Monthly Archives: October 2019

funeral homes in Clinton Township, MI

A Sampling of Famous Eulogies

You may be asked to give an eulogy at funeral homes in Clinton Township, MI. If you’re in a quandary about how to put together a eulogy and what things you should talk about in honoring a close friend or family member who has died, it might be helpful to take some cues from what some famous eulogies have said to honor a person a loved one who has died.

In Oprah Winfrey’s moving eulogy for civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks, she said, in part, “I feel it an honor to be here to come and say a final goodbye. I grew up in the South, and Rosa Parks was a hero to me long before I recognized and understood the power and impact that her life embodied. I remember my father telling me about this colored woman who had refused to give up her seat. And in my child’s mind, I thought, “She must be really big.” I thought she must be at least a hundred feet tall. I imagined her being stalwart and strong and carrying a shield to hold back the white folks. And then I grew up and had the esteemed honor of meeting her. And wasn’t that a surprise. Here was this petite, almost delicate lady who was the personification of grace and goodness. And I thanked her then. I said, “Thank you,” for myself and for every colored girl, every colored boy, who didn’t have heroes who were celebrated. I thanked her then.

And after our first meeting I realized that God uses good people to do great things. And I’m here today to say a final thank you, Sister Rosa, for being a great woman who used your life to serve, to serve us all. That day that you refused to give up your seat on the bus, you, Sister Rosa, changed the trajectory of my life and the lives of so many other people in the world. I would not be standing here today nor standing where I stand every day had she not chosen to sit down. I know that. I know that. I know that. I know that, and I honor that. Had she not chosen to say we shall not — we shall not be moved.”

When legendary Major League Baseball player Mickey Mantle died, Bob Costas remembered him in this way, “Mickey Mantle was too humble and honest to believe that the whole truth about him could be found on a Wheaties box or a baseball card. But the emotional truths about childhood have a power that transcends objective fact. They stay with us through all the years, withstanding the ambivalence that so often accompanies the experience of adults.”

Former President Barack Obama eulogized Senator Edward Kennedy after his death from brain cancer, and his eulogy include this: “This spirit of resilience and good humor would see Ted Kennedy through more pain and tragedy than most of us will ever know. He lost two siblings by the age of sixteen. He saw two more taken violently from the country that loved them. He said goodbye to his beloved sister, Eunice, in the final days of his own life. He narrowly survived a plane crash, watched two children struggle with cancer, buried three nephews, and experienced personal failings and setbacks in the most public way possible.

It is a string of events that would have broken a lesser man. And it would have been easy for Teddy to let himself become bitter and hardened; to surrender to self-pity and regret; to retreat from public life and live out his years in peaceful quiet. No one would have blamed him for that.

But that was not Ted Kennedy. As he told us, ‘Individual faults and frailties are no excuse to give in and no exemption from the common obligation to give of ourselves.'”

For more information about eulogies at funeral homes in Clinton Township, MI, our compassionate and experienced staff at Lee-Ellena Funeral Home can help. You can come by our funeral home at 46530 Romeo Plank Rd., Macomb, MI, 48044 or you can contact us today at (586) 412-8999.

cremation services offered in Macomb, MI

Helping Someone Who Has Lost a Child

After cremations as part of the cremation services offered in Macomb, MI, you may find that you are consoling a close friend or family member as they grieve the death of their child. All deaths of loved ones are followed by an intense grieving process that can last weeks, months, and, in some cases, years until the grief changes forms, always there, but not always raw and on the surface.

However, the overwhelming grief that parents experience when a child dies is usually more intense and lasts longer. Much of this grief centers on a future cut short: the what might have been of possibilities and expectations and the what will never be looms large and continually.

It is not uncommon for parents who have lost a child to be angry and to blame themselves, even if their child’s death was completely out of their control, for the death of their child because parents are supposed to protect their children from harm and that instinctive knowledge stays at the forefronts of their minds.

It can be difficult to comfort and console people when they’re angry and grieving, but it’s important that we hang in there with them, no matter how hard the road to healing is, because these grieving parents need us.

While everyone grieves uniquely and differently, there are some things we shouldn’t do and should do when we are proving support to parents who are grieving over the death of their child.

One thing is to not avoid talking about the child who has died. If people tiptoe around mentioning the deceased child, it can seem as if the child never lived and left no lasting impact on the world for the time they were in it. This can be very hurtful to the child’s parents. Remind the parents of the great things, including memories and stories, you remember about their child. Let them know that their child was and did and will not be forgotten.

Don’t disappear after a short time. It’s easy within a few weeks of a death that is not one of our own to get back into the hustle and bustle of life as if nothing ever happened. But for parents who’ve lost a child, there is no normal to return to. A new normal must be created and adjusted to, but that takes time and healing. Be sure to continue to be there for the grieving parents, whether you visit with them once a week or text or call every few days or just drop a meal off at their home.

Don’t pepper parents who have lost a child with well-meaning, but hurtful expressions such as “You’ve got time to have more children,” “Miscarriages are just nature’s way of correcting things,” “Stay busy to keep your mind off of things,” or “Well, at least you still have your other children.”

Do be loving and available to listen non-judgmentally to parents who have lost a child, no matter what the circumstances were surrounding the death.

Parents who have lost a child may not be emotionally prepared to plan a memorial service for their child. Ask if you can help, and if so, what kind of service they would like to have to honor the memory of their child.

For more information on grief resources as part of cremation services in Macomb, MI, our caring and knowledgeable staff at Lee-Ellena Funeral is here to assist you. You can visit our funeral home at 46530 Romeo Plank Rd., Macomb, MI 48044, or you can call us today at (586) 412-8999.

funeral homes in Macomb, MI

Funeral Procession Etiquette

With funeral processions at funeral homes in Macomb, MI, there are procedures that should be followed, whether you are participating in the funeral procession, or you encounter a funeral procession.

The overarching thing to remember about funeral processions is that somebody has died and they are being transported to their final resting place. There’s a somberness about that, and whether you’re driving in the funeral procession or you encounter a funeral procession, respect and should be shown to the deceased person and the grieving family.

If you’re driving in a funeral procession, there are several things that you should be aware of beforehand.

All the vehicles in the funeral procession will have a flag with the word “Funeral” placed on the front left corner of the hood of their vehicles and they will proceed to the cemetery with their headlights on.

Funeral processions proceed very slowly from the funeral home to the cemetery. This means that you will go no faster than 55 miles per hour on interstates and highways and no faster than 30 to 40 miles per hours on local roads.

It’s important, when you’re in a funeral procession, to stay close to the vehicle in front of you so there is no room for a vehicle that’s not associated with the funeral procession to cut in and interrupt the line of mourners who are traveling to the cemetery.

Be sure to stay in your position in the funeral procession and keep up with the funeral procession. Funeral processions have right of way at stop signs and red traffic lights, which means all other traffic must yield to the funeral process, so follow the vehicle in front of you through these places where, under normal driving conditions, you would stop.

The last vehicle in a funeral procession has two funeral flags and will have their hazard lights flashing to indicate to other traffic that they are the last vehicle in the funeral procession and the normal flow of traffic can resume.

When the funeral procession gets to the cemetery, a cemetery attendant will direct the funeral procession to the gravesite. Once all the vehicles arrive and are stopped, the funeral flags on each one will be removed.

Vehicles in the funeral procession are lined up as they arrive at the funeral home. The hearse with the deceased is the lead car, followed by the vehicle that will carry the bereaved family. All other vehicles are lined up behind them. If you’re not immediate family, but are a close relative or friend, you should plan to be at the funeral home at least 45 minutes before the scheduled departure time so that you are parked near the front of the funeral procession line.

If you encounter a funeral procession, there are a few things that you should and shouldn’t do.

Always be respectful. In many parts of the country, it’s customary for people to pull their vehicles off onto the shoulder of the road to let funeral possessions pass by.

Since funeral processions have the right-of-way, as soon as you see the hearse enter traffic, you should stop and wait for the entire funeral procession to go by before resuming traveling. This may mean sitting through a green light or two.

Don’t cut into the middle of a funeral procession and don’t cut off a funeral procession. This is disrespectful to the deceased and to the grieving family.

For more information about funeral processions at funeral homes in Macomb, MI, our compassionate and experienced staff at Lee-Ellena Funeral Home can help. You can come by our funeral home at 46530 Romeo Plank Rd., Macomb, MI, 48044 or you can contact us today at (586) 412-8999.

cremation services in Sterling Heights, MI

How Grief Can Affect Your Health

Cremation services in Mount Sterling Heights, MI include grief support and grief resources. Grief can affect your health in many ways. Not only is physical health affected, but so is mental and emotional health.

Grief is an intense thing. It’s not just emotional. It’s not just mental. And it’s not just physical. In fact, it’s a combination of all three, so every part of the body is affected. This is normal, but understanding how grief takes its toll us take better care of ourselves during the grieving process so that its impact is not so great.

Grief causes stress, just as death causes stress. This intense amount of stress, sudden perhaps, compacted into a short period of time, and at full velocity all at once, will affect the mind, the heart, and the body. When the physical body is under stress, a hormone known as cortisol is produced. Cortisol increases glucose in the bloodstream, enabling the brain to have access to it for cognition and increasing the availability of substances that can repair tissues.

Too much cortisol for too long, such as may occur during the grieving process, can disrupt almost all of the body’s normal processes. This can create an increased risk of physical health problems, which may include anxiety, memory and concentration impairment, sleep disorders, digestive problems, depression, headaches, weight gain, and heart disease.

Once the body’s processes are disrupted, each area that’s disrupted brings its own problems. For example, sleep is commonly altered during stressful times. Most often, the problem is not getting too much sleep, but instead getting too little sleep. In a normal sleep cycle, there’s light sleep, deep sleep, and REM sleep. It is during the deep sleep cycles that harmful toxins are swept out of the brain. When sleep is disrupted, the deep sleep cycle often disappears, which means toxins accumulate in the brain. With enough stress over time and enough sleep disruption, these toxins that have accumulated in the brain can lead to the development of dementia.

Anxiety and depression are emotional and mental side effects of stress. They can also be tied to a lack of sleep. Both anxiety and depression tend to feed on themselves. The actual brain chemistry and in regions of the brain that are involved in this perpetual cycle that accompanies anxiety and depression are still largely unknown, but neuroscience researchers are discovering that anxiety and depression are much more complicated in terms of brain chemistry and brain regions than the previous assumption that serotonin, a feel-good chemical in the brain, was primarily responsible for anxiety and depression.

Stress from grieving can also impair cognition. There is a fog that is associated with the initial stages of grief. That’s normal and it helps absorb the blow of a loved one’s death. However, prolonged grieving and its associated stress can create memory problems and cognition problems. These are temporary, but they can be very stressful in themselves, which adds to the stress that’s already present because of grief.

While confusion is seldom part of this kind of cognitive impairment, losing things, forgetting things, and not being able to think clearly, in an analytical and logical way, are very common with the cognition problems caused by stress.

For more information grief resources as part of cremation services in Mount Sterling Heights, MI, our caring and knowledgeable staff at Lee-Ellena Funeral is here to assist you. You can visit our funeral home at 46530 Romeo Plank Rd., Macomb, MI 48044, or you can call us today at (586) 412-8999.