December So Far (Plus mystery Tool Number 2 reveal!)

We are well into the flow of December and I feel like making up my own 12 days of Christmas. Needs work but this is what I have so far…

I know it’s awful, and I’m the worst for thinking I am remotely funny just because I crack myself up! Work has really ramped up and we’ve had to be quite on top of things. It’s times like these I think I feel like I’m treading water not very well to try and be as useful as possible but struggling. I got particularly annoyed with myself for needing as much help as I did during the eviscerations on Tuesday when really I need to take a step back and realise even the well experienced need help every now and then. It went much better today and I feel a lot better about how well it’s going luckily. I do get terribly frustrated with myself sometimes.

We’ve been full on training this week with the usual nurses and healthcare assistant training which I always find fun. I’ve said it before, but I never imagined myself feeling comfortable standing in front of a big group of people but death is something I could talk about for hours if you’d let me.

Of course, at Death Cafe they do let me! We had our December and final Death Cafe of 2018 on Tuesday which was a very intense but successful evening. We had a lovely PhD student pop along for some research which was brilliant and we discussed some very hard hitting subjects along with some lighter topics. Not every event needs to be or is as intense as this one and I think it really depends on who is present to influence the kinds of discussions we have. The dates are just being finalised for January and February and I’m working on the flyers as we speak. I’ll release them out as soon as they are confirmed and if you would like to know more or attend please get in touch!

Mystery Tool Number Two….

Well it’s what you’ve been waiting for- Mystery Tool Number Two is…… a skull key! None the wiser? Let me explain. A good guess was it was used for some kind of scraping, and I can totally understand why however that couldn’t be further from the truth. While this nifty little thing could be used to scrape, and sometimes we might use tools for other purposes when the need demands it, it is actually used in opening the skull once sawn open. After the scalp has been opened and folded back over the face, and the skull has been cut so a section is loose with the bone saw, the sharp end of this tool is inserted into the groove made and twisted to force the cut apart. It can also be used around the cut section to loosen or open parts not entirely cut. And that’s the skull key, a handy t-shaped device! We have ones with a longer section where the sharp end is and a short one too. I have no real personal preference over which one I use yet but I know that some do.

Keep an eye out for the upcoming mystery Tool Number 3, the dates of the next Death Cafe’s and any improvements to my 12 Days of Christmas!

MG x