<p>We took my mom’s ashes out to sea. Actually it is a harbor. My dad gets incredibly seasick so he only wanted to go out the bare minimum which was a mile. But I found the experience incredibly depressing. We went out on a fishing boat, dumped the ashes into the ocean and tossed in flower petals. It was just depressing to see the ashes disipate to nothing. And then there’s no gravesite to visit, no remembrance at all. I never thought about it much until we did it for my mom (at her request), but I don’t recommend it. I’d rather see her ashes buried somewhere with a headstone so I could go visit on Memorial Day or her birthday or whatever.</p>
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<p>Ha, I’ve had this same conversation with my children!</p>
<p>We walk around cemeteries while visiting loved ones and I point out things that I like and don’t like. “Look at those pretty crocuses! Planting flowers is not allowed but crocus bulbs bloom and are gone by the time the groundskeeper begins mowing for the season.”</p>
<p>“Ooh, look! A bench headstone. What a great idea! That way you’ll be comfortable while you sit and pray for my soul.” :)</p>
<p>We scattered my mom’s ashes in a spot overlooked by the bench we take our annual New Year’s Day family photo on. That way, when we take the photo in the future, we can look out at her.</p>
<p>We just went really early in the morning the NYD after she died and scattered them without any “permission” or anything. There were a few people around but nobody seemed to care.</p>
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<p>I’m sorry, PhotoOp. I was writing while you were posting and now my post looks insensitive after yours.</p>
<p>I’m sorry, too, for the loss of your mother. I have grandparents without a burial location and I understand what you mean about wishing there was a place to visit.</p>
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<p>Yes, this is a consideration for some people.</p>
<p>I mentioned the post-cremation fate of several of my family members above. The one who chose to have her ashes scattered was my mom.</p>
<p>It does not bother me at all that there is no location to visit. But it bugs my sister intensely.</p>
<p>I think I know where I’d like my ashes sprinkled after I go. There’s a field of lupine in the High Sierra of Yosemite that is incredibly beautiful. My feeling is that I want the kids to visit the meadow and think of me, think of my life, in beautiful surroundings that I loved. Cemetaries and columbariums creep me out. I don’t want my kids going to a cemetary to <em>visit</em> me. It brings to mind death more than life. Nothing says eternity more than looking out over the mountains. “I lift mine eyes up to the everlasting hills”.</p>
<p>(And yes, the lack of a headstone, will make it harder for my GGG-descendants to find GGG-grandma if they like genealogy).</p>
<p>I didn’t know it would bother me until it happened. But I also didn’t know what her wishes were until she was gone. She didn’t want a funeral either but we had a memorial at her house anyway (I ended up officiating since no one else was interested). She was a very practical and unemotional woman but sometimes I think when people make their end of life plans they need to think about those who are left behind, not just what they want for themselves - if that makes sense.</p>
<p>And Villagemom - no apology necessary :)</p>
<p>Our med school does take quite a few bodies/cadavers every year for their anatomy class. My friend donated her H after he died. He was an MD and had close ties with the med school and she felt he would have loved it. She had a memorial service without the body and may have another after she receives the cremains. It was a significant savings to her, which was an unexpected benefit of not having a body that she had to figure out what to do with.</p>
<p>H bought each of us a cemetery plot at the cemetery where his folks are buried, which is near our home. He really wants us buried, NOT cremated. I told him he’d better outlive me, otherwise, I prefer cremation, as more ecological (I think).</p>
<p>For the most part, I do like visiting cemeteries and have mostly happy associations with them, as it is something our extended family does – gather at the cemetery to pay respects as a large group. H also seems to find comfort in them and visits his parents and sister periodically (maybe once or more/year). Most of them are very nicely maintained and a nice green space with lots of grass and often a few trees.</p>
<p>If there are just ashes scatted into the ocean or elsewhere, it would be nice to have a plaque or equivalent somewhere for people who wanted to visit it, I guess. Have not spent much time thinking about this, but it is probably a good thing to consider. My SIL just wanted whatever made it easiest for her surviving brothers. </p>
<p>I know several people who have their loved ones’ cremains in their homes somewhere.</p>
<p>My father is a veteran, which entitles both him and my mom to space in a national cemetary. So someday both of them will rest in their urns at the columbarium at Sacramento Valley National Cemetary. They don’t like the idea of being scattered one little bit. They want to know where they’ll be.</p>
<p>Here is a link to body donation programs in the US.</p>
<p>[Anatomical</a> Board’s List of Body Donation Programs](<a href=“http://old.med.ufl.edu/anatbd/usprograms.html]Anatomical”>http://old.med.ufl.edu/anatbd/usprograms.html)</p>
<p>When my husband was terminally ill, he, I and our three children all agreed that donation what we wished to do.
Philosophically we agree that the deceased person’s spirit is in our hearts with our memories and not in the physical location of their remains. We elected not to have DH cremains returned when the anatomy board process was complete.</p>
<p>One relative wanted to be cremated, and her family followed her wishes. She didn’t specify what to do with the cremains, so her husband still has them in a box in the linen cupboard Her children respond to any news that mom wouldn’t have liked with “That sound you just heard was Mom, rolling over in the cupboard…”.
They wishdad would do something a little more dignified.</p>
<p>Timely issue for me. Both my parents wanted to donate their bodies to medical research. My mom died in 2011 and our state medical school was very appreciative. They just called this week to advise me her ashes are ready for return, and will arrive in the mail shortly. I really don’t know what I’ll do, but probably her church’s section for ashes. I know I will be horribly sad when I get a big box in the mail.</p>
<p>On a different note, a friend of mine was friends with a little 90 year old nun. She had outlived all her relatives and - duh! - had no children to take care of her. The Church apparently (and much to my surprise) does not provide for burial of deceased nuns. So my friend stepped up. She had the nun cremated, but found out it cost a fair amount of money to bury cremated remains, which her husband objected to. It’s illegal in our state to bury remains just any old place. However, in the middle of the night, my friend snuck into the convent’s garden with a shovel and buried her dear departed friend under a rose bush. Her friend probably was laughing quietly up in heaven during the whole process.</p>
<p>Perfect timing for us. Mom has too many “resources” and was denied Medicaid. The resource putting her over the top is her measly $5K life insurance policy. So we’re in process of making the funeral home the beneficiary so she can get Medicaid.</p>
<p>Anyway, Mom wants to be cremated and her ashes spread in the Pacific ocean- of course not the Atlantic where we live. LOL. So we will fly to Cali and do this but I want to have some of her cremains put in a glass paperweight, or something. Check this out- very pretty and not obvious.:</p>
<p>[My</a> Memorial Glass](<a href=“http://www.mymemorialglass.com/index.html]My”>My Memorial Glass, Ashes in Glass, Newport, Oregon) </p>
<p>Something else we are going to ask mom is about the eternal reef- the only problem is that it’s only on the east coast:
[Scattering</a> Ashes - Memorial Reef | Eternal Reefs -](<a href=“http://www.eternalreefs.com/]Scattering”>http://www.eternalreefs.com/)</p>
<p>My father was cremated (in 1978) and the ashes delivered to us by a tall skinny man in a black suit, white shirt, black tie; his name was Mr. Sickle. I remember him all too well; I handed the ashes to my mother and she put them on the mantel, where they remained until she moved out of the house and put them in storage for 19 years. His ashes have since been interred with a headstone at a memorial park near Valley Forge (he loved Valley Forge and we went there often for picnics). My mother wanted to save money and had her name put on it as well, with her birth year and her projected year of death. She was wrong and we had to have it changed after she died. Her ashes were scattered according to her wishes by her sister and me (they’re not with my father’s ashes, by her choice); later that day I was stung by a stingray and I’ve always wondered if there was a connection.</p>
<p>My son’s ashes are buried under a rose bush in Massachusetts; since he will always be with me, it matters not where his ashes are.</p>
<p>My personal wish is to have my ashes released into the winds from the top of Mauna Loa.</p>
<p>My mother’s ashes were interred at a Jewish mausoleum in New Jersey, located within the same cemetery where her parents are buried. I’d like to end up there myself.</p>
<p>My former husband passed away 2 months ago–kids are 15 and 19. We plan to scatter the ashes at sea on Cape Cod in July (going out in a boat we have fished from), and are sponsoring a memorial bench and the planting of a tree in a nature preserve.</p>
<p>My grandparents are both scattered in Scotland, near where they lived much of their adult lives. My dad never expressed any wishes, died and was cremated in Bangkok, where he lived. A friend, knowing how my dad liked mountains, knew just the place, in mountains outside the city. That this was an echo of his parents, made sense. We drove up that mountains, and scattered the ashes down a path, over the forest below. </p>
<p>Later, we learned my dad had never been to that park, as he objected to the white foreigner 10x admission price for entry. And us white faces in the car had to pay that 10x entry fee, as we will have to do each time we visit the site. Offensive to my Scottish values! Now I don’t mind too much the Thais charging more for recreational visits. However paying that to visit my dad’s remains at a place he refused to go seems a little over the top. </p>
<p>Sudsie, sorry for your kids and your recent loss. How hard, at this point in their lives. The bench and tree sound like a good and comforting plan.</p>
<p>Maybe it’s my own peculiarity, but the term “cremains” is like fingernails on a blackboard to me. I certainly don’t find it more comforting than “ashes.”</p>
<p>I have a friend who kept their son’s ashes in a box in the house. They have moved several times since he died, I’m not sure if they kept the ashes or found them a final resting place. To me that box was not “him”, but each to his own. </p>
<p>I have another friend who had a huge tattoo done to commemorate her beloved husband and had some of his ashes mixed with the ink. I cringed internally when I heard this, but I guess whatever helps a person cope. thankfully my husband hates tattoos so having one done to commemorate him (when the time comes) is not on the table.</p>
<p>I’d like to end up at the ocean. Preferably before I’m dead, but otherwise having my ashes scattered in the ocean sounds good.</p>
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<p>Yes, but there are many ways of thinking of the needs of others. </p>
<p>For example, my mom, who wanted her ashes scattered, specified a body of water near her home where she knew there were commercial services that do this. There were other locations that were more meaningful to her, but in those instances, the family would have had to do the scattering on our own. I’m pretty sure she realized that we would have been uncomfortable with that.</p>