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I know that some people take comfort in looking at the remains of their dead loved ones. My stepfather always insisted on visiting the funeral home when e.g. on

I know that some people take comfort in looking at the remains of their dead loved ones. My stepfather always insisted on visiting the funeral home when e.g. one of his friends had died. It provided him with some kind of closure. I myself have always been uncomfortable with the practice and never went along. I made one exception, which I still regret. I went to see my mother in her casket, and the image still haunts me. She looked like someone I did not know. I prefer to remember people alive: animated, smiling, talking, looking back into your eyes.

crispyambulance 4y ago
I feel the same way. Practices surrounding death are deeply individualistic and have a cultural and religious backdrop. Everyone is different in how they handle the grief even within the same family. In my case, I find that a viewing just gives me really bad lingering feelings on top of the sadness from the death. For me, it does nothing to provide closure and makes getting over it more difficult. The death event itself, actually, was very much a relief. That's what signaled closure and the end of suffering. It was the viewing that made the experience drag on for far too long though I can accept that others feel very differently. This is weird, but I am most disturbed by the hands of the deceased. They have an uncanny unreal appearance. So much better to remember them alive. Yet other family members are able to pose selfies with the deceased, I found that repulsive and enraging but kept it to myself. Ironically, death and it's rituals are all about the living and their needs and desires. It has very little to do with the person who actually dies.