It’s a morbid thought to have, but death is simply a part of life. It doesn’t make coping with the loss of a loved one any easier, but the truth is that sometimes, we just have to prepare ourselves for the inevitable. As much as you’d like to lock yourself up in a room and not speak to anyone for a while, you do have the responsibility of making sure that the funeral procedures are taken care of. Think of it this way- you’re doing their departure justice by ensuring that it is a beautiful funeral and memorial service, and you’re doing it exactly the way they would have wanted. If you need some guidance to help you plan this, read on to find out how you can plan a funeral service.
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Understand Their Wishes
The whole point of all this is to honor the memory of your loved one, so it only makes sense that you make the effort to understand what they would have liked. There are instances where people clarify these details, and this makes your life a whole lot easier. If not, then you can talk to the people that knew them the most to get a feel of what kind of funeral and burial they would have liked. The most important being how the burial will take place. Will it be a traditional burial with an open or closed coffin? Would they have preferred to have been cremated? There are even new-age ideas where a person is buried with a tree, in order to give back to the environment. Other than that, according to what kind of person your loved one was, you can go along with the feel and theme of the funeral process. It can either be extremely formal, or it can go in a more celebratory direction.
Contact a Funeral Service
It is imperative that you find yourself a competent funeral service, because you do need the help, and you will be amazed at how much these services can take care of for you. In Australia for instance, Perth locals have their own go-to people that are well known for their funeral services. The options at Funeralcare.com.au give you insight into what such services manage, and how they do this. They can even go as far as planning the whole funeral for you if you feel that this is something that is way over your head. Just clarify which direction you’re going in, and they’ll do the rest.
Discuss With Family & Friends
It’s so important that you rally up all the family and friends that were closest to the deceased because they are the people that will be able to guide you in getting the funeral details right. It’s important that they know that their input for their loved one is cherished and appreciated and that they contribute to the funeral as a whole. You’ll find that everyone will be willing to lend a helping hand. If the funeral was no pre-paid for, you’ll be able to get everyone to pitch in to help out at well, so this is something that will really help you in planning the funeral. You also want to see who will be speaking at the funeral and have them prepare their speeches, and see which order they’ll come up in so that you’re organized in this sense and have an idea of how much time it will take to get through them.
Organize the Day Of
Once you’ve gotten through all the previous steps, the day itself is at hand. You need to arrange the announcement and decide how best to do this. If you’d like to send out emails or make a statement on social media or even the newspaper. When it comes to the memorial and the reception after the funeral, think about hiring food and drink catering company, as well as servers. You’re certainly not going to be in the correct state of mind to take care of these things yourself and then get to washing dishes and cleaning up later. And that’s why you’ll also need to hire a cleaning company to sort things out for you after everyone’s left. Take into consideration that it may or may not rain, so be prepared for this. Always have both an indoor and outdoor option for the reception so that it doesn’t get too crowded.
When a loved one passes away, it’s extremely difficult to function as we normally would, so the idea that we need to plan a funeral is something that is incredibly overwhelming. This is why following the steps provided here will help you get through it in an organized manner. You’ll be able to take care of every factor of the funeral and you won’t have to deal with more than you can handle.
