It is always a good idea to plan for eventualities like death by learning ahead of time as much as you can concerning options available to you and your families. Decisions about how to care for your own remains or those of loved ones should never be made while grieving or under time pressures.  Waiting until it’s too late will add stress and I believe will also add debt to the survivors who must decide how to proceed.

The idea of being laid to rest in a hole in the ground where decomposition is aided by bugs and worms and moisture is sometimes unsettling to people.  As a result, over time mankind has developed other options to create a sense that our dead can be better preserved. Coffins and then Caskets were a natural step towards separating our dead from the elements.  Next came the idea of insulating the casket from the dirt by putting it in a cement vault. Embalming is encouraged by funeral homes to slow down the process of decay. Why put human remains in the ground at all? The Egyptian pyramids and the Indian Taj Mahal are actually very fancy above the ground tombs. Today, many funeral homes offer mausoleums where we also can have our loved ones entombed above ground. All these things may provide some people with a degree of peace but they come with a price tag. By spending even more money we can purchase an air tight seal that won’t let anything in or out of the casket. 

A flaw in this logic is that death and the decomposition of our bodies are both steps in the natural progression of the cycle of life. There is nothing that can be done short of cryopreservation or taxidermy to stop the disintegration of the human body.  Even then, decomposition is still occurring but at a much slower rate. In my opinion, freezing and stuffing people seems kind of creepy anyway. Once you realize the end result will be the same no matter how much money you spend, it is easier to decide which options to choose.  Cremation is also becoming more popular because it can be done without having to buy real estate and in most cases the basic service is less expensive.

To further help you decide if an above ground mausoleum environment is right for you, consider a few more tidbits of information.  As the body continues to break down because of anaerobic bacteria, it will turn into a gooey slurry that can leak out of the casket.  If the casket is sealed airtight, sometimes gases and pressure will build up to the point that it actually explodes or pops open.  Mausoleums are usually designed with a slight backward incline including excellent venting and drainage systems to keep things pleasant for visitors.  The more expensive caskets also have burp valves incorporated into their design to release built up pressure.  Products like Kryprotek and Ensure-a-Seal are available to help mausoleums control gases and leaks.  There have been cases where funeral homes faced lawsuits because they sold the extra air tight seal to a family but were later caught propping open the lid so circulating air could aid in dehydration.

The more I learn, the more I’m inclined to save a ton of money and be gently lowered into my grave wrapped in a burlap bag.  Cremation or donation to a medical school are not out of the question for me either.  For more information about this and other funeral related topics, an excellent source is The Funeral Consumers Alliance.