As a funeral director of many years, I long ago realized that grief compounded by stress can have a devastating effect on families. Having witnessed this firsthand, I've seen countless families go through stressful situations that in my opinion in many cases could have been avoided. Most of which could have been eliminated with minimal planning ahead.

I'm often asked, "What can I be doing to make sure I don't leave this burden to my family?" The truth is that you don't really have to do a lot! The small actions you take today however can make a big difference for those you leave behind. Remember the old saying, "inch by inch...", this especially applies to funeral planning I believe. Below I've listed some "small actions" that anyone could take to help reduce stress for loved ones when that time comes.

1. Let your family know your wishes. In my experience as a funeral director of nearly three decades, I have seen more family arguments, stress and confusion at funeral arrangement conferences over what type of services a loved one "might have wanted." These service decisions when left unknown can create extreme stress for those left to make final plans. If you do nothing else but this one thing, you can avert untold stress for those making your final plans and especially so in larger families.

2. Write your wishes and desires down and keep with your other important paperwork. Many funeral and cemetery facilities offer planning guides free of charge. These usually will offer an excellent format to list these items. Once completed, let your family know where this information is kept as well. It is hard to argue with the written word and in my experience few families ever change what a loved one has written as their final wishes.

3. Preplan this event as much as you are comfortable. Preplanning a funeral can be as simple as taking the two steps listed above or can encompass full funeral and cemetery preplanning where all arrangements are completed and on file at your funeral facility of choice. Remember preplanning does not necessarily mean prefunding. Reputable firms will always assist you in making whatever level of preneed funeral planning your comfortable with, regardless of whether you are prefunding your services or not.

The simple steps above can be taken by anyone with minimal effort, to assure that they will have helped to make their own... a less stressful funeral.