15 Tricks Morticians Use To Make Your Dead Body Look Alive (2024)

Toilet Paper Is A Good Substitute For Skin Tissue

From Redditor/u/TheModernMortician:

With skin slip or tiny puncture holes on an arm or neck, simply use 1-ply, non-decorated (cheap cheap cheap stuff) toilet paper and super glue. Place a torn piece of 1-ply on the wound, large enough to cover and connect with good tissue. Then, apply the super glue one drop at a time allowing the liquid glue to spread on its own. If needed, smooth out the 1-ply over the wound and flatten it out with tweezers before the glue sets. Do not use too much glue.

Allow to dry. Cosmetizeover it!

Cotton Can Help Build Up The Mouth

From Redditor/u/woody1594:

We buy this brown couch stuffing cotton. We use it because it doesn't absorb water nearly as much as rolled cotton. So works great for building up a mouth before embalming. Also a neat thing about it, if you put Aron Alpha (a quick-drying adhesive)on it, it turns rock hard, so works amazing as a plug for trachea tube holes and bullet holes.

Denture Adhesive Helps Set Skullcaps And Alka-Seltzer Fixes Jaundice Discoloration

From Redditor/u/Bamacpl:

I've been using Poligrip denture adhesive gel to set the[skullcap] after an autopsy. It works great and fills the gap, unlike super glue. I also use an odd mix that has great results on jaundice. Mix pre-injection chemicals with 4 Alka-Seltzer tabs in 1 gallon and inject against closed drainage. Let that sit for 15-30 minutesdepending on severity. Mix your jaundice fluid and inject after opening the vein. It will take most of the yellow out.

Everything From Potpourri To Kitty Litter Is Used To Keep A Corpse Smelling 'Good'

From a formerRedditor:

With a fresh corpse, we embalm the body and pack the nose and mouth with gauze and wire the mouth shut to keep any purge from leaking out, and a hard plastic plug is placed in the anus and/orvagin* to keep any gas or fluids from escaping down there. The embalming fluid holds off decay for a while and keeps the body fresh enough for the viewing and funeral. A fresh corpse doesn't really smell that bad. Only when they empty their bowels or a bit of gas escapes is there a truly awful smell.

However, if you're asking about a funeral for a corpse that has already started to rot, there isn't anything we can do. I can't reverse decay, I can only slow it down. Heavily decomposed bodies are not presented with an open casket. At the funeral home where I work, we pour cavity fluid (basically concentrated embalming fluid), lime powder, and kitty litter into the body bag with the body. The cavity fluid kills a lot of the fungus and bacteria, the lime helps control the smell, and the kitty litter soaks up excess moisture. The bag is then sealed up, put into another bag, and then we glue the zipper closed. Then that's all taken and put into a hermetically sealed casket for the funeral. The last thing you want is for a grieving family to smell their loved one's decaying remains. In mortician school we had to read cases of other funeral homes f*cking up and putting a leaky dripping body into a casket and scarring the family for life. That's a lawsuit that you don't want to deal with, not to mention that your reputation would be permanently ruined.

Also, I've never been into a funeral home that didn't have tons of flowers, potpourri, and scented candles sitting about. The smell of roses and lilies will forever be associated with caskets and funeral homes for me.

You Have To Clean A Corpse's Hands And Nails

From Redditor/u/dontlookforward:

I use a 50/50 mix of Dodge's Restorative and Rectifiant in a squirt bottle. It's great to clean the face, and gets rid of the white cheesy skin. I discovered that it also cleans dirt and grime from hands pretty well, too. Squirt a little on and scrub with a firm bristled brush. It also does a fair job at cleaning ink off after taking fingerprints.

Flush Condensed Milk Through The Circulatory System To Reduce Yellow Skin Tone

The Modern Mortician, or /u/TheModernMortician on Reddit, wroteon her blog:

According to [a senior mortician], by running a tank of condensed milk through the circulatory system to flush out the blood before embalming, it would help eliminate the yellow pallor the man was afflicted with due to jaundice.

After the strawberry milk concoction drained from the man’s system, the tank to the embalming machine was then filled with the typical bottles of embalming fluid and proper proportions of water. It was at this point I was excused from the room to continue my regular mundane assistant tasks.

I saw the deceasedman later, before they had dressed him and put a natural coat of cosmetics over his face.The Eagle Brand Milk had worked, however only slightly.They still used a generous amount of color concealing cosmetics on his exposed hands and wrists, which held fast to the strange yellow tint.