The Mortician's Daughter

Growing up the daughter of a mortician is an interesting upbringing. I saw my first dead body at age 5. Dead bodies just weren't a big deal to me. I would often go to work with my dad and watch him work (embalm bodies). My dad was very funny and strange, and so were the other morticians.  I guess you would have to be, to be in that business. Being there was always a lot of fun. When I was really little they would all let me try out all of the coffins and lay in them. That is really sort of creepy if I think back about it.

There were some things that happened that were a bit odd though...for example, I remember one time my dad bringing home some white sneakers with flecks of blood on them. A woman was wearing them when she was hit by a car and died. My dad thought I would like the shoes. He said to me, "Mom can get the blood right out of those..."

One other time he brought home a pair of grey sweatpants. He held them up to me and said "Looks like they'll fit." Turns out they were worn on a teenaged boy who hung himself in his parents' basement. Those grey sweatpants sat folded on a table in the laundry room for 2 years because no one wanted to touch them. My point is, what totally freaks out a normal person, is an every day sort of occurrence to a mortician...you know, perfectly good clothes that shouldn't go to waste. Ewwwww!

I remember one of my first dates with my boyfriend at the time, who is now my husband, was spent at the mortuary. We were hanging out there while my dad worked and embalmed bodies. We were playing cards and there was a ROW of feet in front of us - dead bodies waiting for their turn in the embalming room. My dad even let me put makeup on a corpse that night. It was creepy doing her nails and putting on her makeup - she was stiff, like a doll, not human... My dad was a big jokester and would have a blast at work while he worked on the bodies. But, then the phone would ring and he would immediately become another person because the person on the other end of the line was most likely someone who had a family member just die and need someone to come pick it up. So, he would immediately switch from the jokester to a sincere, soft spoken and caring man. It really was amazing to see...like a light switch.

One other time I was clearing out the garage of my parents' home and I found an actual body...ok not a real body, but a cremated one! I found the ashes of someone in a box with their name and dates of birth and death. It had been there since the 1970's. I asked my dad about it and he said he must have put it on the shelf for some reason and forgot about it. He said that a lot of people would not pick up ashes of loved ones, or that person didn't have relatives, and so those ashes would just sit on a shelf in the mortuatry forever. How sad. He must have had it in his hearse and then set it on the shelf for some reason. So anyway, that "body" was returned to the mortuary, and there she will sit for probably, eternity.

I'm trying to think of more interesting stories and I realized there are just too many and this blog could go on forever. It certainly was an interesting childhood growing up the daughter of a mortician. Have you ever seen My Girl (the movie)? I always loved that movie because it reminded me of my life.  So anyway, maybe I will share more stories someday about being the Mortician's Daughter. I even wanted to be a mortician when I grew up but then I realized how hard Science and Chemistry are and I said FORGET THAT SH*T! :-)

A Bipolar Dad

Today is my dad's birthday. My dad is a complicated subject. Growing up we always thought he was an alcoholic. But he didn't always drink. He would do this in spurts - months at a time, or days, or weeks, but then he could go just the same amount of time and not drink. Socially he was always fine, could drink normally, it was at home, alone that problems would arise. It wasn't the best childhood because of him. But my mom tried to shade us from that a lot. It wasn't until only 2 years ago that we discovered he is Bipolar and has been for most of his adult life.

My dad was a mortician. I will get into that later (another blog all together) he was such a funny guy, very social and fun. But he would have very dark moments at home, drinking binges, yelling and shoving and screaming at his family members. No one on the outside would ever believe he could act that way because everyone on the outside just thought of him as so funny and social and outspoken. But suddenly it all came to a head a couple of Aprils ago when he suddenly "quit" his job when he would have been retiring that November. It turns out they asked him to resign because he was acting "inappropriately" with clients and co-workers. They even got a 2 year restraining order on him after he mentioned in his 6 page "retirement" letter that his lawyers were "Smith and Wesson" (guns).

It was crazy how it all went down. He started acting strange, very out of character. This all went down shortly after Britney Spears had her mental meltdown. It turns out she is bipolar too. He acted much like her. My dad spent $45,000 on gold coins, he spent $1,500 at a little card gift shop down the street, he started acting VERY hyper to the point that people commented on it and asked what we were feeding him. When my mom ended up in the hospital with an anxiety attack and I was eating with my dad in the lunchroom, that is when I really noticed his embarrassing behavior. He was always embarrassing but this was up and beyond anything I had ever seen before. He asked 2 nurses if he could finish their meatloaf if they were done, he talked to everyone that walked by. He went up to a guy in a UofM baseball hat and asked him if he knew me (cuz I went to the UofM 10 years ago). He also tried to tell a sexual joke to two old ladies in the giftshop. It was just unreal. We didn't know what his deal was.

Eventually we called for psychiatric help and got him committed. (That was not as easy as it sounds). He was put on a hold (much like Britney Spears) and spent 12 days in psychiatric lockdown. That is when the doctors diagnosed him as Bipolar. He was on a manic episode. I didn't know anything about this disorder, but I was learning fast. He had no control over what he was doing. It's just a really frustrating (yet interesting) disorder. The brain just takes over and you are not even aware of what you are doing. As they say "the mentally ill are always the last to know that they have a mental illness"

After he got out we had to put him on a "monetary diet". He had to come to me for money and he would get stickers if he didn't spend a certain amount, then in turn could get a bonus. It was ridiculous. That soon faded and he was back to his depressive stage (where he is now). When he was manic though, he did have STRANGE thinking. When you are manic you have "grandiose ideas." A great example of this is my dad said he was going to travel to every state and get a salt and pepper shaker in the shape of each state. Um, ok, why? That is what I'd like to know. As I mentioned, he is now back in a depressive state and has gone off all of his meds.

We are keeping an eye on him and wish he would stay on them but he refuses. He has better days and even read a book that I bought him the other day, and watched a movie! But he loves his chair and rarely leaves it. He also has Parkinson's Disease which was brought on by the Bipolar. These disorders are just strange, to say the least. No one knows what causes Bipolar. It is hereditary only 15% of the time. Most of the time it is brought on by "environmental factors" (ie. maybe his career as a mortician...) I wonder how many morticians eventually have Bipolar disorder...?

Anyway, I'm tired of talking about this as it brings me down. Maybe I will talk about it more another day. And happy birthday to my dad who I will always be there for, who I will always support and who I understand a little better now that I know what he is battling and facing...every single day.