There are no holidays for death...

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!  You must know already a person morbid enough to work in a mortuary must LOVE Halloween!  Haha.  I always had the urge on Halloween to wear a grim reapers costume to work.... but thought that to be tacky while working at the mortuary...  Anyways, after we had the amazing conversation about man's best friends.... Lets kick this up a notch.  Since it is a tradition to celebrate holidays with drinking we will discuss the aftermath of drinking and driving.  One amazing day at work I had the opportunity to go on a coroner call that was a car accident on a freeway on ramp. It was a hot summer day and my partner and I were on our way to what we thought was going to be just another accident that resulted in a death... Oh were we in for a surprise that day.  When we came up on the scene there was a small toyota pickup truck rammed up against the side concrete barrier of the on ramp of the freeway.  Glass, metal, concrete and other debris were strewn about the scene.  We got out of our plain white van and went for a good look of what we were dealing with...  A young man's body was sitting in the driver seat of the pickup.  The cops told us he was at the bar and got in an argument with his girlfriend.  He got into his vehicle and sped off... He ended up here.  While drunk and driving he ran into the side rail.  The merging sign flew off its attachments and came through the windshield of the pickup.  His torso sat behind the wheel, there was blood splattered in the whole interior of the truck cab, his head lay on the seat beside him.  This young man had been decapitated by the sign that flew through the windshield.  It took three sheets and a ruined shirt to get him out of the truck.  I have never seen that amount of blood in one place.  His heart kept pumping the blood out of his neck until there was nothing left to pump.  After a celebration at the bar, he took his last ride.  Do not drink and drive.  What is left after may not be pretty to see.  It's not worth it.  Stay safe this evening and watch out for the ghouls and goblins out.

Since we are talking about pets....

While on the topic of pets we can talk about cats. I love all animals so don't get me wrong, but cats are the devil! I didn't get a chance to go on the call but I had to prepare a body to go to the crematory for cremation. This one just went in our cardboard box and no one was going to view her so we check their ID and then take a picture to save on our hard drive just in case someone thinks we didn't cremate the right person. When I pulled back the sheet to snap the photo I about puked. Have you ever seen the Batman movie, the old one with Tommy Lee Jones as the joker? Well, this woman looked a billion times worse than that. She had died, her cat got hungry and had eaten off her lips! It was like she was permanently smiling to some inside joke. It's one thing to see the horror movie where the zombie has half the flesh on their faces eaten off but this was disgusting. There she laid in front of me showing these large teeth and nothing there to cover then. For as long as I live I will see that image of the young woman lying in her cremation box smiling with no choice.

Dogs are man's best friend....

I have been on many calls where the person died along and had animals.  One of the worst cases I can remember was a call in a trailer house.  The man had been dead for about a week and had two pitbulls. The house smelt horrid.  Not only from the smell of animal feces and dirt but from the decomposing flesh of the man's body.  When I stepped inside there was a sheet covering the body lying in the middle of his living room.  The couch had been torn apart my the dogs, there were things knocked over and what was left of reachable food for the dogs shredded and thrown about.  Animals are animals first and foremost.  No matter how much we love and care for them when the time comes they feel they need to fend for themselves they do whatever is necessary to survive.  As we prepared to move the body I pulled back the white sheet... The dogs had gotten hungry.  The pitbulls had started by just nibbling on his fingers and toes.  Probably in an attempt to wake him so they could be fed.  When that didn't work they did what animals do best.  Scavenged.  The soft tissue of his abdomen had been eaten away.  There were bite marks all down his legs where they had tried to chew of the flesh.  Luckily, he was found soon after that because they hadn't tried anything to his viewing areas yet (the face and neck allowing family to see the deceased).  It's sad that in the end, your man's best friend could become your worst nightmare.

Sometimes the living seem worse than the dead...

I can vividly remember several of the pick-ups I made in my time at the mortuary.  There are lots of gruesome things I have seen and not so pleasant things to smell or touch but some of the worst things I've seen are the families.  There are stereotypes placed on different cultures of people all the time in life, but those stereotype sometimes play out in death as well.  The only time I ever saw someone pass out at all in my life was during a first call to an African American home.  Now quite often people cry and/or throw fits when we leave with their loved one.... I have never seen theatrics top this call.  A man in his early 20s was dead, his mother and large family in the home as well.  Everything was going ok until we came into the home with the gurney.  The mother started yelling, "Oh, god!"  The other family members were making loud unidentifiable moans and wails.  We got back to where the boy was and did our thing and got him back on the gurney to take him out.  The police went out and prepared the family for us coming out.  As we started to round the corner into the living room where everyone was the mother ran up to our gurney and threw her body overtop of her son.  As we held on to the gurney with our death grip (no pun intended) we stopped it from collapsing on its side to the floor.  The father came up and tried to pull the mother back from the cot and as we started moving again she lunged and fell short as her gasping had made her pass out.  We were told by the coroner to continue out the door so we high tailed it and left.  I felt so bad for that mother who lost her son.  It's amazing how some people deal with their grief so very differently.  To this day I still wonder what ever happened after we left.

Dead baby jokes anyone....

I am a sucker for dead baby jokes.  They are off color and make me laugh to no end.  What do you call a dead baby with no arms or legs in a swimming pool?  BOB!  Ok, not to make you think I am heartless or anything.  After so many years working at a mortuary that gives baby funerals for free I have seen a lot.  There is nothing more tragic than the loss of a child who hasn't even had the chance to find out who they were.  One child case I vividly remember was a 20 month old little boy.  Another coroners case I didn't have to pick this one up from his home but instead picked him up at the coroners office.  When we would go to the coroners office to pick up cases they were finished with we backed our vans into a large garage in the back of the building so no one could see.  A office adjoined the garage and two doors on opposite sides of the room.  One door lead into the offices, the second lead to two large refrigerators where they stored their bodies.  The helper in the back room would bring out the cases that were signed off for the mortuary to pick up and we would load them up into our vans and take them back to the prep room.  When the table arrived with little John Doe on it I saw a small white child body bag.  No more than three feet long, these bags were not a good sight.  When we opened the bag to check the toe tag id on the child I saw his pale, lifeless body.   John Doe's skin was charred and blistered.  There was no hair left on his little head.  The smell of BBQ lingered in the air.  Little John Doe had been burned.  Badly.  There is no more shocking sight than a child that was harmed.  What happened to this little boy?  I had to know.  Jessica, the back room tech began telling me the story...  Little John Doe's parents had been having a party.  When distractions mount, an infant falls into a fire pit in the backyard.  The only safe place on his body was under his soaked diaper.  If he had been wearing a full body diaper maybe he would have lived.  His wet diaper saved that small area of his body.  I amount of make-up would cover the damage done to his body.  I took him back to the mortuary and put his little body into the cooler.  After the door of the mortuary closed behind me at the end of that day I let out a big sigh.  There is nothing gain from death.  There is a lesson to be learned though.  Don't turn your back on your child for even a minute.  The smallest action could have the greatest consequence.

I hate cockroaches!!!

So, this one call I went on was a coroners call to a second floor apartment.  We never get any information concerning a coroners call before we arrive at the scene so that means it could be anything from an old cancer patient who's family just called 911 instead of their hospice facility, a suicide, car accident, murder... just about anything.  We arrived at this normal looking apartment complex.  No different than any other middle class apartments in any given city to find cops standing outside the apartment.  Remember the decomp before... cops standing outside isn't a good sign.  Well, as we were imagining the worst decomp possible in the apartment we turn the corner and look into the open door only to see the deceased man laying straight on the floor in front of us in his living room.  Yeah, the apartment was littered with trash, books and papers scattered about but he appeared as if he hadn't been there too long.  The coroner gave us a menacing smile and we knew something was up.  He was going back to the coroners office we were told so we went downstairs and grabbed our equipment to move the body.  Just as we stepped in my foot hit a stack of papers and a swarm of cockroaches scattered from beneath!  The coroner failed to mention that the apartment was infested.  As we moved stacks of books and papers to get to the body the roaches scattered across the floor, up the walls and trying to go up our legs.  There is nothing worse than bugs that move fast and want to crawl up your legs.  We danced to keep our feet moving as we maneuvered the body into the body bag and zipped him up to carry downstairs.  No matter how far away you get from the room, the rest of the day, you feel as if you have bugs crawling across your legs or up your back.  Use bug guard people!

My computer died... I didn't.... lol

Sorry about the long delay there in between posts!  I had been having computer issues and finally, the old PC gave out.  I ordered a new Macbook and now I am trying to make the adjustments from the PC world to the Mac world.  I LOVE IT thus far!  I will be back with more and better posts!

Honor from China

Not only did I do removals at the mortuary but I also got the chance to learn cosmetics from two of  the most amazing women every when it comes to that job.  Mary was the first to teach me her secrets.  A staple of the society we lived in, Mary had lived in the city for years.  In her 80s when I met her and still doing her job while smoking like a chimney she was amazing.  The tricks and tips she learned and gave were only there for me to absorb because of her years in the business.  Mary had gone to cosmetology school way back when.  When she finished she went to work for the mortuary doing piece work (hair and cosmetics only and when she was needed).  Mary had been at the same mortuary for over 60 years.  Most people aren't even in a marriage that long.  The second cosmetologist I worked with was Sharone.  Sharone was a white-girl with the black-girl attitude.  Her children were mixed and she only dated black men giving her that certain attitude that makes you giggle because she is a white-girl.  Her talent was great.  She knew just the right colors and amount of make-up to use without making them look like a porcelain doll that is plastered with make-up.  Both of these women taught me their tricks over the years and gave me the ability to because decent at cosmetics.  It isn't like putting make-up on living skin.  Living skin has elasticity because of your muscles still having control, pores absorb and expel, there is life in the skin that works with make-up.  The skin of a deceased is dry.  If they are embalmed it is firm because of the chemicals used, will absorb anything because of the drying chemicals and sometimes discolored horribly.  Unembalmed skin is even worse.  There is no firmness to it, any pull of the brush moves the skin with it, it's a little slimy because of the sebum of the skin not being washed off and has a huge lack of color to it usually.  It's more artistic like painting that being a cosmetologist.  My favorite part of it was using the molding was to repair trauma and missing parts of a persons face.  The sculpting skill needed to make a person resemble their pictures when what was there is gone is really challenging and fun.  One day at the mortuary we heard a tour bus crashed.  Several people died in the accident and some of them were family of some prominent Chinese officials.  We got those people.  I happened to be working on the day that they needed to be dressed and ready for family viewing.  Their faces had been crushed in the accident and there was discoloration and road burn marks on their faces.  With the skillful work of my hands I was able to wax and apply make-up to make them look surprisingly well.  We cleaned them up and put them in viewing rooms and awaited the arrival of their families.  To my surprise I was requested across the street to the mortuary to meet with them.  Dressed only in a pair of crappy scrubs I felt self conscious meeting Chinese Officials.  When I walked into the room an interpreter walked up to me.  The family was so very pleased with their appearance and grateful that I had given them the opportunity to say good-bye to their loved ones that they wanted to personally thank me and then a man took my picture.  I later found out that he was writing an article for a paper over in China on the accident and the work done on the deceased.  It's amazing to think that somewhere in China there is an article containing a picture of me.  I was blessed that day to feel like my job made a difference in someones life positively.  That's a rare feeling when taking someone's deceased loved one.

The most precious thing is and innocents life

At the mortuary I worked at we gave free funerals for children under 2.  Because of that, we had a high number of infant deaths that were called into us.  There is no words to describe the sadness that eats through you when you go into a hospital and wrap up a little baby and carry their lifeless body out.  Babies were my worst enemy.  Even worse was when we had a coroner's call that was an infant death.  One of my most memorable pick-ups was for a 1 1/2 yr old...

I had gone to the coroner's office to pick up the cases that they had ready for us to take back to the mortuary after their investigations were complete.  As I was loading up the first two cases the girl working there brought out this little boy on a large autopsy table.  A little figure was barely visible under the white sheet covering his lifeless body.  When the coroners office worker pulled the sheet back so we could check his identification there laid this little boy.  Just over a year old and the little boy was still in diapers.  That was the only thing protecting him.  The rest of his body was blistered, red, charred in other places and his hair had been singed off.  While having a party in their yard, this innocent little boy had fallen into a fire pit.  Why would this little of a child be left alone to get that close to fire?  How long did he lay in the pit to get that burned?  Why was it that the only body part not burned was where his sopping wet diaper protected him from the flames?  This was child neglect.  There is no reason for such cruelty in the world.  I gingerly wrapped his frail body in a sheet and plastic, transferred him to my gurney and loaded him up to go back to the mortuary. 

NASCAR move aside...

After that call I was broke in well to the life of a mortician.  There is nothing like being trapped inside a vehicle with a decomposing body, but oh did all the removal people get good at finding the quickest way to return them to the coroners office.  If it was a normal call people would take their time getting back to the mortuary, but oh those decomps.  You never really get use to the smell of decomposing meat, but it does become tolerable.  If you get any of the body fluids on you of a decomp though you might as well kiss that item good-bye.  No amount of washing or scrubbing gets that smell and greasy feeling out.  I ruined countless pairs of shoes in the course of my six years and we won't even talk about pants.  When removal people go on calls there is a set routine that gets followed to make sure it's as smooth as possible.  When a death occurs there are a few steps that not everyone knows.  If the deceased has been ill and is on hospice, either the nurse who is with them takes charge or if the family is taking care of them they need to call the hospice nurse.  Most people automatically think they need to call 911, but that is not true!  If the family knew that their loved one was sick and was receiving care through a hospice or doctor, they are the ones to call first thing.  If they are called they will check the deceased and call a mortuary of the families choosing.  If the family ends up calling 911 an ambulance and cops are sent to the house, they then have to call the coroners office who has to send an investigator out to the house.  The coroner then has to contact the doctor to verify that yes, the person was ill and their death was expected.  Then the coroner will call the mortuary of the families choosing.  If, in that long process of unintended phone calls, the coroner does not get a hold of the patients doctor, the coroner has to take control of the deceased's body until they contact the physician.  It makes the process so much longer and more stressful for the family.  Always remember, if you have a loved one who knew it was impending, call their hospice or doctor first when the death occurs.  After the person is declared dead, the nurse or the coroner calls the mortuary.  At our mortuary we had a switchboard operator who answered the phones and they gathered some general vital statistics and other information and sent the first-call to the preparation facility.  When we got the call in the preproom someone left directly from there or a driver was called who was available close to the death area.  The driver tried to hurry as quick as possible to the first-call and upon arrival grabbed the first-call book and went into the facility or home.  One person was all that was usually needed for hospices, hospitals or some group homes.  Two people were required at a home because usually you needed the extra muscle to get the person out because of not being able to get the gurney right next to the bed or wherever the person may be to get them out of the house.  After signing the necessary paperwork with the nurse or coroner we would talk to the family if they were there and see if they had any questions or needed one last moment with the deceased before we took them.  We would then go into the room and analyze the scene of the deceased.  Would we need to carry them to the gurney?  Would we need help moving them because they were large?  Do we need an extra hospital sheet for any body fluids or to help move them?  Did a hospital ID band match the information we had?  Did they have any personal items on?  All of these were some of the questions we had to ask before even touching the deceased.  A paper toe tag was filled out with name, place of death and SSN then placed on the deceased's right toe for our identification.  Then we would return to the van grabbing gloves, a plastic sheet we used, a hospital sheet if needed and our gurney.  Going back into the room it was favorable to get the gurney right next to the bed the deceased was on, if possible, and then transfer then straight across to the gurney.  Each call the same routine, different cases.  Throughout the rest of this blog I will share some of my most memorable cases with you...

As best put by Ludo in Labyrinth.... Smell Bad!

Well, then next day I got to go on my first removal with Ben.  The mortuary I worked at was special because in the town we lived in the coroner's office did not do their own pick-ups.  A coroner investigator was on the scene but the mortuaries in the city took week long rotations taking the bodies to either the coroner's office if more information was needed or taken back to their mortuary if there was nothing suspicious.  The first call came through the printer and Ben said, "here we go!"  We went outside and got into one of six Chevy 1/2 ton vans parked along side the preproom.  (That was just the van this particular mortuary liked for running.)  Each van was unmarked except for a personalized license plate with a name and number on it.  Inside the vans the front two seats were the only thing left factory.  The back is gutted out with a metal plate lining the floor.  On the end of the metal plate by the back doors there are two metal cups affixed, these hold pegs on the underside of the gurney.  Two gurneys go by the back door and a shorter 'straight cot,' meaning it only is up or all the way to the ground, goes in the side door.  Three bodies can be picked up at one time while a driver is out on the road.  As we started driving to who knows where I was looking around at what was in the van.  There was a cardboard box between the seats that held plastic books.  Inside these books there was the first-call handouts.  Pamphlets to hand to the family with information on what happens now, cremation, burial, death certificates, etc.  There was also a tote bag laying beside the box.  What's the tote bag for?  Well, I learned it's the most dreaded going through a hospital.  The tote bag was for infants.  When a tiny baby dies it's very hard for a family and seeing a huge gurney rolling down the hall with a little bump is extremely unsightly.  So, if the infant was small enough they could be carried out in a tote bag.  Most people wouldn't even think twice about what it would be unless they were familiar with the ominous tote bag.  The first-call wasn't far away from the mortuary.  A low-income housing park is where we ended up.  A couple cop cars an a coroner vehicle were parked in front of one unit and Ben said that must be it.  We backed into an open space left right in front of a walk way leading to an open unit.  We walked up the sidewalk empty handed at first, except for the first-call book.  As we neared there was an unpleasant smell.  It's also not good when the police officers are gathered outside a residence and not inside.  Ben turned through the doorway with a big last breath.  Yup, it was a decomp.  A decomp is a decomposing body.  Mortician's don't use that word lightly.  You have your nice, clean bodies.  Your soiled themselves, haven't bathed for a while, normal bodies.  There are your have been sitting around and skin is starting to blister and fall off with a smell of sulfur slight-decomps.  And then there are your yeah, they have been sitting around for quite a while, turned green, bloated with tissue gas, when you touch them the skin sloughs off decomps.  Finally there is your was a decomp, now has maggots, lost all the bloated gas they had because the pressure has forced it out of any open orifice or weak spot and now they are a total decomp.  He was a decomp.  We walked into the cluttered, tiny apartment and there he was lying on the sofa.  Green, bloated and smelling oh so ripe I just wanted to run.  I had to touch that thing!?!  Ben said this would be the perfect case to break me in and laughed.  Because of the degree of decomposition the coroner investigator estimated he had been there for about a week.  With that degree of decomposition it is also hard to determine cause of death by sight so he needed a more thorough once over.  We were going to have to take him back to the coroner's office.  We went back to the van, got three clean sheets, a body bag, two pairs of gloves each and went back in.  To make a call as easy as possible you want to be able to get your gurney directly parallel to the body so you just have to transfer straight across to it.  We moved a coffee table that was piled high with porno mags... some still in the packaging, he must have been a collector.  The gurney then was right next to the couch.  The adjustable cots could go down at different levels unlike the straight cots that were up or down, we used the adjustable this time.  With the gurney lowered to the proper height we put on our two pairs of gloves, opened the body bag with the zipper flap on our side to protect our pants from any body fluids and laid one of the clean sheets in the bag.  Then it was time to roll the man into one of the other clean sheets.  We tucked one side of the sheet as far as we could under the man on the side we could reach.  Then we had to roll him forward to bring the sheet up his back.  We took the third sheet and opened it up in front of him.  Ben said we were using this one to hold onto his wrists and legs while rolling him.  You see, once decomposition is that far advanced if you pull on the persons skin it will tear and start pulling away from the body.  What is left is like a severe burn without the skin, a wet and slippery mess.  As soon as I grabbed his ankle to pull him forward I felt the skin give under the sheet.  It is the weirdest feeling to have what you know should be solid in your hand give away.  It was almost like the sheet was covered with Crisco and my hand was slipping off the body even though he was dry and it was his skin sloughing off under the sheet.  Slowly forward he went and we could start seeing the sheet under him.  Then, it happened.  There was so much gas built up in him that it had to escape somewhere and the pressure in his belly made him pass gas, except there was a slight problem.  A rather large blue dildo shot almost a foot from his rectum!  Ben and the coroner investigator started laughing as I looked in horror.  I was naive and had never seen one in a picture let alone fly out of a dead mans ass!  Ben moved it to the side and we finished pulling up the sheet and used it to pull him on the gurney.  Removing the first pair of gloves that were now covered with decomp juices we zipped up the body bag and hurriedly took him to the coroner's office.  Have you ever been on a long car ride where someone with you farts in the car?  Well imagine that but they have been holding that fart for weeks and had eaten only Mexican food the whole time.  It's not a pleasant car ride.

Well that's embarrassing.

So I was left with the turkey timer image after finishing up that case. We then would tie the arms up with a hospital gown so they were in the proper place lying on their abdomen for the viewing, place their head on a styrofoam head block and slightly turn it to the right (viewing) side, cover them with another sheet and put them in the smaller embalmed reefer to firm up from the fluid. What happened to that boner you ask? Well, they usually subsided after the pressure was taken off the vein and some fluid was released. Most morticians never leave the vein intact while embalming. The open up the vein to allow drainage of the blood so embalming fluid will take its place, doing so usually never lets an erection happen. Helen was special in that way making sure all body parts received an ample amount of fluid. It was the deceased's one last hoorah you may say. The next day, Ben was giving me the opportunity to go on some first-calls with him!

You're sticking what, where?!

The machine kicked to life and began doing its magic.  At first I saw no difference.  Helen began rubbing the body with a dish washing sponge.  She added a little soap to the body and continued the assault with the scrubby side.  Although it seemed painful I began noticing a change in the body.  The slimy dead skin was coming off, the tissues were beginning to appear as if they had color back in them and the person began to look like they were full of life.  It was weird.  The embalming fluid was penetrating the tissues and giving it the pink color our blood usually does.  Helen scrubbing so vigorously on the body was working like the heart pumping and valves working, moving the fluid throughout the body.  Helen then pulled out two small plastic half moons with little hooks on them like a cheese grater.  Those were eye caps.  Eye caps are placed under both lids to keep the shape of the eye since fluids settle and sink into the body.  She grabbed an 's' shaped needle and some white thread.  She used this to suture through the nostrils into the mouth, in the bottom jaw and finished back in the nostril to tie the mouth shut.  With the eyes and mouth now closed the person was beginning to look like they were sleeping peacefully.  I asked how long the process usually took and Helen said if it's a 'one-pointer' it can take as little as 45 minutes.  A one-pointer means that they only have the one incision by the clavicle to embalm.  If someone has a fairly healthy circulatory system them blood-flow goes everywhere, arms, hands, legs, feet etc.  If someone has a blockage somewhere, say they are diabetic and have poor circulation in their feet, then the embalmer my have to open a secondary artery.  If the feet don't receive fluid they have the option of opening an artery in the groin or the shin or even the ankle area to try to shoot fluid down to that extremity.  Each opening they make adds a point to the case.  So if they had to make both clavicle (neck) incisions, both femoral (groin) incisions and both radial (wrists)  incisions then they are a six-pointer with six incisions on the body.  How do you know when they are done?  Well, Helen had the perfect timer.  She never opened the vein of the body while embalming unless absolutely necessary.  Doing that caused pressure to build-up in the circulatory system with both blood and embalming fluid trying to fill the spaces.  This caused every open space for blood to fill and expand.... yes, that means with men she knew they were done when they got an erection.  The 'turkey-timer method' she used.  I laughed thinking she was joking at first but shortly the fluid began doing its job and the turkey timer was inching its way to done.  After all the fluid was in Helen opened up the vein and let a little of the blood to flow out.  Once she just started getting fluid she tied up the vein, removed the cannula and tied up the artery.  She did a final wipe down of the body and began towel drying them.  After they were dried, she grabbed a bottle of medical super-glue.  All of the leaks got a coating of glue.  If there is an iv site it would keep oozing because of the lack of clotting factor after death so a drop of super-glue would seal those leaks.  A small amount was also placed along the lip line to keep it closed and the eye lids to seal them shut.  Then came the disturbing part.  She pulled out a very large needle looking object.  Longer than my forearm and thicker than a sharpie this was a trocar.  The trocar is plunged deep into the abdomen slightly higher and off-center of the belly button to puncture all the organs and remove as much fluid as possible in the abdominal and chest cavities.  Ash she fanned the trocar upwards and downwards a clear suction tube attached to the end was pulling red, brown, yellow and clear fluids through the tubing out of site.  As much fluid as possible has to be removed to help preserve the body.  Fluids left inside will only decompose and start to break the body down faster.  Once she was happy with what she got out she grabbed two bottle of DriCav and attached them to a yellow rubber tube that took the place of the clear tubing.  The DriCav is a very strong embalming chemical that preserves tissues greatly.  She pulled out the trocar and screwed in a small white, plastic button that sealed the hole.  Embalming was complete on this case.

You do what to my naked body?!

I got to watch my first embalming that day.  I remember the process perfectly.  We went up to the 'big reefer' (the large refrigerator that held the unembalmed bodies) and chose the correct person whom we received a written consent to embalm on.  At this mortuary we started with a paper toe tag that was placed on the right toe of the deceased.  On that tag we wrote their full name, social security number and place of death.  That had to match with a hospital id band on the patient somewhere and then both of those were matched with the first call sheet in the folder which contained all of the above information.  When we brought them down to the embalming room we untied the plastic we wrapped around them to stop any body fluids that may come out from contaminating things, untied the hospital sheet we had wrapped around them and exposed this frail old person we were about to preserve.  Dressed in only a hospital gown I couldn't imagine the tests we were going to put them through.  This body did not look like the clean made-up wax figure I had seen in the other room.  This person smelled horrible of urine and dirty hair.  Their skin was damp from being inside the plastic sheet and collecting condensation from the reefer, causing their dry skin to become a thin white slim covering parts of their body.  When we removed the hospital gown and Helen grabbed an arm and I grabbed the leg to pull them directly onto the cold stainless-steel table my hands slipped from the slippery gook of dead skin.  We finally got him onto the table and Helen kicked into auto mode.  She turned on a water hose and hooked to to a rubber suction cup affixed to the upper corner of the table.  The water ran down the sides of the deceased to their feet and down a drain at the end of the embalming table.  Helen then began mixing the embalming solution to be used on this case.  Mixing of fluid is really an art.  You have to be able to look and feel the body and see if they are really water logged, you need a strong fluid such as Manhattan that will help dry out the tissues more.  If they seem to be in fairly good shape and have not been deceased long, they use a little lighter strength fluid that will work just fine.  If they look really washed out, maybe a little dye is needed in the fluid to help pink them up more.  The most used formula at our mortuary was 2-1-2, two Triton, one Manhattan and two Chromatech.  After Helen mixed the embalming fluid she turned on her machine to mix it well.  While that was happening she grabbed a disposable scalpel.  A small incision is made just below the clavicle, an aneurysm hook is place in and the hole is stretched out.  Helen pulled up a few straw-looking structures and started explaining to me.  She showed me how the tendons are a little shinny, a vein is blue-colored with blood and the artery is pretty flesh-toned.  She loosely tied two strings around the vein and then isolated the artery.  Two more strings were then tied to the artery and she made a small incision in the artery taking special care not to break it.  A small amount of blood came out and she quickly put a cannula into the hole.  when then took a cannula clamp and made a leak-proof seal around the cannula.  She clamped the other end and then took the embalming machine hose and attached it to the cannula.  With one flip of the switch the game was on.

Dead on a slab, getting poked and prodded.

I was young and naive.  I have never even seen a naked person let alone a naked DEAD person!  The embalming room was a place of wonder, disgust and excitement.  The first thing you notice about embalming is the smells.  When a person dies all muscle control is lost.  Now that does not automatically mean you shit yourself when you die but it can happen.  If you have a meal that has worked its way through your digestive system but you pass before you shit well... It is very possible that the gases that build up inside your body from the bacteria living inside of you may push all of that de-lish last meal out.  You also lose bladder control.  If you have any IV sites they will not clot up and will continue to leak.  If you had eaten before you passed the gases may push the food up and you may vomit.  There is a huge variety of  "what-ifs" and they are all just as gross, giving off a wonderful bouquet for the nose to pick up.  Now, embalming fluid has its own unique scent.  If you haven't had the joy of smelling formaldehyde it is one of a kind.  You have that sterile medical smell mixed with an eye-watering sting of the strong chemical that can chase you out of the room.  Chromatech, Triton, DriCav, Manhattan all types of embalming fluids are used in the process.  Each giving the own unique smell, color and use to the fluid.  Mix all of those smells and you have an embalming room.  There is nothing good about it but it is a smell that comforts me now.  There were three stations in the embalming room and because the mortuary I worked at was always so busy there were always a minimum of two of the stations being used.  The loud "hmm" of the machines pushing the embalming fluid into the bodies was a constant in that room.  Although the radio was always belting out a loud array of music styles the noise of the work always took front an center.  The gleam of the stainless steel and the sharp objects being used are a whole other thing.  Trocars to remove the liquid from the abdominal and chest cavities, scalpels to make the incisions, cannula inserted into arteries, clamps holding in the cannula and the aspirator!  Embalming is an exciting process...

The first day playing with death

At the mortuary the preproom (as we called it) was full of a mix mash of characters.  On my first day I met Ben out front of the preproom.  My heart was pounding not knowing what to expect when I walked through the front door.  It took all my muster to follow him into the unknown.  When I stepped over the threshold there was a large room with a washer and dryer, a scale, two sets of doors at the far end, a few gurneys standing in a line against the wall like parked cars and among them closed caskets.  This was the waiting area for items moving on to somewhere else.  I followed Ben through the set of doors on the left-hand wall into an office with two desks.  One was Brad's and the other was for a woman we shall call Candy.  Candy was a "death certificate coordinator."  For every death that we dealt with she gathered all of the vital statistics that the funeral director gathered from the family and typed up the hard copy of the death certificate for the "DC runners" to take to the doctors and get signed.  This was a feat all on it's own.  When I started there were 2 DC runners, John and Alan.  I got to act out their days a couple times and I have to say, they had the life.  Yeah, some doctors are real dicks but OMG! Their entire day included driving around in a Neon with a/c, calling doctors or their offices to see when they can meet them and taking death certificates out and picking them up, taking them to the coroners office if they were involved and then finalizing them at the county health department. That's it. Ok, sometimes they had a rush one and had to meet a doctor at target or a restaurant or wherever to get it signs but hey, that was easy! It was the best job at the mortuary. As we walked through another door at the other end of this room there was another large room where dressing and casketing happened. If you looked to the left there was a casket storage room and to the right there were two "refers" (refrigerators) and a door leading to the embalming room. There were three bodies laying on wooden tables that were used for dressing and cosmatizing. Looking at a deceased body dressed, casketed and cosmatized is like looking at a wax figure. They are cold, hard and appear fake. The essence of the human that occupied the body is gone and it really is just an empty shell. I tried to keep my cool but I was totally mesmerized. I couldn't get over how the process of death left this wax figure behind. Trying to get past my excitement I was introduced to four more people in this room. Doug was Brad's right hand man if the preproom. He made sure bodies were where they were suppose to be when they were suppose to be. Cheryl was the cosmetician who was making these bodies look so lovely and there were two "removal" men, Ted and Chad. Then I was led to the embalming room where I met Kurt and Helen. In front of them there were three stainless steel tables. Two of which had naked bodies on them. I was completely unsure at that point if I could handle this...

The last breath

I was infatuated.  After I met my soon to be future boss and asked him some of the questions for my report he told me to come back and meet with him for an interview.  I was ecstatic.  Everything I was envisioning for myself was falling into place!  A week before graduation I met with him and a colleague at the mortuary for my interview.  It wasn't so much of an interview of what I knew and wanted but how I interacted with them.  Let me give you some background into this mortuary I worked at to better understand.  I worked for a mortuary that (at that time) was the largest family owned mortuary in the United States.  They had their hands in everything except casket making.  There were many mortuaries, a memorial design center (where monuments are made), a flower shop and even low cost and religion specific mortuaries.  It was basically ran like the production line portrayed at the big corporation Kroner in the Showtime series Six Feet Under.  There were six facilities around one city that the company operated, one of them being strictly religion oriented and another the low-cost to gain the widest population appeal.  With all of these facilities there was one "main" hub in the center of the city that completed the preparation and sent them out to the other mortuaries.  I was interviewing to start in the "preparation facility" at the main location.  Each aspect of the funeral business was separate at these mortuaries.  There was the preparation facility that handled the care of the deceased only, the crematory was considered preparation as well but they had their own set of staff and separate building from the actually preparation facility.  The preparation facility was the start of everything.  We picked up, embalmed, bathed, dressed, casketed and delivered all the dead.  In the mortuary buildings there were divided departments as well.  There was a main coordinator who made sure all of the scheduling was in line and nothing would run into another, the event was staffed, the cars were ready and any other detail was caught by this department.  There was support services who filled out paperwork, answered phones, ran paperwork, etc.  Funeral directors only made funeral arrangements all day long.  There was a Funeral Service department who worked all the funeral and graveside services.  My dream was to eventually be a licensed embalmer/funeral director.  When I met with these two men, we shall call them Brad and Ben (names changed to protect identity), They were not looking at my lack of mortuary skills, but rather were seeing what my personality and sense of humor were like.  When you deal with death on a daily basis it changes you.  No matter how sympathetic you are or how much you care you have to find a way to deal with all of the tragedy for fear of having a mental breakdown.  Brad and Ben asked me a few questions and then took me out back and said we will see you two days after graduation.  I got the job.  To start I was working 3 days a week (Friday, Saturday and Sunday) at $10.00/hr.  For a new high school grad I was thrilled.  I left in anticipation of that first day.

How did you decide?

To start, you must be wondering how one finds a job at a mortuary when they know nothing about the business...  When I was sixteen years old my older sister died in a car accident on Christmas Eve.  I know... OMG!  How sad!  Life happens and it shapes who you are becoming.  When my family and I returned home to attend her funeral I remember looking at her in the Viewing Room, laying there in her casket, she appeared way too dark.  My sister was always fair skinned and the cosmetics they applied to her were not normal for her at all.  I judged everything about her.  Not just because I was so confused at that time how such a horrible act could occur but because I wanted to know how she could have been pinned under her van but still be viewable.  As my eyes cascaded around her figure I say a big blotch on her clavicle that appeared to be something smooth covering whatever lied beneath (later I would realize they used wax to cover her embalming incision because her husband had brought in a low-cut dress for her to wear).  Her hands were room temperature but slightly ridged and affixed in place.  How do they keep them like that?  The corners of her mouth were slightly turned upward as if she was trying to smile her last smile for us.  I was intrigued at how they can prepare someone for their last viewing.  When I returned home I began my research on death and the mortuary sciences.  I was in a vocational high school learning to become a CNA and my mind set completely switched at that moment in time.  I was staring at the computer explaining to me the procedure of embalming and realized that I what I want to do.  I want to help the patients after the nurses cannot.  As time passed my thoughts didn't falter.  Senior year we had a final project in school, we had to do a report on a health field of interest to us.  I went to my teacher and asked if Mortuary Science was still considered a health field and was given the "green light" to run with my new obsession.  When I went home and told my mom about my ideas she looked at me and said, "I know the right person for you to talk to."  By a stroke of pure luck from the Gods, my mom had a regular customer at her food-service job who waited for his wife to finish shopping and he was the boss of a mortuary!  How could I have been any luckier!?!  A couple phone calls later and a time set I had my interview set with one of the executives of a mortuary...

The past is always there to haunt you

My first career in life was working at a mortuary.  Although an odd profession it is one that will always be a staple of human society.  The things that Mortician's deal with on a daily basis would send most people to the nut house.  This is my blog about the best/worst six years of my life as a young female working at one of the largest mortuaries in the U.S.  I will rehash memories I have of first-calls I went on (deceased pick-ups), the numerous preparation fiascoes that happened in the preparation facility, some of the most disturbing things that no person should ever have to see as well as some of my memories that will haunt me for the rest of my life.  No matter how long or short of a time you spend working, if you ever work at a mortuary it will define your mind set for the rest of your life.  Every funeral you attend you critique the work and imagine ways it could have been better.  I still every now and again have dreams of some of the cases that tore my psyche in a way that it could never be repaired.  Follow my journey through my mind... The mind of an ex-mortician.