I like to go anytime I am husbandless. We’ve only recently started going to this place, but we love it and even though it’s a bit of a drive (but not too bad, the little town is practically part of the city I live in) I think we are quickly becoming regulars.

So, we sit down in a booth that Clem (my daughter) picked out, and this super-adorable, butch-y server gets us some menus and says, “Back for some more torture?” She had been our waitress once before, about a month ago, and apparently remembered us (two hot chicks and a cute kid, I’d remember us too). She got us some beers that she thought we’d like (she was right) and would stop by the table every so often to flirt and let me charm her socks off, especially once she found out that I’m a mortician. Close to the beginning of the evening she pointed out the way I was dressed (skirt and matching vest; white, high-collared, button-down shirt; pantyhose and four inch heels (hot, right?)), and asked what I do for a living (I said mortician just as she started to ask if I was a paralegal or some shit, LOL). Apparently her sister always tells people that she’s a mortician just for kicks, and through the conversation we had about her sister I learned that my super-cute waitress is 24 years old (and just barely that). We continued the flirty banter throughout the evening, and I finally asked her why she works in the little (more conservative) town when she could get a job working in my (much larger and accepting of the lesbians) town instead. Here’s our convo (or what I remember the conversation going like):

Waitress: I’d get in a lot more trouble working there than I do here.
Me: What kind of trouble?
W: Well, let me just say, I like them married.
Then she WINKED and walked away.

Or something like that

So, yeah, she’s totally warm for my form, right? Maybe I’m not as old looking as I thought I was, or maybe she likes the girls that are almost thirty…

Jewish Services

So, I don't know how many of my reader friends are Jewish, or even have many Jews in their community, but this past month I've had two Jewish funerals, and let me tell you: they are not easy.

So, Jews, Orthodox Jews in particular, have rules about burial, like, not just traditions, but rules.  When one dies, the interment (burial) must be within 24 hours (as long as that's possible), not counting the Sabbath (sundown Friday to sundown Saturday) on which it is forbidden to do work pertaining to the funeral arrangements.  This can be a bit hectic, especially when the deceased's doctor isn't Jewish, as they don't always cooperate with the funeral home in how quickly they do the death certificate paperwork (which is necessary for burial to take place).  The evening before burial (the day of the death) the body must be bathed and shrouded, then placed in an Orthodox casket, called an Aron, which is always a wooden casket with no metal or animal-based glues, and usually has holes in the bottom (to aid in decomposition of the remains) and a Star of David on the lid.

So, the bathing ritual takes place in the embalming room, so I have to make sure it's extra clean, and I have to take down the crucifix that I always have hanging above the sink, and get out protective gowns, shoe covers, gloves, etc. for the people to wear that come in to do the bathing.  The ceremony is done by four members of the Synegauge that are of the same sex as the deceased, and I have never watched it, I feel out of place when they start chanting in Hebrew, but I do pop my head in every once in a while to make sure they don't need anything.  It takes about three hours, and when the bathing/praying/shrouding is done we all put the deceased in the Aron.  There are candles that get light when the bathing ceremony is taking place, ones that look a lot like the Catholic ones, but instead of Jesus they are decorated with a Star of David and words in Hebrew.  THe candle is to stay with the remains before they are buried, lit the whole time, and then after the burial they are taken by the surving family members and burned for another 6 days at home.

At the time of the death (if the Rabbi is there) the Rabbi tears the clothing of the family members.  The clothing is then worn for a week to remind the family to grieve.  If family members weren't present at the death their clothing is torn at the graveside.

The attendees at the burial all help shovel the earth into the plot once the Aron is lowered into the ground, and that's it.

It doesn't seem like as much work as it really was, rereading the post, but I promise, it was stressful.

Friday Question-fest

Question from Jenn:
Also, most of us like to think of death as a nice, quiet passing; but there are those that pass quite violently (car accidents, buildings collapse, airplane crashes) how does that differ? Have you ever encountered anything so horrific that you couldn't stand it?

It's strange I suppose, but the horrifying part of dying is usually okay with me.  There have been auto accidents that have been very scary looking when the body reaches me, with the re-building of the skull alone taking a whole day, and the actual face taking a lot longer.  A few suicides have also been quite the projects, shotguns are very damaging.   The worst looking cases (and most likely that I cannot help them) are usually drowning victims that don't get removed from the water quickly.  We call them floaters, and the water makes them decompose very quickly, and they smell awful and look even worse.  But really, I haven't ever had a case that I couldn't work on because it was too gross, I actually like the gross ones, they give me something to do. 

And IT asked:
Do funeral homes charge like a corkage fee if somebody already has casket that they bought from Walmart or Costco?

LoL.  It's actually illegal to charge a casket handling fee, but funeral homes get around it by either offering package pricing when a family buys a casket from them and then itemizing their service fees if the casket is purchased elsewhere, or by raising their service fees and lowering casket prices so that they get the money anyway.  Costco has been selling caskets for a while now, and I have only encountered a family using them twice, so I'm not really sure how well they're doing with the whole thing, and just as a side note: the caskets offered now by Walmart are made by the same company as the Costco ones.

And a last one from RIC Girl:
I have a question about facial reconstruction. Can you explain how you disguise bad cuts, broken bones or areas of the face that are shattered? How about the smells involved with the whole embalming process? Is it something you get used to?

As for facial abrasions, it depends a lot on the type of wound.  No matter what the hole is stitched up, I usually use dental floss (white, mint).  It's very strong, and thick enough not to rip through and tear the skin when pulled tightly enough to close a gaping facial wound, but not heavy like the string I ues to stitch up the embalming incision(s), and it smells nice.  Anyway, if part of the skin is missing i bring the two (or more) sides together as much as possible when I stitch it up without pulling too hard so that the skin looks too tight.  That way there is floss going across the hole, giving the stuff I use to fill the hole up with something to hold on to.  once its all stitched I dry the tissue really well with a chemical, and I can then start rebuilding.  The product I like to use the most for that sort of thing is called "Easy Way" (I know, totally lame name) and is made by a chemical company called Dodge (I think they're out of Massachusetts (wow, I don't think I would have EVER been able to spell that state n my own)).  The Easy Way is a powder and a liquid that I mix together when I'm ready to use it, and I can make it any consistency I need.  I usually make it a little more pliable than modeling wax, and stick it where I need it.  If I'm using it to fill a hole I just sculpt it to fit the surrounding tissue, and smooth it over using a paint brush and a chemical called "Dry Wash II" something a lot like nail polish remover, that allows the brush to glide over the Easy Way and not stick to it.  When the Easy Way looks the way I want it to I cover it with some of the powder in the mixture and let it sit for a bit.  I can add layer after layer to build up features (like a nose or lip, or something like the brow bone or cheekbone if it wasn't able to be rebuilt from the underside) after the underneath layers dry and become hard if I need to.  When Easy Way first came out it was hard to work with, but I kept at it, and now I like it much more than the wax clays we used for eons before the Easy Way came along.  I've been trying to teach Jane to use it as well, but she's old and set in her ways (and she usually hires me to do reconstructions anyway).  Once the features are the way I want them I use make-up over them, and then apply any hair that might need to be there (eyebrows/eyelashes are common things that need to be replaced in accident victims).

As for the smells, yeah, they're gross, and I'll admit, I have gagged a time or two, but they really don't bother me too often.  Don't get me wrong, I dont adore the smell of decomposing flesh, or the smell of viscera on an autopsied case (imagine what rotting feces would smell like), but it's just part of the job.  Same thing for the smells of the chemicals, I just kinda have to bear them, so I do.

Children and Babies

So, I've been really thinking about the questions regarding children, and I have a few different answers.  People usually want to know how I work on children and babies, like how I don't just cry and cry when I work on them, but they never really ask about the process and how it differs from that of adults, and I'd like to cover all of that here.

Children and babies have higher fat content in their bodies than normal adults, which makes it harder for the bodies of children to embalm as well as an adult since embalming relies on fixing proteins (muscle).  Fat people are a lot the same, the tissue just doesn't "fix" (get firm) as well as in bodies of someone with less fat.  In order to compensate for the higher fat content we usually use stronger formaldehyde content, but that can lead to tissue becoming dehydrated more quickly than in a "normal" case.  with children I try to use the stronger fluid mixed with humectant chemicals, which, if I try to explain, is like injecting them with lotion so as to moisturize the tissue from the inside.

With babies, especially with fetal deaths that were premature, sometimes it isn't possible to embalm them using the arterial system, as it is not developed enough to do much good, and their skin is so underdeveloped that it tears easily and is hard to stitch up any injection site.  In cases like that we normally "pack" them, which means we wrap the baby in cotton and saturate the cotton with embalming fluid, and let the body sit for a day or two.

So that's the technical aspect.

As to the emotional side of things, that's a lot harder to answer.  It wasn't until recently, in dealing with the homicide of a young child, that I had any emotional issues with the death of children.  I don't mean to sound like I am cold, or unfeeling, but I am fairly good at understanding that people, even children and babies, die.  I don't feel like it's fair, and I don't think that I feel like it has to be fair, and I know that me doing a good job, whether it be meeting with the family of a dead child, or embalming them, that it will help a grieving family, and that helps me tremendously.  Usually when a child dies it is because of an accident, or maybe a long-standing illness, and while families have questions about why their child had to be the one to die, I don't tend toward those thoughts.  But then, with the homicide case a little while ago, I was shaken.  I cried when the case got to the funeral home.  I sobbed, I was uncontrollable.  I didn't understand.  I still don't.  I cried when I met with the family.  I cried at the service.  I cried as I attemped to make the little body look like it hadn't suffered.  I cried to my mom, and my friends, and was just not myself.  I still don't sleep well, waking to thoughts and images of the little body.

So, that's what took me so long to post.

Questions of the day, Jenn edition

So here are Jenn's questions, and my answers. Keep in mind that different morticians do things differently, so my answers might not be true to what your local funeral professional does.

1. Do the bodies ever move or twitch or make noise (groans, etc.)? Yes and no. When someone dies there is no twitching or moving of the limbs and what have you. They might move a little because their muscles have completely relaxed (eyelids open, mouth opens, arms relax, etc.), but there are no other motions made by them. They can, however, make noise, usually because of air trapped in their lungs that releases, especially when we move them from their place of death onto a gurney. The air will kind of just come out, sounding like a heavy sigh. The first time that happened to me I took the guy's pulse to make sure he was dead. He was.

2. Do you really put a plug in the rectum to stop "leakage"? Yes, sometimes. The plug is actually called an A/V plug (anal/vaginal), and looks like this:

It screws into the cavity (after embalming), and first I fill it with absorbent powder (the one in the photo is a bit different than the ones I like to use, the ones I like have a larger area to put powder into). It isn't the best part of the job, but it's better than sewing the anus or vagina shut (very hard to do effectively) and WAY better than having stuff leak out of their body.

3. Do you really sew the eyes closed and/or wire the jaw closed? Kinda. With the eyes I use things called eye caps, which look like contact lenses made out of plastic, with tiny raised spots on them to "hold" the eyelid down, shown here:

The ones I use are clear, and they are placed on the eyeball before embalming.  This keeps the eyes closed during embalming, and after the embalming the tissue is hard enough that the eyelids don't open easily.  Just as an added precaution though I use a dot of glue on the eyelid to make sure that there isn't any chance the lid could open during a viewing (due to the dehydration and shrinking of the eyelid tissue, not because people try to pry eyes open all the time).

As for the mouth, the other embalmers I work with wire the jaw shut using things called injector needles, wires with a little barb on the end that embeds into the gum tissue, one on the top and one on the bottom, and intertwine those two together, closing the mouth.  I don't like the barbs though, they seem mean, even if they are easy, so I sew the jaw shut (my husband thinks it's crazy that I don't have any issues sewing a mouth shut but won't use a needle injector (the instrument used to force the barbs into the gums)).  I might have to work on a diagram to explain how I sew it, I guarantee it isn't the way you are thinking it is done.  Maybe I'll work on that this weekend, or see if I have a book with an illustration of it.

4. Do the muscles relax when you pass and you poo and pee? Yes, but most of the time that is taken care of during embalming.  Not only do a lot of the people that die have on some sort of adult diaper, but they are also on diets that consist of water and IV nutrients, so they don't have much to excrete (gross) anyway. And one of the things I do during (after) embalming is called aspirating, in which i take a trocar (a long "needle" of sorts, about two feet long) and puncture the stomach and suck out anything trapped in the organs (poo, pee, blood, bile, etc)  and drain it, and put in extra strong formaldehyde to embalm those organs well.

So, let me know what else you have...

Busy girl

I was a busy busy bee today. Tank is out of town so I have been meeting with more families than usual and have had to be the one to approve all the cremations before they leave our facility to be cremated. Jane is also out of town, but I've been to busy with other stuff to do the embalmings today so I called in a part-timer to come do them for us. Actually, I am kinda glad I didn't have to embalm today, it's been getting cooler and I am one of those people that's constantly cold anyway, so I just freeze in the prep room.

J checked on me last night and I told her that I was really hurt and sad, but that I would be here whenever she sorted all her stuff out. It was wonderful to hear the relief in her voice, I think she has been worried that I would hate her, and today she texted to let me know how much better today has been for her compared with this last week. It just might mean progress, folks.

One thing I wondered: Is there anything you want to know about my job? If not that's fine, I'll keep posting the happenings, but if there's something you wonder you can ask and if I know the answer I will tell you.

What a way to go

So, Buffy is working on death certificates for people that died over the weekend and got one with diarrhea listed as a cause of death. I was certain that the handwriting must just be difficult to read, as who has ever heard of that killing a person? Turns out that it was not the handwriting that was wrong. Diarrhea really is the cause of death. So, that's something new.

On another note: I had a bummer weekend. I saw J at church on Sunday and felt awkward. She looked great, and we talked a little. I was on my best behavior so as not to let her know how hurt and angry I am, that wouldn't be helpful for her right now. Anyway, that's it for now.