Radio NZ Question – The issues, Rise of Non-attended Funerals
Last week I appeared twice in the media. First in an article in ‘Stuff’ about the increase in ‘Non-attended Funerals/Farewells, then with Radio NZ with an ‘on-air’ interview last Wednesday 31st at 3.45pm. To listen to the short interview you can paste the following link into your computer internet browser address bar. https://kapiticoastfuneralhome.co.nz/goodgrief/
What I planned to say and what came out is a little different but here are my reflections.
Why are Funerals without family or friends on the rise? There is a move of people in our communities who are choosing not to have a funeral or farewell, pushing this ‘lack of farewell’ on loved ones, we can see this rise, from our Loss and Grief Centre statistics to be causing real emotional issues, and ‘messing with peoples heads’ possibly causing some long term grief/mental health issues.
We have seen the purposeful ‘choosing not to have a funeral/farewell’ increase now to 22% of all deaths this year in Aotearoa NZ, – this can result in real issues.
The question is;
Why are people choosing to do this?
From my observations, there are two reasons why.
Firstly there is a small portion of people doing this for cost reasons alone but this group is a lot smaller about 5% of people who replied to our questions.
The second reason seems, from our conversations with family, is that these ‘non-attended farewells’ come from deceased requests, with directions such as “I don’t want any fuss’ – “Just cremate me”
This comes from the deceased trying to be practical, not wanting to cause a hassle, but at the same time not taking into account the needs of those left behind to farewell their loved ones, we need to consider fulfilling their emotional, spiritual and cultural
‘well being’, helping them with good grieving.
What is the answer moving forward? Two things: First, talk about and write down some of the things you want for your own farewell. But also, add into your wishes things that might help all those close to you grieve well.
