Reiner's story made me (re)think of something. Am I unusual (for a forty-something) in never having seen a dead body? Nor, actually, a badly injured one - in a traffic accident, say? (I had the chance to see my father's dead body at the funeral parlour when he died, but I didn't.) Now, here's the thing. What do I feel about this? Unlucky?! Ignorant? Missing out on a 'life experience' (so to speak)? Incomplete, somehow? No. What I feel is, strangely, guilt. Go figure. 

Not being in any way connected with the medical profession, I can truthfully say I've seen far more dead people than I'd have ever wanted to.  It is a very strange experience.  They just aren't there!  The body looks like a chrysalis from which the butterfly has flown.  Empty.  

I was advised not to see my own father as he'd passed away whilst we were on a fortnight's holiday in France.  He lived alone and we were ten days into our holiday when the neighbours finally called the police having not seen him.  It is supposed to be therapeutic to say goodbye to the deceased, but I'm ambivalent about whether I would have wanted to see him or not.  The shock and trauma of losing him have lived with me ever since as he hadn't been ill and it was very sudden - and then not to say goodbye in any way.... I couldn't tell you whether I would have felt any differently had I been able to see him one last time.  I did sit with my husband's open coffin for an hour or more and held his hand, but again - couldn't tell you whether it was a worthwhile experience with regard to the grieving process.  My experiences of the strangers I have been caused to see due to accidents or sudden illness have raised emotions from shock, horror to just plain numbness.  

Same is true for me, except I'm thirty-something, my father lives, and I feel very lucky to have never seen a dead someone. I'm sure it's not at all uncommon outside the medical or law enforcement professions.

I saw my grandfather 's dead body when I was 12, he was living with us at the time. I also helped my mum lay out my dad's body, that was pretty awful I have to say, she seemed so detached from it all ( she used to be a nurse so I suppose it helped her... not me !)

I also saw a dead man in a London park... that was weird.

A

It's a really bizarre feeling isn't it? That you're there doing something ordinary like having tea and at the same time someone suddenly isn't there and it's permanent.

The only one I feel actually really guilty about is because of an accident that happened right outside our last home - before we moved here.  I was making tea and I heard an almighty crunch, so looked out of the window and there was a 3-car pile-up right outside.  I went outside to offer telephone/first aid/any help whatever and there were a few people standing round the cars, so I assumed that everyone had got out ok.  The very first car was an MGB coupe and there was a large labrador retriever seemingly trapped inside it.  It was howling hysterically, so I rushed back inside to get something to smash my way into the car with to rescue it.  Nobody else seemed to be bothering.  Someone had rung an ambulance in any case for the walking wounded.  I came running back out with a poker and a hammer and was shouting at people to come and help me rescue this "poor dog".  I managed to break the window and open the door by myself and pulled the dog out, when a woman came up and barked at me "YOU'D THINK YOU'D BE MORE WORRIED ABOUT THE POOR MAN".  I looked down into the car and to my absolute horror was an elderly man who had collapsed at the wheel and was obviously dead.  I hadn't even seen him before.  How stupid was I?  Obviously if the dog was trapped inside, a person had to be as well!  The police came and everyone disappeared leaving me with this retriever and deceased owner.  The ambulance came and they pulled the poor man out and lifted him on to the trolley - which they asked me to hold steady as we were on a hill!  I had to lean against it with my hip because I was still holding the dog.  Oh it was awful!  Off he went, poor man, and it wasn't till the recovery vehicle came and everybody dispersed that I realised I was STILL holding the dog.  I couldn't take him home because I'd got a big alpha male dog who wouldn't have liked the idea at all and I had no idea where the retriever lived.  I handed him over to the police when they'd finished their statements.

I still feel guilty about rescuing the dog first though. :-(

Reiner,

Sorry to read of this incident. Like Anna says, whether you were there or not the incident would have happened.

Maybe that fact can help heal the guilt/depression you might be feeling. It might be a lingering feeling that YOU WERE THERE but could do nothing to assist. Just think how much worse is a situation where someone might have done something but didn't, people have to live with that situation, particularly after car accidents where if they'd left the house five minutes earlier etc etc. or, worse, a production manager ignored a faulty machine until an employee got trapped in it. Incidents like those eat at people for a long time particularly after a fatality.


I've only seen dead bodies at funerals, but I have arrived at two accident scenes, both involving motor cyclists, before the emergency services arrived. In both cases the injuries of impact were serious, no point us moving or comforting the victim, alive, unconscious, bleeding. Both later died from head injuries. You don't forget such situations, maybe they help prepare you for anything worse that you might witness in the future (dread the thought).



John W

Thank you Kitty.  Unfortunately though, the time I spent in rescuing the dog meant that the time was wasted as far as the man was concerned.  By the time I realised he was there, CPR would have been out of the question.  It was a good 20 minutes.  Far too late to start.  Apparently he had died at the wheel but had managed to brake first, which was what had caused the other two to pile into him. 

I used to be a St. John Ambulance volunteer and my rule was that if I actually saw someone go down myself, or was informed by a reliable witness that it had only been a minute or two since breathing had ceased, then I'd start CPR and keep it going till someone arrived with a defibrillator.   After 20 minutes there would really be no point in starting the process - unless someone had drowned.  (They've been revived after as much as 40 minutes due to the extreme cold.) The ambulance men made no attempt to resuscitate him.  It was far too late.  I suppose I feel a bit responsible.  A little knowledge is sometimes not a good thing.