Current News

Three times per year Howe-Peterson conducts a six-week grief support series.  Our fall session begins Tuesday September 21st, for children ages 5 to 12, and Tuesday September 28th, for adults and teens ages 18 and older.

These groups meet from 6:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at Hope Lutheran Church, located at 3640 Madison (at Carlysle) in Dearborn.  To register or for more information please call 313-561-1500.

Many more people are choosing cremation today than in the past. People tend to have strong opinions one way or the other. For some the thought of being buried is not appealing. For others the thought of being cremated makes them uneasy. Either option can go against spiritual philosophy. It really comes down to personal preference.

One would think that the most basic difference between burial and cremation is obvious – using one method you are cremated, using the other you are buried. However, even if you are cremated someone will have to decide where your cremated remains will go. The decision will remain whether or not to be buried. Some family members need a place to visit (like a cemetery), others may find that thought morbid, and both of these opinions can run in the same family.  

If you are not buried or placed in a niche at a cemetery, what will happen with your cremains? Being cremated allows the option of having multiple urns so immediate family members can have their own. There is beautiful jewelry that can hold a small portion of the cremains, or the cremains may be scattered over your favorite place. 

Whatever choice is made it is beneficial if you share your thoughts with family members. That way your loved ones will know what you would like and won’t have to presume during a time that is typically fraught with stress and confusion.

There are several ways you can prearrange for a funeral and still get Medicaid.  How much money you can protect and for whom depends on which arrangement(s) you choose.

 Effective June 1, 2010, the Irrevocable Funeral Contract Limit will decrease from $11,450 to $11,393.  Remember that the irrevocable cap is reduced by any life insurance funded funeral already assigned to pay for the Medicaid applicant’s funeral. 

 Funds in an irrevocable prepaid funeral contract are unavailable and thus are not counted as assets.  Also note that all monies certified irrevocable by the Department of Human Services are not refundable, but are 100% transferable to another funeral establishment upon request of the preneed owner or upon death, by next-of-kin.

 If someone arranges for services and/or merchandise that exceeds the irrevocable limit, a separate contract (Burial Space Exclusion) can be drawn up and still allow a person to receive Medicaid benefits.  The Burial Space Exclusion items are defined as those items dealing specifically with the burial space:  burial plot; crypt; headstone, monument, or plaque; burial vault; burial clothes; opening/ closing of the grave; flowers for the grave.  The person qualifying for Medicaid can also purchase burial space items for qualifying family members.

 We can assist you with your Medicaid matters and help preserve as much of your assets as possible.

I often tell our staff what tremendous opportunities we have to impact people’s lives. We have the opportunity at Howe-Peterson to serve families in their greatest need, to care for them and their most prized possession, their loved one. We have the opportunity through our community work to reach out and touch people’s lives also, or even sometimes our own lives are impacted. I am a member of the Exchange Club of Dearborn and my life was impacted today.

I am working on a project through the Exchange with Child’s Hope, the Child Abuse Prevention Council of Wayne County. They offer programs for Mandated Reporting Training for professionals in our community, Never Shake a Baby to teach parents about Shaken Baby Syndrome, Don’t Stress Take 5 a workshop to teach parents how to manage stressful situations and disciplining children, My Body is Mine for preschoolers to learn about inappropriate touching and IMPACT a preschool literacy program. I also came into contact with Sharon Ottenbreit; she is a two time “Teacher of the Year” in Dearborn. Sharon wrote a book based on a true story of a little girl coming into her class with her much loved teddy bear. The little girl was asking for help finding a new home for “Teddy” because her family was entering into a homeless shelter and she was only allowed to bring one toy, she had chosen to take “Dolly” which her grandmother had given her and she needed a new home for “Teddy”. This was a heart wrenching story; it literally moved me to tears.

The impact on me was the realization of the needs in our communities. We all know these are tough economic times; people have lost jobs, homes and families. But, the simple needs in our communities of simple items like diapers for the food banks and shelters at the rate of thousands per month. The need not only to donate money for those diapers or the diapers themselves but the need for volunteers to drive them to those food banks and shelters is overwhelming. The children of our schools who have raised money by selling their own toys to help others in need at the local homeless shelter are to be admired for they are learning at such a young age the meaning of community. We have people in our community like Annemarie Valdez and Sharon Ottenbreit who are impacting people’s lives everyday through their work and their passion. Please help support them in your thoughts or prayers and any other way you may.

I just ask you, have you impacted someone’s life today?

Tim Schramm

Funerals are an important ritual that can actually start the healing process.  Even if the deceased has chosen cremation there can still be a viewing and visitation/service before the cremation.  Funerals are not for the benefit of the deceased, but for the ones who are left behind.  They allow family and friends to begin to deal with their loss by sharing their thoughts and feelings.  Their support offers continuity and hope to the mourners.  It creates a safe haven for the loved ones to express their grief and share memories, honoring and validating the life of the deceased.

In these times where the trend leans towards wanting to get things over with quickly, and wanting to avoid mourning, we forget that avoiding a funeral is not going to shield us from our grief.  Hearing stories about how a loved one touched other lives can be a great comfort as we accept our loss.

When we care about someone who passed away or their family members, we need to show our support by physically being there, to let them know that they are not alone in their grief.

Dear Friends,

Usually I commit this space to topics associated with working our way through the funeral process, from preplanning through the journey of grief. Today I would like to take the opportunity to introduce you to our e-version of our newsletter.

The electronic age is upon us.  Actually, it has been here awhile but never has it been so forceful.  I can’t even keep up with it all – facebook, myspace, blogs, twitter…twitter?  What is that anyway?  And what about this “blog” business?

A blog (a contraction of the term “web log”) is like an on-line journal. On our site it will be referred to as “Current News.”  It will give us a voice to address issues that are relevant to the funeral industry as they arise.  These “articles/entries” will remain there for future reference.  It is a wonderful tool.  With this change brings a switch to our newsletter.  Some of you will have received this issue via U.S. mail, others will have received it via e-mail, and still others will see it on our website.  It is expected that this will be the last time we send a paper version of the newsletter.

We anticipate that this update will make our website a more useful tool for our families.  I hope you will forgive us if we make mistakes as we move along through these unchartered waters. Our goal remains the same – to serve our families.  Serving our families is an honor and a privilege – a responsibility that we do not take lightly.

Kerrie D. Peterson
President

We strive to maintain a website that serves our families needs, especially the online guestbook. We have added the ability for multiple photos to be scanned and displayed in the photo gallery for the guestbook.

Another recent update is that you can now link that guestbook to your Favorites tool bar on your computer, to your Facebook page, Twitter and a multitude of other venues. The option to do this is at the bottom of the notice. The Favorites, Facebook and Twitter links are displayed, but if you click on the “more” button you will see many other links available.

It is our desire that these options help you honor your loved one. If you use them, please e-mail us and let us know what you think.

The title of Howe-Peterson’s grief support series has always been “Journey Through Grief.” But when I think about most journeys, they are something we plan for and anticipate. Something where we know what will take place—and we know that we will return home afterwards. They are not forced upon us, as this journey of grief is.

On this journey there are a lot of mountains to climb and many valleys to cross. In those valleys, we try to deal with the obstacles in our path, but we don’t always know where we are going, how we got there, or even what the journey will be like. But as Vaclav Havel said,  “Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense regardless of how it turns out.“

Just as the longest journey begins with a single step, so we day by day make our way upon the path before us—we do not have to comprehend or accomplish it all at once, but focus on this portion of the road for today. If we remember that, it makes the journey more manageable.

When we began this journey, we may not have been prepared or adequately packed, but it helps to know that there are places along the way where we might stop and rest, oases where we might take comfort in the midst of dry and barren wastelands, places of light amid the darkness. These are places you recognize because you have been there before.

To have the memory of Christmases past, of times shared—these can be very painful, but by the same token, what would our lives be like if those memories were erased? Would anyone trade the loss of those precious times for the numbness of never having loved at all? We would then have nothing to recall, nothing in our treasury of memories, and nothing to give our lives purpose. Memory is the storehouse containing what we need to provide us for the next day of our journey.

You are not alone because there are others who are also grieving. These other mourners are your own family or circle of friends, and each has his or her own treasury of memories which can aid you on the journey. They are also a means of support as you travel your journey, for they also journey with you. Though you feel as though you are alone with your grief and that the world has shut you out, it is not so. Together, you have more reason to hope, more memories to share, and the connection with others who also shared in loving that person.

Our life after loss will not be the same as our life before. We may complete our journey only to find that, rather than returning home, we have arrived at a different destination from where we started out, finding a wholeness we had not experienced before. And when we reach our destination, don’t be surprised if, like the man in the “Footprints” story, we find that we have not made the journey alone, but were in fact carried in some places.

You may now be experiencing the worst moments of your life, and yet I assure you that this is not the final scene nor the conclusion of the story. What endures beyond loss is memory. You will never forget that person. What endures beyond loss is love. The love you had for that person will never be taken away. For memory and love are stronger even than death. We take one day of the journey at a time. We seek meaning and purpose where we can find it.

Do not forget to take advantage of the laughter of children, the lights of the season, the company of friends, and the love of family as gifts and sustenance for the journey. We cannot predict how long the passage will last, but I can assure you that we shall arrive, and that the meaning of the journey will be clear to us when we finally rest.

Condensed from the talk Dr. William Hale gave at our Holiday Memorial. Dr. Hale is chaplain at Canterbury-on-the-Lake in Waterford MI, and co-pastor of the Down River Episcopal Area Ministry (DREAM)

It isn’t easy to think about our own funerals, but more people are realizing that preplanning a funeral offers great emotional and financial security for them and their families. It brings peace of mind knowing that these important decisions won’t have to be made at a time of such stress and confusion.

We encourage you to take some time to consider what type of service you would like to have. Talk with your family. Make sure they are aware of what your thoughts are, but most importantly learn what their thoughts are. Don’t be afraid to ask for assistance from a trusted funeral director.

A funeral or memorial service provides family and friends a time to remember and honor the deceased, and is a way to show their love and respect for the deceased as well as for each other. It is an important part of the grieving process, providing an opportunity to bid a final farewell to your loved one.

For more information on preplanning and/or prepaying, contact Charles Gury at 313-561-1500 or email info@howepeterson.com.

In continuing our commitment to the community, we provide the following free, nondenominational grief support groups

Caring Connections

Taylor – meets every Tuesday at 10:00 a.m. at the Ford Senior Activity Center
6750 Troy in Taylor
Facilitated by Elaine Lamparski, CBF

Dearborn – meets every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m.at the Dearborn Senior Center in the Ford Community and Performing Arts Center
15801 Michigan Avenue in Dearborn
Facilitated by Elaine Lamparski, CBF

Grief After Suicide

Meets the first and third Wednesday of each month at 7:00 p.m. at Hope Lutheran Church
3640 Madison at Carlysle in Dearborn
Facilitated by Vanessa Lewis, MSW, LMSW

Grief Support Series

This series has something for every age group. Please see the outlines below. It meets for six weeks,three times per year at Hope Lutheran Church. To register contact Elaine Lamparski (see below).

~~~

Journey Through Grief

for adults ages 18 and older
Adults explore the physical and emotional effects of grief. Working through their grief they share memories, finding hope and reconciliation.
Facilitated by Peter Wolf, MSW, ACSW

~~~

Teen Connection

for teens ages 13 to 17
Teens share their experiences of losing a special person in their lives.
By working together in this safe, secure atmosphere, they learn skills for working through grief.
Facilitated by Peter Wolf, MSW, ACSW

~~~

Helping Hands

for children ages 5 to 12
This support group allows children to work through their loss by using art and other creative expressions.
Facilitated by Connie Doyle, LPC

~~~

For more information on our grief groups, please contact Elaine Lamparski at our Dearborn Chapel, 313-561-1500 or via email at info@howepeterson.com.