Funeral Pyre

For many years, I was an organ donor. After, being diagnosed with Chronic Lymphatic Leukemia (CLL) - a blood disease - I changed to an anatomical donation (my body) to Michigan State University to train doctors to use others organs.

The school will only accept complete bodies, so I needed a back-up plan in case I had lost a limb or organ.

I looked into the University of Tennessee "body farm" where they put corpses in a large field in various states of undress and buried at various depths in different seasons to check on decay and bug infestation for forensic work when murder victims are found.

Those methods made a gift of your body - training doctors, giving life-saving organs, and catching murderers.

I also looked at more traditional means of disposing of one's body. I knew that I did not want to have my body stuck in the ground in some cemetery rotting away wasting valuable land.

I considered tradition cremation for a while, but then, out of the blue, I did an internet search for "funeral pyre." I found that there is one facility in the United States - in Crestone, Colorado - that is licensed to burn the body with Juniper branches on a traditional pyre. The pyre takes about five hours to completely consume the body. Family members can even light the pyre if they wish.

The questions are these:

1). Would you consider the open-air funeral pyre? And, if so, who would you choose to - paraphrasing the "The Doors" - "Light Your Fire?"

2). And, if you wouldn't opt for the pyre, would you choose one of the other options, e.g., anatomical donation? And, if so, which one, and why?

Looking forward to hearing how people plan to dispose of themselves.

Quakertrucker

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Chorma · 36-40, M

Sorry for the sad news.
Respect for bravery shown by you and determination to help society even after you are gone.

Open air funeral pyre is the way Hindus cremate the body. You can read literature if interested. Ping ne if wanna know more.

Quakertrucker · 70-79, M

@Chorma

No, I understand that Hindus, among other religions and ethnic groups, employ funeral pyres. Some, like the Vikings, also put bodies on funeral barges, and light them on fire before pushing them away from the shore.

I was just mentioning that I found that there is only one place in the United States that is licensed to dispose of bodies with a funeral pyre.

I am a Quaker, and I can't think of any need that I will have for my body after I die. I would like to feel that my body is being used to help others, or, at least, if it is being disposed of, that the ceremony has some panache.

When people ask me what type of casket I want if I am used as cadaver to train doctors, I always tell them that - since I will be all cut up - I don't believe that I will need a casket, but that a large Glad Bag will do.

Quakertrucker

Quakertrucker · 70-79, M

@Chorma

Actually, I wouldn't say that being diagnosed with the cancer was sad. It was definitely disconcerting, but not sad.

I never expected to live forever. It's not a question of IF we will die (for we all will), but WHEN we will die.

As soon as I got that diagnosis, I was on the internet looking for answers. I found one in a two-year clinical at the James Cancer Center at the Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio.

As part of the study to test a drug for CLL, I had to go to Columbus - 485 miles south of our home in Northern Michigan - every fourth Monday and let them draw ten or so test tubes of blood in return for 28 pills for the next four week.

They told me that if I participated, they would continue to provide the drug even after the study was completed, as long as I would come to the Center every 28 days so they could monitor the state of my CLL.

They did all kinds of tests before I started the study and when the study officially ended two years ago. When the study began, 76 percent of my immune cells were cancerous; when the study ended, only 14 percent of the cells were cancerous. And, they said that within a year - which was a year ago December - that the numbers would be too low to be detected. There would still be a few cancer cells floating around, and if I quit taking the medication, they would proliferate again.

What is sad, however, is how many people react to news like this. People told me that I would have to go through a five step grieving process.

After securing a spot in the clinical trial, I investigated the grieving process. I found that the steps were Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Something Else, and Acceptance.

The first four steps were only a waste of time and energy. If the data says you have CLL - or anything else - why waste time and energy denying it? And, who or what are you supposed to be angry, and to bargain, with? I am a Quaker and my wife is an Atheist. Who or what - God or the Universe - should I/we have been mad at? The only step that makes sense is acceptance. Only once you accept the existence of the problem can you look for answers.

So I am not sad at all! Rather than wasting my time and energy grieving, I found a clinical trial which hads had fantastic results.

Quakertrucker

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