Rich 0:00
Hello and welcome to episode six of our dads died the podcast about death and dads specifically, I'm responding I'm here with Tom gherkin, yo, this episode is probably and we've said this a few times already, but we mean it this time is probably our favourite one. This one's

Tom Gerken 0:17
really weird and really different to what you've heard before. It constantly jumps between things, which are really hard to listen to, in terms of like blood and guts and gore. But then things that are really hard to listen to, in terms of like really depressing topics. It is, and yet the whole way through rich keeps making me laugh.

Rich 0:38
Okay, I'll probably come back to that. Because otherwise, that was you describing how hard this episode is to listen to in two different ways you

Tom Gerken 0:47
but it is it is though it is also really funny. Yeah. And I think that's the podcast. Yeah, really, that's the podcast, it was,

Rich 0:54
for a bit of context. It's the second instalment of our interviews with the Deaf daddy, Victor mortician Sweeney, our fantastic friend from overseas. And in it, we get into some more sort of gruesome details, we also get into a last victory experienced in his life, which is, as Tom said, it's a difficult story to hear. It's very tough, and it's obviously affected him very deeply. But it's really interesting to talk to somebody for whom death is a daily occurrence about how he experienced His death and how that's different, or the same as the rest of us.

Tom Gerken 1:33
This is going to be a tricky one, I think for some people, but I also think that if there was an episode, I would say you should listen to, I would say it's this one. Yeah. Because I think what we start talking about, and what we get into is a way of dealing with grief and dealing with death and all the things around it. That is completely something that I think people might find helpful. So I really think this is the one to listen to.

Rich 1:57
I really do. Yeah, having said that couple of trigger warnings, I reckon there is discussion of suicide. So if that's something that affects you, maybe not the best episode to listen to. And then also, as with the previous Victor Sweeney episode, quite a lot of fairly graphic information about corpses. And if that's again, something you're not in the right place to listen to right now. Absolutely. Fine. We'll pop in the timecode for the outro here 47 minutes and then you can pick up where we leave off

Tom Gerken 2:31
brilliant. Here's Victor M Sweeney The M stands for murder.

Rich 2:36
I wanted I wouldn't what happened to all the the units? Which of course he said get put into a big bag. And then yeah, embalmed.

Victor Sweeney 2:45
Yeah, with Yeah, with an autopsy, they do so I can have the end. So there are two ways this might interest you. There are two ways you can do it. You can either keep so you can keep all the viscera, you cut it up, treat it and keep it in the bag. And then that goes in the abdominal cavity if it's an autopsy. And then there's the other method, which is called this is great. It's called the lasagna method. Yeah,

Rich 3:09
this is how the Italians do it.

Victor Sweeney 3:13
Mamma Mia. So instead of instead of keeping everything in the bag, you take all the guts out after being treated with the chemical, and you put like a layer of viscera in the body cavity, and then you sprinkle it with embalming like dehydrating powder, and then put another layer then you sprinkle it with embalming dehydrating powder, and then another layer until you're done. And then you put the you put the breastbone back in. And so everything you soak back up, which is interesting. I've only done it a couple times. The reason you do that is because sometimes when the viscera is all displaced, and then it's in this big bag, it descends and when you finish the abdomen can be like distended and they just won't look natural. So like on a on a child, let's say you wouldn't want to have like a big distended belly. So yeah, child you you would you'd want to use the lasagna method. Of course we'll kind of pack everything in tight so it doesn't look unnatural

Rich 4:16
is disgusting and fascinating and lasagna when he first said it's called the lasagna method I was like Why could it and then as soon as you said he put it

Victor Sweeney 4:28
here so let's look let's go some more food things because apparently that's that's a thing in the funeral world. You also have there's there's three types of what we call purge Okay, so Purge is okay, so Purge is well okay, so there's no purge of course you can imagine. Well, of course,

Rich 4:44
we've seen that so

Victor Sweeney 4:48
it was in a tough No, but no with with purge. Um, there are two types and what sorry, three types. And so what we'll be talking about as I need to time when fluid is either coming out of the nose or the eyes or the mouth before someone's involved or after they're involved. So you have you have a lung purge, which looks like frost milk in a cap in like, in like a coffee drink. Lonely fridge. And then you have and then you have you have stomach purge, which is like coffee grounds. And then you have Yeah, and then you have brain purge, which is like a like a pail. Sometimes like, like jelly. Which, yeah, so those those are the three types of purge.

Rich 5:34
Oh, wow. Wait, which one was no purge again?

Victor Sweeney 5:38
It it'll Purge is just on the other end. So they don't say, yeah, it doesn't get the same kind of classification.

Tom Gerken 5:46
Go. Go. You're listening to the hardest podcast to listen to? Ever and we love it. Yeah, but one of the you mentioned this thing. I mean, obviously, yeah. Part of the job. It's part of the job. children die. Get it's part of a job. But I mean, with bodies like that. Yeah, that's that's got. That's that's got to be harder.

Victor Sweeney 6:08
It's just the worst. It's just the worst. Yeah, I I'll never forget, it was some years ago. But there was a young boy in our community who had he was five, and he drowned. And I received him on Father's Day. So Father's Day Night, I'm a new father. I don't know if my boy was just one or two. But I'm a new father, and I'm taking care of this young boy. And, I mean, it was just just terrible. I mean, just terrible. And then you do that in you just you know, and then you get home, you lie awake all night. And then you meet with his parents the next day. And like, that's, in some ways even worse. Um, but I don't know, you just you just do what you can, you know, I mean, you can only provide what you have. And I mean, you know, at least I'm doing something like with kids, for instance, um, like, we don't, we don't charge anything for kids. So whenever there's a child or an infant that dies, we just don't charge anything at all. So, you know, our services, totally free. casket free. Everything's free. We just don't we just don't charge.

Rich 7:18
And is that is standard across the industry? Or is that something that just you guys do? Really, it's

Victor Sweeney 7:23
it's not standard? Which kind of grinds my gears a little bit?

Tom Gerken 7:29
Surely you see, like GoFundMe is for? Yeah, it's

Victor Sweeney 7:33
like, I mean, you know, like, nobody likes working for free. Nobody likes going backwards. But I mean, do you think your average 20 to 30 year old parents whose a kid has any money to spend on this sort of stuff? Like I don't? Like you know, yeah, I mean, yeah, so I yeah, I Nope. Never will ever charge anything for a child's funeral. Never

Tom Gerken 7:54
legend. So it's hard to listen to you get the blood and guts, then it's hard to listen to because it's emotionally devastating. So back to the blood and guts. Now, what do you got this thing about? The bodies and how they descend and stuff sometimes, right? But are you always so in the muck to look like that? Even when no one's gonna see him?

Victor Sweeney 8:20
Okay, so well, so not not everybody, of course, is split down the middle, right? That's just but yeah, so even if we have if we have a body, where the family is like, well, we're gonna bury the body in a casket, we want it close. We're not gonna have any viewing. Yeah, I still always prepare everyone the exact same way I would. So, you know, for men, if they had their face shaved, I will shave their face, I will get them dressed, I will do their hair. Because there's eyes the off chance that someone is going to change their mind, right? Because it's not something you can get back. Yeah. Right. So it's like so you know, if the if the widow, for instance, is like, actually I want to see him, like, you don't want to be sitting there, like caught with your pants down like, oh, sorry, I didn't get him ready. You know. So I always do it. And like we had, we had a situation some years ago, just off the top of my head, we had a suicide by a gunshot wound. And it was a fairly large gun. And so there wasn't anything left of this person's head, really. And like the parents obviously wanted to see their child so and the deceased individual had been at home for like a week before they were found, Oh, Jesus. So we're really not great, but managed to embalm the person and what we ended up doing is we just showed the arm. I just got the person dressed, had them in a body bag, sealed everything up but had their had their arm out. Because like at least you have that. That's really nice. Um, but that Yeah. So to answer your question, yeah, I do that. Like, I mean, like, you know, I was kind of like getting gaggy and not feeling so great when I was putting a tarp on this person who had no, you know, how are you

Tom Gerken 10:15
putting a tarp on someone who wasn't ahead? I mean, without putting it in any other way. That's what it is, isn't it?

Victor Sweeney 10:21
Yeah. Just is what it is.

Tom Gerken 10:23
Yep. He I think it's high.

Victor Sweeney 10:26
No tie. Yeah, that'd be a tough one. Yeah, but no, but yeah, I mean, so I yeah, I mean, because I figure like, you know what, whatever the case, everybody deserves to be buried as nicely as I can. Given the circumstance. Yeah. You get them dressed. You do it. You know, you don't ever want to like open that bag up again. But, mom, dad, bring in clothes. You're getting them dressed.

Tom Gerken 10:49
Which went really emotionally heavy again. I need to be grossed out.

Rich 10:53
Well, I was gonna ask is, after the many years you've been doing this? Is there still stuff that will? Turn your stomach? Yep. Yeah.

Victor Sweeney 11:06
Yeah, yeah. Like that the missing the missing things that should be there. That's not great.

Tom Gerken 11:14
Horror directors say when they're making horror movies that the thing that's really disconcerting and really puts you off is when someone looks normal, but has something just wrong. Like a disfigurements, like missing, like the mouth being covered up that kind of stuff. That was really unsettling. You must get a lot of that.

Victor Sweeney 11:34
I can believe that. Yeah, I can believe that. Yeah. I don't think that turned my stomach. There aren't a lot. Like extreme decomposition, like we're talking people who weren't found for a week in their own air conditioned house. Like, yeah, like, Yeah, we had a person, I mean, just the smell. Just the smell is so bad. And then like, depending on the situation, you know, you get this these bacteria, these gut bacteria that just run wild. And so like, I've had cases where someone's been, you know, not found for a week or two. And like, everything about them is distended, like fingers, plump sausages face like it. I don't, I don't know if it's the right term, but like it's called. Sometimes it's called a monkey face. Because like, it will look like at a certain point, if like any human in the world, their face can be so distended, it's just like, just everything is big eyes are bugging out. Lips are bugging out tongues lolling out, and like things are green and purple. And that's really gross. Willy Wonka

Tom Gerken 12:37
where the foot girl eats the blueberry and she goes all blue. It's like,

Victor Sweeney 12:42
it's like that. Yeah. And then yeah, and then like the juice and then the juicing machine isn't another? Sometimes it's you

Tom Gerken 12:50
said the juice. I did think you were gonna talk about some kind of Oh, yeah, we call it?

Victor Sweeney 12:54
I did. Um, yeah, I did. I did have somebody split in half. And I had to get new shoes. Oh, good, Lord. Yeah.

Rich 13:04
That's not great. What was it? That was it? We're talking blood guts, just kind of

Victor Sweeney 13:09
whatever. Sort of the follow leftovers? Yeah. And it's just like, split. Or, or, like we've had, we've had people who've passed away after like, severe gi bleeds. And usually they're like, on the toilet. But it's just like, you walk in and just like, yeah, what everywhere? Yeah, everywhere. And like, like, it's happened a couple times, where it's like, you take the body back to the funeral home, and the family's like, I'm gonna go over to mom's house and you're like, so like, like, my boss. And I have, like, cleaned up several scenes of death just because, like, you know, what, like, you don't, you know, like, you know, these people and like, you don't want them walking in on that. Yeah, yeah, that's like, alright, well, I'm, you know, just, you know, we're gonna go to the house first and just clean up a little bit and like, you're throwing away, you know, laundry and washing floors and doing that, like, and that's pretty rare. We don't, you don't have to do it all the time. But like, you know, you just don't want people to have to deal with that. Like, if anyone's gonna deal with it. Like, just let me deal with it. I've already, you know, been there done that. My eyes are just ruined. So you know, What's one more?

Rich 14:21
Bite I've got a friend who is a doctor now. And when he was in medical school, he he told me a story about when they were doing sort of, I think quite early on, they saw an autopsy. And one of the head lecturers took them through it. And it it was an interesting one, because he said there's obviously you get very used to seeing dead bodies, as I'm sure you do. But there's such a level of respect in your industry for the body. Whereas he said this guy if he was in his 60s He'd been doing his whole career he was over it. And he sort of cut this body open was Take in the organs and go, Well, that's the liver puts that over there. This is the kidney puts it over there. And I think it was when he got to the lungs, maybe? Or maybe it was the liver when he got to the liver, he'd run out of space for where to put these organs. And so he looked around for a second, and then just slapped it on the guy's face. And then

Victor Sweeney 15:23
oh, yeah, yeah. Um, so in school, they always tell you, you know, when you're, when you're preparing someone, obviously, you have your horrific looking tools and such, and all your various instruments. And they always tell you, it's not a tool chest, basically, like you don't you don't just like stack your stuff on someone as you're working on.

Rich 15:42
Yeah, yeah. Which feels like something you shouldn't need to be taught. And I imagine most doctors, you would think they wouldn't need to be taught it. But it's different

Victor Sweeney 15:51
when it's a liver. I don't know. Maybe Maybe that's like exempt. There's like a symbiotic effect you're gonna wear I don't know. Well, I'm

Rich 15:58
actually it's about the size of a face. So it's the good, good covering is the size of a face. I don't want to talk about what I've seen.

Victor Sweeney 16:05
Yeah, it's probably bigger than a face bigger than a face.

Rich 16:09
Depends on the faces. Of course.

Victor Sweeney 16:11
It depends how big your liver is, like how much you drink, like, bigger than your face or smaller.

Rich 16:18
Which would be the hardest organ to get to stay on a face. Because the smaller ones, you'd have to sort of put it in the eye socket. I guess you're trying

Victor Sweeney 16:29
to think you have to be something Slippery like like probably like your intestines Like Good Luck piling those up. Anyway, good point, just a lot of free noodles.

Tom Gerken 16:38
Noodles assumed that all guns were made the same when it comes down to slipperiness? No, I didn't think there was a hierarchy slipperiness

Victor Sweeney 16:48
hierarchy, you guys, was this what we

Tom Gerken 16:50
talked about? I'll agree felt that that's and how, like, kind of sad that is. Yeah. But you know, also like, in quite an aggressive way. We sort of argue, to our guests always why our grief is worse than theirs. Okay, tell me pleasant that our guests know that. Because, you know, it's really it's really sad. Well,

Rich 17:11
as as the daddy of death, you're the perfect fit person to, to let us know, once and for all, who which of the two of us is higher in the hierarchy of grief, based on our personal stories? And I want you to be brutal here. Victor will tell you what happens in sort of bullet point form. Yeah, and I don't want any emotion. I don't want any I just want pragmatism. Okay.

Tom Gerken 17:36
preme court justice here. We're talking

Unknown Speaker 17:39
Russo? Well, we'll

Rich 17:41
go chronologically so my dad died when I was 24 or younger. That's I was significantly younger. I was 24 years old. I'd had left home a couple of years before I was living alone in a flying Doncaster. It was the 23rd of December 2014, two days before Christmas, I just bought my dad's Christmas gift and I was wrapping it. And I went, I got home from work that day. And I got a phone call to say your dad's dead. Or, to quote my mom, daddy died, which is even worse, which is worse, but I hadn't called him daddy for a long time. So it was also just confusing. And, and it was, and I'll say this again 23rd of December. And I then had to get a four hour journey home from Doncaster to my family home in the Midlands. And then we had Christmas Eve, just a few hours later. And I had to unwrap the wallets that I bought for my father. Did you know that he never got to receive

Victor Sweeney 18:51
I was going to ask if you if you gave him gave him the gift.

Rich 18:55
I couldn't he he

Victor Sweeney 18:58
didn't put it in like wherever like in a casket or if he's being cremated like put it with them. That's what happened. Yeah, I

Rich 19:04
did. I did wonder I did

Tom Gerken 19:06
that now. Rich.

Rich 19:07
I put in. Well, I've actually still got the wallet. It's on its I can see it right now. So I kept it. Do you use it? I did for a while. But I didn't like how it looked too much. It's quite chunky. So dad wallet. I gotcha. Yeah. But I've kept with that. Yeah. So yeah, that's my story. And I mean, I'm trying to think of it is there anything else really tragic that I can add in?

Tom Gerken 19:39
Yeah, I like the way you added the bit. You've never said that before you added the bit about lonely on your own unwrapping depressant. Yeah, yeah, a nice bit of embarrassment that

Rich 19:49
and it was snowing when I went back to Doncaster for the first time and I had to sleep alone in a flat that had no central heating and I to go and write radio jingles the next morning.

Victor Sweeney 20:02
Oh, that's juxtaposition is not good. Pretty sad, isn't it? They're all like a minor key. Okay, yeah. Well, no one's buying cars this month.

Rich 20:14
Yeah, there was some pretty massive jingles that year. But yeah, Tom, you go you go. Top that.

Tom Gerken 20:22
Yeah, knock me out to get the loneliness angle. i Well, it was something like the 14th of November 2019. So chronologically speaking, it happened to me more recently. That is about a week before my 30th birthday. So Rich, it was just a normal Christmas for him any old Christmas, but for me, it was my 30th birthday of about ruined. So milestone. November goes into December. So I'm still filling it in Christmas. So it's sort of both kind of ah, was it was he had cancer, which was, what kind of cancer all kinds of cancer. The old classic cancer where it starts out with, we had a prostate exam. Oh, that's a bit weird. We'll have another person look at another one. That's a bit weird when that person look at it. And third person goes, we have a little scan of your body and then they go it's in your prostate. It's in your hips. It's in your kidneys. It's in your lungs. It's go into your brain. You've got no symptoms. Well, I'm lucky it's one of them so properly like proper shark of any deteriorated for two years. Two very long years, which they were so long

Rich 21:39
too long years you spent with your father.

Tom Gerken 21:43
Too long years of him getting slowly worse. Yeah, it was about a minute it was bad at the end you know, like for up for out obviously. It was lovely, you know, chance to spend time with him. But at the end, you know, Jesus Christ watching someone, your last memory of someone being them in a hospital bed, you know, did you like lose a lot of weight to loads of weight? Yeah. Well, I mean, but he was that was good for him because he was originally really fat man. So he actually looked in a way when he died. He actually looked sort of, like, one of the rarely mentioned

Rich 22:13
upsides of cancer. That was a

Victor Sweeney 22:16
great weight loss opportunity. Then I put that on the brochure.

Tom Gerken 22:22
Always bold, so as well. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So there was that, but yeah, sort of study got sick over a long period of time. And

Victor Sweeney 22:32
so to like to help you make your point he looked okay, but he was really bad. Oh, so yeah, like it was just

Tom Gerken 22:39
right at the end, you know? Yeah. Presumably, you get this a lot when you see someone when they're just about to die, and they're just there, but they're not. Yeah, you know, when you can't shake that image rich, you can't shake that image. All right. So that that does that does hang on. And then you know, I went to see him and then he got phone call the next day saying is died. And then on my birthday, everyone kept texting me saying happy birthday. Happy birthday, your dad's dead, you know, kind of things. It's hard to forget. So I just think and also the UK lecture was on the night to work. So, you know, I couldn't get away from work. You're writing radio jingles. I'm gonna have five lives to talk about the election. You know, it's different rich.

Victor Sweeney 23:30
Yeah, um, that's what I'm saying. Ya know, in my experience, like working with a lot of families, there's really not a good way to go, like long and drawn out has its benefits, right? Like you have time to spend. But yeah, like you say you have this deterioration and it's like hard and everybody and it takes forever and then like the quick way, you know, Rich is like, also awful. Worse. You Yeah, well, it's like that. Yeah. Hey, wow. Well, what we'll get we'll get to my reasoning here. Sure. Um, because that um, yeah, there's something there's something about that too. That's hard because it's so dang quick. But also you don't you don't maybe have this long drawn out time where it's like you're slowly maybe desensitising yourself to this loss. So you in some ways, like when it's long you lose them over and over and over again. And maybe when it's short you lose them once but it's like the heartbreak so I don't know I don't know I always tell people like there's no good way can I tell you my death story?

Tom Gerken 24:34
Absolutely. Please but do be aware that I will rate it against my

Victor Sweeney 24:38
own Yeah, please. Yeah, we can do like like a tiered system. Or we could do like a like a secret ballot maybe. I don't know if that'd be fair.

Rich 24:45
We all vote for ourselves. So

Tom Gerken 24:48
anyways, I always happens.

Victor Sweeney 24:51
But no, so for me I haven't lost my dad. He's living but my my,

Tom Gerken 24:58
tell him this podcast to rub that off. Facebook, I'm sorry.

Victor Sweeney 25:00
My dad is so alive. You guys

Rich 25:04
have been great if you just logged off

Victor Sweeney 25:10
yes, no. So my Okay, so in 2018, my best friend took his own life. Whoa. And so I was 28, he was 28 as well. And he has been my best friend from the time I was 14. So I'd known him for half my life. And so I so as I was born outside, in a suburb of Detroit, Michigan, and moved to North Dakota, when I was 13. And I, you know, everybody's moody a 13. And I didn't really fit in and everybody like, hunted and fished, and did all these things like a city boy doesn't know how to do. And, you know, I was like a pretty erudite kind of guy, and not a whole lot of readers where I was at. So I didn't have any friends and was in a really low spot. And I met this guy, Alex, who, um, we shared a lot with the Blues Brothers initially. And then, as well as all people should. And then we just spent like, the next several years, like, always with each other, like people, people thought we were very gay. But in some ways, I'll say this, though, we had like this very, like intimate male friendship. And I don't know if that exists anymore, where it's like, I have someone who I could like, bare my soul to, and like, I don't know, we're just very intimate, I guess. And anyway, he hit a rough patch got really into drugs, we went our separate ways, we reconnected. He got married, his wife ran out on them. And then on November 5, the day before my birthday, I get a call from his wife saying, Hey, Alex, hang himself,

Tom Gerken 26:55
Jesus.

Victor Sweeney 26:56
And I will forever be grateful. So it was November 5 2018, I'll forever be grateful. Because there was nobody in my office that day. And there was nothing to do and nobody died. My boss was in here. And I just like, laid on my floor and cried for like two straight hours. And like, I transferred the phone to the answering service, I would have talked to anyone and just like cried and cried and cried and cried. And then I had to like, call my parents and Alex like, grew up in our house. I like call my brothers and he was like, close with all my brothers. And so I had to like, Call everyone and tell them. And then his parents then kind of came to me and they're like, hey, Victor, what do we do? Like you do this? Like, what do we do? And that was just excruciating. Trying to figure out like, hey, how do we like, coordinate this? Like, I'm glad I don't have to be like, hands on hands on. But yeah, so like, My birthday was the next day, I lovingly call it my cake down. Because like, my wife brought up my birthday cake. I'm just like, openly weeping, trying to like enjoy my cake with my kids. And they're like, Dad, why are you crying? I'm just like, I just like ugly crying, trying to eat cake. And then we had this funeral on November 11. And I gave the eulogy. I was one of the casket bearers. And we left the church to Strawberry Fields Forever. Which was just like that. That's what he called, like, our childhood. He's like, Yeah, like 2015 with strawberry fields, like, we just lived in like this dream world. And like, we didn't work and we just, like, spent every waking moment with each other. So yeah, and then and then the worst part of it was, he had Hank, like, and I had to, of course, talk to the medical examiner and the mortician. Because they're like, his parents were like, well, they said, we can't see him like why? Well, let me find out. So I had to, like, sit there and listen to the exact details of my friends hanging as we'd hang themselves and hung there for three days, so all the blood had pulled in his head, and then broken down. So you have what's called Skin slip. And the eyes are bulging and distended. And so we couldn't we couldn't even see them. And when you're used to doing that, yeah. So yeah, so that was, um, yeah, so that was my death story. And then I also just had to, like, carry on at work and help other people with their deaths. And

Rich 29:27
so how does how does your job affect the way you deal with something like that? Do you? Do you feel like you know, too much? Almost, does it make it harder?

Victor Sweeney 29:36
Yeah, I mean, nobody wants to sit there and listen to like, post mortem details of their best friend. And then have to like explain that to his parents in like, a soft way. Yeah, you know, um, so that's hard. But it's, you know, like, as you know, I guess like, I got to experience it very firsthand. Like I got to, like I wrote the first draft of it. Alex's obituary. And I, you know, got to hands on do a lot of these things, which was really nice. In its own weird way. So yeah, so that so then every so his birthday is in October, and mine's in November, one month apart, our birthdays are. And so the three years after that, I find like, October to, like October to November is I just like, like my blue period. Like, everything is just like, sad. And it sucks. And I'm just, like, sad all the time about it. And I find myself crying about it. And I'm like, by myself. Um, but that's okay. You know, it's okay. I don't know it is what it is. And like, and, you know, like, my grandpa died in February. And we saw him my brother and I drove back to Michigan during COVID 17 hours one way. Like, he's actually staggered 17 hours one way to see my grandpa the last time. And knowing that's the last time I was just like bawling. And then like, I started thinking about Alex, and I'm just like, bawling fresh again. And I'm just like, my mom is my mom showed up there. And she's like, driving us back to my grandma's house. I'm just like, in the back, just a puddle. And like, I just don't care. Like, if you're gonna cry, you should just do it. It's yeah. Yeah. Um, but yeah. So which one of yours is worse? Higher? Oh, you

Rich 31:25
can't tell your story, and then suddenly go.

Tom Gerken 31:33
I'm afraid. The thing about it is that you expect your dad today? Yeah. That's how it's meant to happen. If everything goes right with the world, your dad you experience your dad dying, because otherwise your dad's experiencing you dying, and no barber shifts to bury their son. Right? So you should at some points, but your dad's that's just when it happens earlier than it should. But it's really hard. I guess. You know, eventually, at some point, one friend will see their other friend die. It's just that's the kind of thing you think will happen when you're all 80 or 90 or something like 96 Whatever you're going for. Yeah. But God, yeah, I mean, for it to happen when you're

Victor Sweeney 32:17
2828. Yeah. Yeah. And then just to have to be like, really involved is hard. Yeah.

Rich 32:24
Did you did you wish at that point, if you could have not been involved at all, and just had the normal sort of experience,

Victor Sweeney 32:32
maybe I am, I like went through some serious depression. I had anxiety for like, marking that day, I would get anxiety while driving at night. And I that was like, for about a year, like I was on Prozac and like hyperventilating while having to drive at night. So that was great. I really, really good for a job where you're working late in the evening. So yeah, I, um, you know, and I initially had wanted to, I kind of wanted to volunteer to drive his body back from Wisconsin where he died back home. But that was one thing I just couldn't do. I just couldn't do it. And so sometimes I wish maybe I wasn't involved. But even being someone who was on the inside of that, even that, you know, funeral funeral in a country Lutheran Church, for a guy who wasn't that religious like it was, it was good. It felt good to actually like memorialise something, you know. Yeah. Yeah. So

Tom Gerken 33:31
that is a question that comes up on this podcast every single episode. Who is the funeral for? If you're a person who dies, or is the person who left behind?

Victor Sweeney 33:44
It's about it's about the one who died. And it's for everyone else. It's what it's got to be. I don't know. Because I've been to funerals. And I plan funerals. Were like, we follow the person's instructions to a tee and it's all about them. And it's their favourite music and their way or the highway. And I just don't know if people are always served by that. Like, I had a cousin that got married, and she was really into like, the Detroit like techno club scene. And she's like, at my wedding, we're only going to have Detroit techno club music and like, they tried that for the first like, 20 minutes, and it sucked. And

Rich 34:20
nobody was dancing. Sounds like it would. Yeah. And

Victor Sweeney 34:23
and so then then they went back to like, the old days and you know, love shack. And you know, all those standbys. And everything was great. So I think about that, sometimes it's like, you know, it can't always be for the person who died. It's got to be about them. But it's got to be for everyone else. It's got to serve everyone.

Rich 34:42
And you think your cousin might try that again at her funeral?

Victor Sweeney 34:45
I don't know. I'm kind of curious. Actually. I should ask her about that. Like, can you plan your funeral? Think in Detroit tech? No.

Tom Gerken 34:53
It's not a circumstance where you really need to worry about filling the dance floor, I suppose. Is it?

Victor Sweeney 34:58
No, it's all Yeah, and like you can't RSVP that's always fun. Yes. Like you don't know if like a funeral like 50 people are gonna show up or 500. Sometimes you're surprised and like, like, I did not, we don't have enough food for everyone.

Rich 35:14
So after Alex's death, has that affected your sort of your work your day to day, the way you experience your work, has it changed the way you think of death?

Victor Sweeney 35:30
Yeah, I think so. Um, well, I was telling you guys about the gentleman that took the person who took their life and we had like the arm, right? Yeah. And all throughout that I'm thinking like, Man, I, I would have loved to have seen Alex's arm, or like, held his hand one more time, you know, like, shook his hand. Like I would have loved to have shaken his hand and like, I can tell you, I can tell you what his hand feels like. We're like, I had a dream. Two months after his death, where he gave me a hug. And it felt like his hug. Have you ever had that? Have you had? Yeah, like you wake up and you're like, I just want to go back to sleep. Like there was just so real.

Tom Gerken 36:09
We've, we've said about dreams, because it's vary so wildly. But do you do experience it often?

Victor Sweeney 36:18
I'm not as often as I'd like, one and I like when it when it happens. It's really nice. And like, I've I've like woken up like with tears in my eyes several times. Like, is that ever happened to you? Like you wake up crying or like you wake up laughing? That's like a fun one. Yeah. But it's only I only have that like, really intense, like emotional awakening. Like when it's about Alex. I don't know why that is. Yeah, he was. You would have liked him. You guys. He was um, he was like he was he did stand up for a little bit. But he was primarily an improv comic. Yeah, he was he was at the IO or he was at the I O Theatre in Chicago. Which is where like Chris Farley got to start.

Rich 37:00
Those guys very famously. That was that. Yeah. So

Victor Sweeney 37:03
like, he would have been like, you guys would have got along? Well, it was hard. It was hard to see him like, cut himself down. Like, in what could have been his prime? Yeah.

Rich 37:16
That's such a sad, but also not uncommon story of young men. Which is, I mean, this the case here it's the case in the state of ghosts all over the world. But when it's a new be, you know, you hear stories and you hear these statistics, but when is your friend and it's Alex and he Yeah, was a funny guy. And he had these dreams and this life and it's It's brutal.

Victor Sweeney 37:43
Yeah, I am. When it when, when when his parents put out his gravestone. It was, I thought it was kind of it says it was like it was lacking, you know, like, some people are just larger than life. Yeah. And you're like this, this like gravestone should be 10 feet tall. Like it's just be thick and huge. And it's just like a little cemetery marker. So I have a friend who's who's a headstone engraver, who does some work for us the funeral home, and he made me a little little piece of granite and the same colour as Alex's headstone. And it has a pair of Ray Ban sunglasses, and it said, on a mission from God. So I went out there and put it next to his headstone. Yeah.

Rich 38:23
Oh, that's nice. That's

Tom Gerken 38:24
really nice.

Rich 38:25
He's good with that as well leave. I mean, most people couldn't do that. But you've got friends in the business.

Tom Gerken 38:31
Right? You've got connections. That's true. Yeah.

Rich 38:34
Yeah, if anyone's going to be able to hook you up with a headstone engraver? That's right, it's Victor sweetening.

Victor Sweeney 38:40
Why Well, I actually designed headstones as part of my like side gigs, so I like design and sell headstones.

Rich 38:46
Oh, nice.

Victor Sweeney 38:47
Yeah. Tell us more about that. Um, that's kind of neat. It's just something we do on the side. So being a small town, we have to kind of be everything to everybody. Yeah. So we're more or less a one stop shop. So I set up funeral trusts and do pre planning. We do funerals, of course, I embalm and then I also headstones. So that's one thing that's been kind of fun, because it's something you can create, you know, and it's, it's maybe perpetuals too strong of a word, but it's something that's going to be up for a very, very long time, and withstand the elements. And so that's, that's been kind of fun, because you get to make something that's, that's that. I know people have their thoughts and you work with families, but you also get to put your own spin on it a little bit. And so that's, that's been interesting. I actually, there's a there's a, I should put a plug in. There's a headstone engraver in the UK who's given me a lot of inspiration. Okay, yeah, go as it is a company called stone letters. And they do they're like an artisan headstone maker so they like carve all lettering by hand and they do a much like much more detailed job than my monument company does. But it's been kind of fun to look through how other countries do their headstones and incorporate that into into your design because like over here, you guys, I wish I had an example. It's like, you have a three foot wide headstone, husband, wife, husband side will have a hammer, and square because he'd like to build stuff and the wife side will have a sewing machine because she'd like to sew or something like that. Yeah. And I just last couple years have been like, I'm not doing that anymore. I want to make things that you know, in 100 years, they'll still look good. They won't look kitschy, I guess or like you don't want like, like, what are your debt? Like your dad's have gravestones?

Tom Gerken 40:40
cremated mine,

Victor Sweeney 40:41
okay. But like but they're not in a cemetery then?

Tom Gerken 40:43
No, still, actually, your dad's still us. So my step mom's house by the fireplace, okay, but by the fireplace in an urn.

Victor Sweeney 40:55
We haven't cleaned out the fireplace since we ever use it.

Tom Gerken 41:00
We just put it over to the UVA and then which has big Liverpool fans and said I want a Liverpool shirt. So the earnest Liverpool Football Club kind of on it, and it's just there. We don't really know what to do. I guess waiting till COVID comes to an end to do something. Yeah. with it. But it's been there for so long. Now. It's starting to become a big part of the furniture. Yeah,

Victor Sweeney 41:24
yeah, it's hard.

Tom Gerken 41:25
That's in the room kind of business. Yeah,

Victor Sweeney 41:27
well, you know, I guess like, like, if you do nothing, like what happens? Do you like inherit it? Eventually? You know, is it like something you just pass on down to your

Tom Gerken 41:37
to? Do you have to keep the ashes altogether? Or? No, you don't. But it almost feels weird to be like, with you've got part of dad and this. You've got public in this week. We've just DVD Matt between the

Victor Sweeney 41:54
I'm not a big fan. I mean, just for myself personally, I really prefer cremated remains that that's like industry speak cremated remains is, um, keep those intact. And like, like, bury them or in tune them or have them in a place that is neutral.

Tom Gerken 42:12
You found a scattering of the ashes?

Victor Sweeney 42:15
Yeah, I'm not I'm not big on that. I mean, I think it just, you know, there's something every human life is special. And every human life matters. And I think there's something about being able to say, Yeah, My great grandpa is buried right here. Like, I can stand where my great grandpa was buried. And I don't know, like, if you scatter your dad in the ocean, like, you know, or in the river, you know, like they say no one steps into the same river twice. Like,

Rich 42:43
where Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you can't. You can't really rethink that can be later on. Yeah.

Victor Sweeney 42:51
Yeah. So I'm not I'm not big on scattering or divvying or, like, cremation jewellery. That's a big thing. I yeah, I was gonna sell some of that. But I'm not a big fan of it. I just don't. It's just not my thing.

Rich 43:03
Yeah, that's fair. And what about you, Richard? Well, my dad, he is buried. He's in a graveyard. Not far from where we lived, but just down the road from where he worked. He was a GP in a small village. In the Midwest, what is the GP? General? Sorry, general practitioner, so

Victor Sweeney 43:22
I would have guessed. Yeah. That's cool. All right. Does he have a gravestone?

Rich 43:27
He does? Yes. And it's, I have an odd relationship with it. Because I'm not a hugely religious person, and neither was he. Sure he is buried in a church and he had a Christian funeral. Yeah. And it was an odd thing. Go, I'll go there. And I sometimes I'll feel very connected to him. And other times. It just feels like you're standing in a cold field. Looking at a bit of rock.

Victor Sweeney 43:56
I can see that. What does it say? Yeah, what does it say?

Rich 43:59
It says his name and his date of birth, that is date of death. And then I think it says beloved father, husband, friend, son, Doctor of this parish, and then there's a quote from Winnie the Pooh. Nice as some people care too much. I think it's called love. She's very nice.

Victor Sweeney 44:25
And like that. Yeah. What's it What's it made out of? What's his gravestone made out of? Do you know?

Tom Gerken 44:30
What materials?

Rich 44:31
It's good question. It's what colour is it? Grey? Light grey? I'd say.

Victor Sweeney 44:38
So it could be it could be like granite or maybe like a type of sandstone

Rich 44:42
possibly. Granite. Sounds like it rings a bell.

Victor Sweeney 44:46
Okay. Is it polished? Yeah, I'm just curious. Yeah. So it's probably granite. Yeah, granite polishes the best. That's interesting. I yeah, I am Someday I hope to never have to use it. But I read this on on that stone letters they have they have a whole All series have like epitaphs, which are really beautiful. And I've been trying to use epitaphs more because they're not really used here are like quotes, which I think is really cool. I've been trying to use it more. Well, there's one that I read that just touched me and I thought if I ever have a child die, like either in my community or maybe one of my own, God forbid, it says it says this, and it just it just broke my heart. When I read it. It says God's garden has needed small flowers. Oh, that's beautiful. Isn't that nice? Just gut wrenching? I don't know. Yeah. It just kind of hurts a little bit.

Rich 45:38
I think I mean, we've taken up so much of your time, up yet. But one final question. If there were to be a zombie apocalypse, yes. Do you think they will remember you? And take care of you as one of their own? Yes.

Victor Sweeney 45:57
Yeah. I hope so. Um, yeah. At least in my living experience, you know, you deal with a wide swath of people from very, very low means to very high means. And if you can make friends with like, the very rough people, like, you're in, you know, like, you can go to a bar if there's a fight, like, they got the morticians back. So I don't know why like zombies would be any different.

Rich 46:23
Well, I actually love them you would have, you'd bury them, they'll their last memory will be this kind man looking after them.

Victor Sweeney 46:29
Or, or it'll be like, this kind man like puncturing all their organs with a big spear.

Tom Gerken 46:34
That's the balance,

Rich 46:35
isn't it? That's that's the possibility problem that in fact, they'll come for you. First, you'll be

Tom Gerken 46:41
the main target of a lot of dead people.

Victor Sweeney 46:44
And I only live like two blocks from my city cemetery. So I'm in trouble. My house is not that far to fiable.

Rich 46:51
And you probably there more than most at the cemetery. So if, if it all kicks off? You're

Victor Sweeney 46:57
sure. I recognise his walk?

Rich 47:01
Yeah, yeah.

There we go. Victor M. Sweeney edition. The second couple of important points raised. Tom, where's your dad?

Tom Gerken 47:19
Two years on from two years later, where does he reside two years on from the from the episode, I guess. Yeah. Well, it's interesting. So so it's illegal in the United Kingdom, for you to scatter somebody's ashes on private property? Is it?

Rich 47:39
I mean, that makes sense, I

Tom Gerken 47:40
suppose. Yeah. Like without the landowners permission. It's illegal to Yeah, his ashes? Yeah. on private property, valid landowners permission? Yeah.

Rich 47:47
So where have you have you scattered him?

Tom Gerken 47:52
Well, I mean, I would say that his urn is almost as full as it once was. In the living room. It's in the living room Liverpool on it, and it's almost as full as it once was. Okay. And why is it not analyst at one and it's an it's illegal in the United Kingdom, to scatter somebody's ashes?

Rich 48:10
Property, those two facts you're presenting completely unrelated?

Tom Gerken 48:14
Those are just two facts. Right. You know, those are just two facts. Right, right. But it really isn't legally mean that can schedule a pub properly. So if he had a favourite place, yeah. It would be totally illegal. It would be illegal. Yeah, throw it there.

Rich 48:28
So what you're saying is, next time you go to a high ramsons do make sure that is pepper. Because you never know. I mean, it is illegal to scatter ashes on private property as you've made very clear without the landowners permission without the landowners permission. But as we discussed on a previous episode about your dad's favourite place, had my dad being cremated, it would have looked really quite quite an odd image, wouldn't it seeing someone just chuck some ashes in a tip?

Tom Gerken 48:58
I guess it wouldn't be illegal though.

Rich 49:00
No laws against it. I just think it would make me look very callous.

Tom Gerken 49:04
Good. Is it? Is it illegal to scatter your dad's ashes at a tip? Sure. Well, because it's a private it's a privately owned. But yeah, oh, first of all wake up. No, I'm further away. I'm just frying these lights. Oh, bad.

Rich 49:18
Yeah, yeah, that's how I would say it as well to disguise my

Tom Gerken 49:22
Yeah, that's my impression. Yeah.

Rich 49:24
I think it's probably okay to skirt some ashes in a tip. Not not a body, not a body. You really can't leave a body there. You do. And the police say that if you've got a body do burn it before you put it in the tip. They make that very clear.

Tom Gerken 49:40
Oh, dear, I do. So thank you so much for listening to this episode if you loved it, and I loved it. So if you loved it, that's amazing. Rich. Yes. There's something very important that we need people to do.

Rich 49:57
Yes. Listen, when Gonna keep banging on about it. It will never stop. It will never end until every single person when we've got more than 8 billion reviews on Apple podcasts, then maybe

Tom Gerken 50:12
around again at that point, then we have a second reviews for people. Yeah. Getting more than one, that's what we want.

Rich 50:20
Yeah. When we've got 16 billion reviews to from each of you, maybe then we'll let it rest. But until then, please do rate review. Subscribe, download, follow. That is everything. Like

Speaker 2 50:39
yes, please do absolutely everything that can help this podcast grow. But I think the number one thing I'd actually like you to do this week, dear listener, tell a friend. Oh, yeah. Tell a friend. Tell a friend. Just tell just one. If everyone who listened told a friend, we would have doubled well, and they listened. Yeah, we were like 1000 listeners. I mean, it's crazy. We've had so many, such a brilliant response to this. And thank you so much. We're approaching 1000 lessons rich. Yeah. Which is just crazy.

Rich 51:12
And figures. If you if you do know someone who is and a lot of us will know someone who is going through grief in one way or another at the moment. And you think this podcast might be helpful for them. Pass it on. Please spread the gift, which seems like an arrogant thing for me.

Tom Gerken 51:28
So the gifts, hashtags, spread the gifts that's the message with a sting. Hashtag spread the gate, spread the G, G. S that G Thank you so much for listening. And next week, we've got another bounce normal for you and me and Richard, we're talking about our dads final parting words. What will they be? cliffhanger.

Rich 51:51
I think in fact, I think last word was our last words to our fathers.

Tom Gerken 51:56
Oh, well, I think it's both.

Rich 52:00
Yeah, it probably is supposed to be for next week. Bye. All right.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai