Final disposition (Morbid topic alert)

[Rorey]

Who knew? I never heard of this.

Alkaline hydrolysis. It's water cremation. It's better for the environment than standard cremation. I thought my plans were set with standard cremation, but now there's a new plan. I gave the composting thing a brief thought, but I don't want my family to have to think about it, so quick is better.

Ideally, I'd like my body donated to science so that somebody can learn from it. I realize that may not be an option, depending on unforeseen factors.

Water cremation isn't legal in every state, but it is in Colorado. I thought it would be too expensive, but it turns out it's not that costly, as far as final disposition goes.

[sinkingfeeling]

1. Never heard of it. Would it pollute the water?

[billh58]

3. From a Colorado Holistic Funeral Home

1. What’s the alkaline hydrolysis process?

Water cremation uses mainly water and alkaline compounds such as potassium hydroxide (lye or potash) to do what would happen naturally, over a longer period, with a natural burial; our bodies become fertilizer for the earth. The reduction of the physical remains to bones happens over a few hours in a water cremation vessel that has a gentle rocking motion. At the end of the alkaline hydrolysis process, the PH is adjusted, all pathogens are neutralized and rendered harmless, any implants are recycled ,and the resulting liquid is a sterile and nutrient-rich biofertilizer. Bones remain just as with flame cremation and can be returned to family in the familiar “cremains” form.

https://www.thenaturalfuneral.com/water-cremation/

Seems like an ecologically sound process.

[Rorey]

7. Thank you!

I found a place called Be a Tree Cremation in Denver, which is a little closer to where I live down in Pueblo.

[yellowdogintexas]

2. my husband's grandmother donated her body

which kind of shocked me since she was such a strict Baptist and I would have thought she would insist on having a complete body for the Second Coming.

So I think I am going to do that.

Or get a prepaid cremation with Neptune Society. Under $1000 for the whole kit and kaboodle. My aunt and uncle did that and that convinced me it was a good thing

[Rorey]

8. Once upon a time, somebody warned me I shouldn't do that

He said sometimes the students studying the cadavers joke around sometimes. I guess he didn't know me very well. The thought of that didn't at all bother me. I just smiled.

[haele]

4. We did that with Princess.

It wasn't any more expensive than a pet cremation. Far more environmentally sustainable, no need for toxic embalming chemicals (unless of course, you want the 3 days of open casket a week after death so all the relatives can make a show of good-bye first) or the 20 hours of high temperature cremation.
I'm hoping it gets more widely accepted.

Haele

[Rorey]

9. There's no way in hell I'm putting my family through the viewing thing

I told them I want them to have a simple gathering. I want them to take no more than 10 minutes to let everyone get any crying out of their system, and then tell jokes about this or that thing that I did during my life.

[3catwoman3]

13. I think the whole viewing/ "visitation"/ open casket thing is completely...

...barbaric.

Some years ago, the 20 yr old daughter of our across the street neighbors died. Possible combination of asthma and weight loss drugs. Her mother had to go buy a dress to put on her daughter's body for the viewing, and then stand there for hours beside the body while people "visited."

I cannot imagine how tortuous is must be to have to stand next to the open casket containing your dead child's body. I could not do it.

[Rorey]

14. I completely agree

When my favorite husband died 29 years ago, his family wanted a viewing. I had just spent 9 days at his bedside in the ICU. I held him as he died. I didn't need or want a viewing. But I went along with it for their sake. Our three adolescent children didn't want to be there, and I didn't make them.

[multigraincracker]

5. I want my pacemaker donated to

an animal org. Don't really care about the rest.

[bahboo]

6. can animals use pacemakers?

never heard of it. If so...done...

[multigraincracker]

11. Here you go

The first clinical, fully implantable pacemaker in a human was attached to the epicardium of a patient’s heart via thoracotomy in 1958 in Sweden. This device failed after three hours, and a second device was then implanted which lasted for two days. The patient, Arne Larsson, went on to receive 26 different pacemakers during his lifetime, before dying at the age of eighty-six in 2001. One of the first clinical implantations of a pacemaker into a canine patient occurred here at Angell Animal Medical Center, by Dr. Neil Harpster with assistance by human cardiologists from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. The first published report of such an epicardial pacemaker implantation into a canine patient came out in 1968, followed less than a decade later, in 1976, by the first published transvenous placement of a pacing system in a dog. Since then, veterinary cardiologists have been able to use this technology to provide improved quality and quantity of life to countless patients.

https://www.mspca.org/angell_services/pacemakers-for-veterinary-patients/

[bahboo]

12. well who knew....thanks for this....

Fido would be more than welcome to mine...

[multigraincracker]

15. Hope mine help a furry animal

as much as mine has helped me. It’s like the fog has lifted. Ran 5 miles today.

[Rorey]

10. That's my attitude

Take what you need, if there's anything left, and the rest doesn't really matter. I won't be there anymore.

[yonder]

16. So, somwehat soiled mortal coils are roiled, maybe boiled, but not spoiled.

Boooooo.

I'll see myself to the door.

[Laffy Kat]

17. I'm in Lafayette, CO and I think there's a place a few blocks from me that does WC.

https://www.thenaturalfuneral.com/

I have thought about it, too.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

18. My mother willed her body to the cadaver lab at the nearby medical school.

We eventually got her ashes back, and eventually scattered them where she wanted. Yes, body donation, cremation, and eventual scattering of the remains. Everything in the end.

[Thunderbeast]

19. John Prine figured it out a long time ago...

Please don't bury me down in that cold cold ground...