Have You Ever Seen A Dead Body

[BrassFusion]

as for pets... i'm really lucky. i've seen gerbils die spasmodically, but i was at work this july when my dog died. poor dad was home alone with her and our other dog. i guess she just kinda buckled her legs under her in the middle of the kitchen and sighed. dad says he tried to do some measure of CPR, which is REALLY REALLY funny in hindsight, but it's also very sad. i'm so glad I wasn't here for that.

by the time i got home they'd taken her body away.

[Scary Guy]

4-5 funerals (maybe more, don't feel like counting right now) and there was the wayne state mortuary science department's open house last October where they had two cadavers out that had been plastinized. I won't go into any more details there but wow I had fun.

[n0Mad]

Wow you and I shoulda got together cuz I used to pick them up from the funeral homes and bring them to the cemetary for cremation. I also tickled a dead lady's foot once, she didn't laugh

A friend of mine used to do cosmetics on corpses to get them all pretty looking for their funerals.

[pomba gira]

A friend of mine used to do cosmetics on corpses to get them all pretty looking for their funerals.

Just talked to someone a couple days ago, who had a job offer to do that. Sounded like really good $$... like $300 per stiff as I recall... if I had the skills I'd be at the nearest funeral home in a heartbeat.

I think it would be a real work of love to make people look as nice as possible for their loved ones... avoid that waxy-corpse look which is always upsetting to me.

[JaneDead]

reading all about the pets up there ^ - i have seen 3 of my pets after they died. i didn't have to watch them die but as a kid seeing your dead pet is pretty messed up either way.

one died in our kitchen, one on our front porch and one on our back porch. i had to help my dad out with the back porch one. that was messed up too. i never wanted to touch a dead thing let alone my dead pet!

i also got to watch another one of my pets eat her dead puppy. i thought my dog was a monster for doing that and screamed and probably cried. i don't remember. my dad told me it was ok. to this day i wonder - is that normal for a dog to eat her dead puppy. ick.

i've seen dead mice too and had to get rid of them. that's not as bad except for the smell. dead birds are a pretty gross thing too. i have only ever seen them outside of the places i have lived which now that i think about that, that's kind of weird. i guess i think any dead thing is gross. if i find a dead bug in the basement i get grossed out.

i could have been around when other family members have died but i choose to leave before it happened. in a way i wish i would have stayed now that i dealt with it with my dad. the first 2 times it was my uncle and my grandma in the hospital but right before they were going to die i freaked out and had to leave. as painful as it is i think it is better to stay and be there when someone you love is about to "leave".

[JaneDead]

I think it would be a real work of love to make people look as nice as possible for their loved ones... avoid that waxy-corpse look which is always upsetting to me.

i think it really helps the family too. my uncle, grandma and dad were all at the same funeral home and they made them up to look really nice. not that i think a dead body can actually look "nice", it helped to see them look "like themselves".

the funerals for my great uncles - they looked really weird. cakey make up, not the right skin tone, made them look not like themselves and it was more disturbing. to me at least.

[n0Mad]

So is this the most goth thread yet or what?

(and how come we don't have a dead smiley?)

[BrassFusion]

So is this the most goth thread yet or what?

(and how come we don't have a dead smiley?)

how come we have smilies PERIOD? they're so ungoth.

[Msterbeau]

how come we have smilies PERIOD? they're so ungoth.

New goths are unpredictable that way...

[Homicidalheathen]

Yes, a couple accidents.....a dead loved one, and a corpse. I don't want to go into it about the last one.

[pomba gira]

i also got to watch another one of my pets eat her dead puppy. i thought my dog was a monster for doing that and screamed and probably cried. i don't remember. my dad told me it was ok. to this day i wonder - is that normal for a dog to eat her dead puppy. ick.

i could have been around when other family members have died but i choose to leave before it happened. in a way i wish i would have stayed now that i dealt with it with my dad. the first 2 times it was my uncle and my grandma in the hospital but right before they were going to die i freaked out and had to leave. as painful as it is i think it is better to stay and be there when someone you love is about to "leave".

It is entirely normal and done by animals from mice to lions. A lot of times a mother animal will kill (or refuse to nurse) & eat a severely deformed baby... the idea is this serves 2 purposes: gets rid of the dead offspring so it doesn't draw scavengers/predators to the nest area, and builds up the mother's strength after birth. Same reason cats, etc. eat their offsping's poops until they start eating solid food.

I was angry with myself for a while, for not making it in time to be with my aunt when she passed. I feel better about it now because I had an experience while racing to get there, where I believe her spirit came to say farewell... and to tell me to slow down before I wrecked my car.

[Steven]

As tough as it is to watch a human die, it can be equally tough to watch the life of a pet or some other living creature go, too. It was not easy to say "yes" when the vet asked if I wanted to hold my cat Tasha while she put her to sleep. To hold and comfort her while she breathed her last .... Another memory that will not likely ever go away.

pets are family.

[Steven]

Just talked to someone a couple days ago, who had a job offer to do that. Sounded like really good $$... like $300 per stiff as I recall... if I had the skills I'd be at the nearest funeral home in a heartbeat.

I think it would be a real work of love to make people look as nice as possible for their loved ones... avoid that waxy-corpse look which is always upsetting to me.

BRENDA- are you reading this?

[Nienna]

Once. I was just driving along and traffic was all backed up. I got to the accident causing the backup and there was this guy laying in the street, obviously dead, with a woman holding a piece of paper over his face to keep rain off it while they waited for the authorities. He seemed to have been hit while biking.

I can still see it pretty clearly. I really wish I hadn't looked.

[Shade Everdark]

As tough as it is to watch a human die, it can be equally tough to watch the life of a pet or some other living creature go, too. It was not easy to say "yes" when the vet asked if I wanted to hold my cat Tasha while she put her to sleep. To hold and comfort her while she breathed her last .... Another memory that will not likely ever go away.

I held Kiri, my cat, as she was put down. It was worse, by far, than seeing my grandfather die, when he went. Sometimes, death is inexpressibly tragic and heart-wrenching; at other times, it is simply a blessing.

Like an unwelcome shade, it haunts me still.

[JaneDead]

I held Kiri, my cat, as she was put down. It was worse, by far, than seeing my grandfather die, when he went. Sometimes, death is inexpressibly tragic and heart-wrenching; at other times, it is simply a blessing.

Like an unwelcome shade, it haunts me still.

all the deaths (in my family- uncle, dad, grandmother) were both heart wrenching and a blessing at the same time. their suffering was over and ours began. my dad and uncle were sudden in a way and my grandma we knew it would happen one day just not when and it still seemed sudden to me. i don't know what is worse - knowing and preparing for it or just having it happen out of nowhere? though i am not sure how you can ever really "prepare" to lose someone.

[Brenda Starrr]

i think it really helps the family too. my uncle, grandma and dad were all at the same funeral home and they made them up to look really nice. not that i think a dead body can actually look "nice", it helped to see them look "like themselves".

the funerals for my great uncles - they looked really weird. cakey make up, not the right skin tone, made them look not like themselves and it was more disturbing. to me at least.

BRENDA- are you reading this?

You have NO idea how badly I'd love to do this.

After seeing so many of my most favorite people look like fucking drag queens in the coffin, I know for a fact that I could do it better.

Besides, they can't bitch and breathe onion breath on me while I work.

[CixWicked]

An ineresting bit... I've witnessed an exorbitant amount of death.

When I was about 6 a friend of mine was riding in the street, and was hit by an out of control car, and decapitated, right in front of me.

Again when I was 6 a 4 year old had sever MS, and died in my mothers arms while I watched from the stiars.

When I was about 8 a kid in the neighborhood next door, was hit and killed by a car... I came on the scene as the paramedics were trying to resus him...

When I was ten a kid in my elementary school was killed in a car accident right outside the school... I didn't see the death, but I remember vividly watching his brother walking into the building holding the lifeless body of his brother.

When I was 11 my father passed away from Lukemia. I didnt witness it, but it still lives in me...

When I was 14 I was arrested because a known associate of mine (Alias, one of my best friends) was shot and killed by someone fitting my discription. By the time I got to the station, the actual killer's girl friend turned him in... the killer whas David "Daddio's" sister's boyfriend...

When I was 16 I found a dead body in the dumpster behind my house... he was a guy from my neighborhood, and had been shot to death and left there by a rival gang.

Again when I was 16 I saw a man shoot another man in the back with a shot gun and kill him right off the balcony across the alleyway.

Again when I was 16 some friends of mine got into an arguement, one of my friend pulls out a gun, another friend of mine stepped between him and his target... shot through the stomach, and killed... his target was also hit but he survived.

When I was 17 a fight broke out in a house party across the street from my house, and my older sisters boyfriend was shot in the back of the head, and killed.

When I was 19 a girl in my neighborhood said that her boyfriend was trying to kill her, so she ran out of her house... my two brothers I ran to her house to make sure he calmed down...

[n0Mad]

Damn Cix, I'm all depressed now. =( Seriously.

[Medea]

I didn't see her actually die.

I don't think I could have, honestly. I think it would have been too much to actually watch the monitors flatline, and watch her breathe her last breath.

I was outside of the hospital smoking up a storm when my sister's best friend's mom came running up towards the door and just said "You need to go in there, it's happening"

I clutched my best friend's hand like a vice the entire way down the hall and up the elevator to the ICU. By the time I got there, she had already died, and my sister was laying next to her, tears streaming down her face as she just kept repeating "Come back, mom, you promised! You promised you'd be here for Christmas!"

I just collapsed at the foot of the bed, hugging her feet so tightly. I cried... so much. Someone stroked my back, I don't know who.

She looked so... normal. Like she was just asleep. But at the same time, she looked altogether different from my mom. Her feet were so cold...

[Troy Spiral (13)]

3

1. Dead Grandfather (had to help carry the corpse out of the cabin up north when i was 16)

2. Dead Girlfriend No. 1 (suicide, found her)

3. Dead Girlfriend No. 2. (died in a car cash on the way to visit me went with her father to identify)

[Steven]

3

1. Dead Grandfather (had to help carry the corpse out of the cabin up north when i was 16)

2. Dead Girlfriend No. 1 (suicide, found her)

3. Dead Girlfriend No. 2. (died in a car cash on the way to visit me went with her father to identify)

heavy.

[pomba gira]

all the deaths (in my family- uncle, dad, grandmother) were both heart wrenching and a blessing at the same time. their suffering was over and ours began. my dad and uncle were sudden in a way and my grandma we knew it would happen one day just not when and it still seemed sudden to me. i don't know what is worse - knowing and preparing for it or just having it happen out of nowhere? though i am not sure how you can ever really "prepare" to lose someone.

With my aunt, I had about as much preparation as anyone ever gets and I feel truly blessed that I was able to be so close to her in those final months... Aunt Myrt was 92 (altho we thought she was 88) & her health had steadily deteriorated for the past year. During her last month or so I could feel her letting go more & more as time went by... I knew she would leave us soon but now how soon. I think she chose the time of her passing... when we brought her home from the hospital her last day, she was so upset because she couldn't walk... but once we got her to bed she was so happy to be home & have us all around her. In fact one of the last things I heard her say was "I'm home, I'm home and my children are here". And her last words to me were "thank you for everything, Punkin' Babe". She was always adamant that she didn't want to be in a nursing home, and I believe she knew that she wouldn't be able to live at home much longer. She was a very strong willed person and if anyone could choose their time of crossing over, it would've been her. She taught us all countless lessons throughout her life, and I believe the serenity and quiet strength with which she faced death was her final lesson to me. I miss her more than words can say... but I can also see her death as a blessing. I think of how much she hated growing more & more dependent on others for her most basic needs, and how happy she must be to leave her frail, , painful, failing body behind. She was the last survivor of 10 siblings... only one person who she knew as a child/young adult is still living... and I can't help but smile and be comforted when I imagine how joyful her reunion with all those loved ones must have been. So much of grief is just selfishness and lack of faith... but even that understanding can't entirely ease the feelings of loss.

[JaneDead]

pomba's response brings up another question for me, and probably brings the subject more OFF topic than orginally intended but:

does it make it easier to accept death if the person dying/who died (suddenly or not) lived a full life? or lived to an old age? my uncle was 33, my dad 50 and my grandma in her early 60's. so i guess in that way i feel there was much more they could/should do.

my great uncles were much older so i feel they lived that "full life" but also i was not terribly close to them so the loss was also very different.

my first friend who died was when i was 10. she was sick and it was a very weird thing to have to be exposed to. childhood sickness that lead to death. i was not there when she died, i don't even remember going to a funeral but it was the first friend i had that died. this is WAY Off topic but i remember a b-day party for her in which they gave her stuff that you give older girls and i thought "why would they give her that? she doesn't need that" then i realized when i got older it was because they knew she would not live that long and wanted her to have things she would never have otherwise. after that i wondered what it must be like to lose a child much more than i had thought about what it was like for me to lose a friend.