Planning A Beautiful Service

Use These Three Suggestions to Avoid Stress While Planning a Funeral

3 February 2016

Cherly Fox

Having to plan a funeral for someone you care deeply about can be overwhelming. Here are a few suggestions that can help you prevent hardships so that the funeral can proceed without causing you more stress than you can handle.

Divide Up the Work to Avoid Being Overwhelmed

You may have loved someone so much that you feel personally responsible for planning every aspect of their funeral. However, you may just not feel well enough to do everything by yourself. To take the pressure off of yourself, make a point of involving others in the planning process. For example, you might have a close friend choose the floral arrangements or ask another family member to select a casket. You may find that others are eager to help you during this time.

Control Costs to Prevent Spending Too Much

Money may be the last thing on your mind when you are planning a funeral for someone you care about, and you might experience feelings of guilt when you think about trying to save on funeral costs. You may find yourself wanting to buy the most expensive casket there is, for example. However, consider that your loved one would likely not want to cause financial hardships for you in addition to the stress of dealing with their death; have a friend or relative with you when you making spending decisions so that you avoid going overboard.

You can also do some easy things to save some money on the funeral ceremony. For example, you can digitize funeral programs and put them online so that you don't have to spend a lot of money to have them printed. You might also suggest to guests that they donate cash for additional costs instead of buying flowers for the ceremony.

Prevent Distress by Seeing Their Body Early

One of the things that is sometimes surprising for the family and loved ones of those who have passed away is how their loved one looks in the casket.  You may discover that your loved one doesn't quite look as you expected them to. To avoid any distress about how your loved one looks, arrive early enough on the day of the funeral so that if changes need to be made to the makeup or hair, they can be discussed with the mortician before others get there.

With the ideas in this article, it should be a bit easier for you to plan a funeral for someone you love. Enlist the help of a reputable funeral home, such as Danks-Hinski Funeral Home, so that you can be confident that the funeral is one that honors the life of your loved one.

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