Planning a funeral is one of the most devastating things you have to do in life. And yet, it’s something the majority of us will have to go through. Such is the way of life – but that doesn’t stop it from being highly stressful and taking a huge emotional toll on your mental health. You’re in the midst of dealing with grief, yet now you’re expected to plan how to say goodbye to someone very close to you.
It’s not fair, and you have every right to feel stressed and upset during this situation. Nothing will make those feelings disappear completely, though you may find these tips helpful for dealing with this scenario and making it slightly less stressful.
Give Yourself Time To Grieve
Funeral planning is mentally taxing because you’re thrust into it immediately after someone passes away. What happens is that you don’t give yourself time to grieve because you focus on the funeral. It causes a bottleneck of emotions deep inside that bubbles to the surface and can cause an emotional breakdown.
So, give yourself time to grieve.
It’s okay to spend a day or two coming to terms with the situation and grieving with your family. This won’t cure the pain, but it can feel like a weight lifts when you actually allow yourself this time to be emotional and let it all out. You can start planning the funeral without feeling like there’s a massive weight hanging over you.
Find A Really Good Funeral Director
In all seriousness, a great funeral director will change the entire scope of funeral planning for you. Find some highly recommended funeral services and focus on one that takes most of the work off your plate. You can delegate to them to handle a lot of the admin side of things – it’s more about you picking certain aspects of the funeral and them doing all the booking, calling around, etc.
A good partner at this stage takes so much pressure off your shoulders. It gives you more time to continue working through your grief because you’re not on the phone trying to order flower arrangements, etc.
Don’t Overthink Your Decisions
The worst thing you can do in this situation is overthink things. Stop worrying about whether or not your loved one would like this or that. All that matters is that you celebrate their life and honour who they were as a person.
That’s what they’d care about the most.
Stop worrying about what colour coffin to buy them, and don’t compare their funeral with anyone else’s. Don’t overthink it; make the funeral about remembering the person and what they mean to everyone there.
Please keep in mind that these tips will not make planning a funeral “easier”. It’ll still be a hard thing to handle mentally, but you can get through it. Give yourself time to grieve, find a good funeral director and stop overthinking every little decision. Bit by bit, this eases the mental toll on your mind. You’ll still feel sad, yet you stop this from turning into a mental breakdown.
