How To Know Whether You Would Make a Good Mortician

The first thing I imagine people think I should say is that you need to have a strong stomach. This couldn’t be less true. I have been a Mortician for almost two years now and I have never been in a situation where my weak stomach has almost turned inside out. Sure, when I first began, the initial shock of seeing a person inanimate was a bit intimidating. You expect them to sit up or roll over and say “just kidding guys!” But they just continue to lay there with their mouth agape. And when I was presented with somebody who had laid in a pond for over a week, even then my stomach didn’t turn because I had a job to do and you tend to be much too focused on that. So my initial statement is this: you do not necessarily have to have a strong stomach to become a mortician.

The other thing people always say is, “You seem too happy and smiley to have this job!” Yes, well, just because you work in a funeral home doesn’t mean you can’t smile and be happy. The grief other people are experiencing isn’t your grief, and after days of seeing friends and family with worried and sunken eyes, I’m sure a smile from the mortician isn’t the worst thing to look at. Grieving folk are still alive and they still want to be treated like humans. Just because an elderly woman has now lost her husband of 65 years doesn’t mean she won’t appreciate a smile and a joke. In fact, after all the pressure her family is probably putting on her to sell the house and move into a retirement home I'm sure your joke about “dying for a coffee” in the funeral home would brighten her day. So, do you have to be the gloomiest person around and listen to The Smiths while embalming? No. You can certainly jam to some Britney Spears if you wish.

The next thing I’d like to address is the stereotype that morticians are a little weird. As most stereotypes are actually true, this one is as well. I don’t know why exactly. I certainly didn’t think of myself as exactly weird growing up. Sure, I had a pet snake and preferred to read books and learn about Wicca than go to a party or drink underage, but I figured that’s what all teenage girls liked to do. Then I started working in a funeral home and I realized the kind of folk that were drawn to that job. In mortuary school, the goth kids and gore freaks were weeded out very fast, and we were left with this group of misfits who seemed nice enough. Ages varied 18–55, myself being 19 at the time. It wasn’t until I started working in the funeral home that I realized our sense of humour was a little darker than most and our attraction to the odd balls was a little stronger. Our prep room is on the second floor of our funeral home and our visitation suites are as well. My favourite joke I like to play is to tell people to go to the second floor and if by chance they misheard me and start heading towards the basement I go after them and say, “Oh no no no, you do NOT want to go down there.” By which they usually respond “Oh my, OK, no problem!” And I laugh and say I’m joking and usually they don’t laugh back. If you consider yourself to have a sense of humour that is a wee bit dark and people don’t tend to understand it, maybe you should spend some time in a funeral home.

The last thing I’d like to touch on is the idea that we are recluse introverts. We tend to be the exact opposite. Where I live, morticians are more commonly called funeral directors. We direct people and tell them where to go, when to go, and what to do, and you can be directing 10 people or 100 people. My favourite phrase is, “We are undertakers not order takers.” The people who are shy and think all we do is hang out with dead peeps don’t last very long. There are some jobs where all you do is embalm all day, but let me tell you that would get tiring.

Morticians are excellent fakers; we are quick on our feet when something goes horribly wrong. We are excellent small talkers, lots of "how’s the weather?" We are quick to grab a box of Kleenex, and we certainly wear our heart on our sleeve, which can get us into trouble when all we want to say is yes but we have to say no. For example, the wife of a man who fell into one of those things that turns wood into wood chips... She wants to see him more than anything; she doesn’t care what he looks like. And your response? It has to be no.

Here are my top ten traits/things I think you need if you are thinking of joining this wacky career choice:

1. Compassion
2. Attention to Detail
3. Organized
4. Good sense of humour
5. Good active listening
6. Able to lift over 80lbs
7. Ability to communicate clearly
8. Good time management
9. Able to work very closely in a team environment
10. Respect for the living and most importantly, the dead