yeah i don't know if i'll talk about
them all but i got all sorts of fun
blood draining devices and
this one is for closing mouths
kind of cool hi i'm victor m sweeney and
i'm a licensed funeral director and
mortician and this is mortician support
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this is a question from saint severin
question for morticians
when someone dies do you remove their
poo
or are we all buried with an unpoo'd poo
that is such a good question more often
than not your poo is up to you sometimes
you you hear the myth that everybody uh
poos themselves before they die that's
not always the case sometimes it is for
my purposes when i get someone back to
the funeral home and i'm preparing them
um if they have pooed then i'll clean
them up if it's the case that they start
pooing when pressure starts to build up
in the abdomen then i stop what i'm
doing i clean them up typically what
i'll do is i'll actually flush out the
bowels with the hose because the last
thing you want to have happen is someone
to start pooing and then they continue
doing it when you can't control it jaded
never won if a person wearing contacts
dies
does the mortician take them out
shower thoughts
yes historically i've always removed
contact lenses because one of the things
that we need to do of course is what we
call set the features setting the
features would mean that we close the
mouth and we also need to close their
eyes so we actually have a device that
helps us do this
these are called eye caps they're
essentially spiky contact lenses that
fit over the eyes and will actually grip
the eyelid when we pull it down over
those little burrs there i typically
remove contact lenses um because those
just get in the way of me doing what i
need to do to set their features and
provide a decent appearance for the
family
question from laney will my cat eat me
when i die possibly
hopefully i think the short answer to
that is yes
i've heard of that happening from
colleagues of mine and as we all know
cats being inferior to dogs they will do
anything they are opportunists the
question from vamp florence how do
morticians not want to chug the
embalming fluid these look like they
taste like froot loops
well i really love the picture you have
and
i noticed
you forgot the blue flavor embalming
fluid is really colorful but i can
assure you
it is not tasty it smells
awful as far as the coloring goes it is
strange isn't it one of the reasons that
a lot of these fluids are maybe red or
other colors is so that the embalmer
knows what they are without having to
maybe read the label but you'll also
notice that a couple of them are red
when we push the blood out of the body
in arterial embalming we're pushing out
a red fluid so ideally we want to put a
red fluid back in so we gain access to
an artery typically we'll make an
incision maybe in the neck or in the
thigh and then we'll also gain access to
a vein we open the artery
we are going to have an embalming
machine which acts as a pump and we're
going to use this arterial tube
something like this so this goes down
the artery and then it's going to pump
fluid through now your vein
we are gonna open
with either a large forceps or this
device called a drain tube so this goes
down
the vein
and then when we open it the blood will
pour out the side of our device here and
then we can control how quickly or how
slowly we want the blood
to leave the body when we have a
deceased loved one they're going to look
very very pale because the blood has
stopped circulating so when we put in
the the red blood the red fluid rather
that's actually gonna pink them up in
some ways and make them look a little
bit more alive all right this is a
question from clementine okay full
disclosure i'm fat and this is a legit
question i'm not trying to be fat phobic
but how do extremely obese people like
i'm talking 400 plus pounds fit in a
coffin do they make a plus size coffin
or does a mortician like cut fat out of
them and sew them back up gonna answer
the second part of that question first
no we do not remove fat and and sew
someone back up everybody is buried
intact if we can at all help it so we
actually have caskets that are made by
our manufacturer to be oversized
typically when someone passes away if
they're larger we'll measure them at
their elbows because those tend to be
the parts that stick out the furthest
and then determine what width of casket
we will need to give them a more
comfortable appearance c for chase do
morticians put chapstick on the bodies
or are they just sitting there casket
open lips cracked out that's actually a
great concern of ours is drying out not
just the lips but after you die of
course your body is not producing any
oils
so your skin can get quite dry we
actually have a like a heavy face cream
that we use on almost everybody that
comes through in the interim between
when they're embalmed and when we get
them ready for the funeral and put their
makeup on if we need it we always have
that heavy face cream on to make sure
that their lips don't dry out so as far
as chapstick goes i've never put
chapstick on a body but if someone
really wanted me to i guess i i wouldn't
say no
here's a question from coco now i'm
going on google looking up the weirdest
stuff
what do dead bodies smell like
dead bodies smell
awful rotting anything smells awful we
are hardwired to think that dead human
bodies smell bad and it's a smell you
never forget i myself i went out to a
nice restaurant to have some aged steak
and i couldn't do it i love this
username this is a question from future
corpse aren't we all
what do morticians do with our organs
after an embalming what happens when
they aren't donated when we do embalming
all your organs just stay inside your
body we can prepare them all internally
after we finish the arterial embalming
we have what's called the cavity
embalming optimally with the cavity
embalming you're trying to puncture the
lungs
the heart
the intestines the stomach and then
you're also going to try to shoot for
the kidneys too we actually use what's
called a trocar and i
i have one here it's a hollow point
spear essentially
and it hooks up to what we call an
aspirator so it's a it's a vacuum
essentially insert this in the abdomen
and then try to puncture all the hollow
organs and then the vacuum will actually
draw out all those nasty fluids if you
donate your organs typically organ
donations are handled by organ
harvesting companies and they will
actually work with a hospital or with me
to transport a body where it needs to go
and then they'll harvest the organs
donate them where they need to and then
the body will be returned to me after
that whole process is done question from
paul matthews do morticians normally
just drain the blood down the sink the
short answer is yes all of our bodily
wastes are disposed just like our normal
bodily wastes the sewer system
that goes right to the water treatment
plant this is a question from soggy emma
why are coffins so expensive y'all just
bury me raw well soggy emma that is uh
definitely an option you can be buried
in the ground without a casket a lot of
funeral homes put substantial markups on
their casket and i think it's just a way
to collect money on on the tail end of a
service but just like a furniture store
which would maybe mark up their
kitchen tables four times what they
actually cost
i would guess that most caskets are
marked up probably one and a half to two
times what the wholesale cost is this is
a question from tiny rain do morticians
put a bra on you
if so
i would like my rotting corpse to not
wear a bra and would like my ghost to be
wandering braless with poking nips well
tiny rain i don't know if there's much i
can do about poking nips but we do put
bras on if the family requests and the
reality is i've probably put on more
bras than i have taken off in my life
that answer your
question this is a question from leonard
de montague does a mortician feel just
as sad as a normal person when someone
close to them dies the short answer of
that is yes
that was one of the things actually i
myself really worried about when i got
into this profession because at a
certain point
when you see a dead body you almost
always kind of go into work mode what
can i do to help this family what can i
do to prepare this body so i was very
concerned when i started doing this that
maybe i would start to even think of my
own loved ones as something to help or
something to fix and not really take in
grief like i used to for my own family
for loved ones
my own grandpa passed away just a few
months ago and i feel just as sad about
that as i i think i ever would it's just
a matter of of perspective and maybe
where you're at at the moment
question from t
what foundation do funeral directors use
to make dead people look alive well
that's a good question all the makeup we
use is actually formulated for
dead people so it's made to go on cold
skin as opposed to warm skin like
regular makeup and one of the things we
we try to do is not cake people with
makeup but just do kind of light layers
so that way their actual skin tone does
shine through a little bit if you've
ever gone to a funeral and maybe you've
seen someone in the casket who has caked
with makeup they don't really look like
themselves so one of our goals is to
tone that down a little bit so they do
question from lala approximately how
much does a mortician make the minimum
and the maximum i really couldn't say
what the minimum and maximum are the
average i've read in the country is
about 65 000 a year and talking to my
other friends and colleagues that seems
to be about the average for my area as
well opia dana can you get half your
body cremated and the other half buried
do morticians do that
asking for a friend i have never done
that and i've never had anybody ask i
guess i could see it happening if you
really wanted to you would have to have
a disposition permit that would have
cremation and burial and i guess we'd
probably have to sign a waiver to uh cut
someone in half but maybe the bigger
question would be
what half are you going to cremate and
what half do you bury
this is a question from that doodle
bunny how do morticians handle their
jobs without becoming emotional wrecks
that is a good question most morticians
i know are pretty normal people there
are times where it's emotional so you do
feel it and there are maybe days you
come home where you just feel done and
you don't want to work or maybe do what
you're doing anymore but i think the
fact that you can actually help people
on on my side of the desk on this side
of things there are things that you can
do that maybe nobody else can do you can
provide a chance for a mother to see her
son one more time it's those kind of
things that keep you going in those hard
times this question is from not waving
how do you dress the deceased i have
theories
well i would love to hear what your
theories are but really it's fairly
simple you're just gonna work their arms
through just like you dress a baby maybe
often times if we have someone maybe
very large that we can't move very well
or maybe someone who has outgrown their
clothes or maybe their clothes are too
big will often time make cuts down the
back and simply drape it over the front
and tuck it under the back maybe sew it
in a couple places so that way it sits
right on the person and doesn't look
like a like an over large tent or
squeeze them into their clothes like a
sausage this is a question from trap
jason
why don't we bury people vertically
instead of horizontally they are already
dead so why does it matter we could save
so much space
that is a great question i think a lot
of it has to do with practicality so if
you were to bury someone vertically
you'd have to dig a pretty deep hole and
it would have to be pretty narrow you
can imagine how tough it would be for
let's say six people to carry a casket
to the graveside and then turn it up on
its end and drop
grandma down the hole you might need a
like a seat belt of some kind question
from crowbar jones what does a mortician
do if are artificial nails on a corpse
keep them
take them off
asking for a friend i hope you don't
mean keep them by keeping a collection
but if you mean keeping them on um more
often than not i will typically the
artificial nails look nice clean and of
course your nails underneath are pretty
rough if they have them on i usually
keep them other things that people might
be concerned about removing piercings
they almost always stay if it's an ear
piercing and they have their earrings in
maybe we'll take the earrings out clean
them up a little bit other body
piercings i always leave them in this is
a question from melody jackson do
morticians take makeup classes when
getting their certifications yes we do i
have a four-year degree and at my
college we took courses on what they
call restorative art so this would
include things like makeup and coloring
but it would also include things like
putting people back together after
accidents sculpting an ear if someone
has lost an ear lip boy do morticians
also give haircuts anyone no one that
can do a nice fade
yeah lip boy i do give haircuts every so
often usually only to men and usually
only if it's something minor if someone
does need to get their hair done we'll
actually usually call a hairdresser in
it's fairly simple because really you're
only working with the front and the
sides of the head this is a question
from veronica say a body gets exhumed
after two years
what should be the state of the body to
be expected to be that's one of the
interesting things about my job is that
i never actually know
what happens after burial if we had an
exclamation um you actually have to have
a court order to open the vault and open
the casket i've heard of cases where
they've opened the casket and the body
looks more or less unchanged and this
was maybe 50 years after the fact this
is a question from jonathan cowep monty
pythons always look on the bright side
of life as the nation's number one
funeral song what's the oddest funeral
music you've ever heard i haven't heard
too many strange funeral songs myself
but i do have this dream i have a friend
and i told him if he passes away before
i do i'd really like to sing on eagles
wings but like the sweetest chef from
the muppets
it would sound like this
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relief
[Laughter]
and that's it that's all your questions
i sure enjoyed answering them and i hope
you learned something
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