My husband passed in our home. We called hospice, the nurses came to take care of the I/V and such as well as a bereavement counsler. We were able to stay with him as long as we needed. The bereavement counsler asked questions that led us to remembering his life rather than his death. When we were ready, they called the funeral home and they came with a hearse and transported him to the funeral home. It was done with much respect for my and my families feeling and also with diginity to my husband.

Mama was no longer with Hospice but that wouldn't have mattered based on the hour. I called funeral home. Mama was taken away in a body bag, which I thought was the norm at the time. Now, I'm being told that was wrong - that it should be just covered and on a stretcher. (???) I watched from the door - it was dark outside, I couldn't see that they didn't transport Mama in a hearse. They took her away in a van. A friend saw it. I'm sick - to this day.

A body bag isnt abnormal, when my mother passed it was more of a relief she went out in a bag, she had liver cancer so she basically starved to death, she couldn't have weighed more than 80 pounds and looked like a skeleton. So I think it all depends on the condition of the body. As for a van or herse wouldn't have mattered to me, so long as she was treated with respect, even though my mom would have said that you could play lawn darts with her bones she wouldnt care shes not there anymore!

My experience is somewhat similar to yours. My father passed away at home and he was cremated. The crematory was responsible for picking up his deceased body. I left the room as they put him in the body bag and secured his body onto a strecher which was a must because we were on the second floor in our apartment building and they had to transport him downstairs. I asked them to unzip the body bag so I could say goodbye and give him one last kiss. The crematory vehicle was an unmarked white van, meaning that it didn't look like a company van.
Then, when my grandmother passed away four years earlier, her body had to get picked up from the hospital. It was explained to me by the crematory that that her body was picked up in an unmarked white van as well. I'm getting the feeling that using vehicles like this is not an uncommon practice when most of think of a hearse when the deceased is transported. I completely understand how you feel. There are certain details for me that I tend to focus on as well.

MamasChild1 ~ I work at a funeral home (29 years). It is standard to place a deceased person in a body bag and transport them to the funeral home or creamatory in an unmarked van/mini van. I assure you that the utmost care and respect is given to the deceased and their families. Funeral directors have also lost loved ones and treat your loved ones in the same manner they would want theirs cared for.
We truly do understand your pain and loss and hope this gives you some comfort in knowing we care about the deceased and their families (((((((((((((Hugs))))))))))))))))))

I have found that whatever choices my son and I made at the time re which undertakers to choose, burial or cremation, type of stone, words on stone, order or service at the funeral, wake or no wake, that we could not please all of the people all of the time. Its an extremely difficult time to find oneself faced with difficult decisions or choices.

The removal of my partners dead body from the house was dealt with extremely efficiently in our case, my qualms if any, would be with the nurses confusion as to when Christopher was very near to death. Somehow they did not seem to notice this, it was my son and I who had to point out to them that BTW Christopher looked like he had only days to live and we were indeed correct. It was not until a few hours before he actually died that they told us he was not going to make it through the night. To me their demeanour was not appropriate to that which one would expect nursing a man so near to death.

Its all such a sensitive issue that different people deal with and respond to differently and we are all left thinking, I wish we had done this or that.

I too am haunted though by the vision of my man being carried out on a stretcher, inside a body bag to a van and driven away. Not because I think they did something wrong but because it was not something I thought I would ever see and when I think of it even now I just cannot believe that this nightmare has actually happened to me.