ASK A MORTICIAN- Why Don't Mausoleums Smell Like Decay? 

My mother has been in a mausoleum for ten years now and she never complains about the smell, god rest her soul.

Never thought I could get addicted to watching videos about corpses, but here I am. Love you corpse woman

I literally always thought mausoleums were just walls with little cubbies for urns of ashes. I never thought there was an actively decaying body 4 inches behind the facade.

I just lost my 27 year old son, and yes, the loss was traumatic. I placed him in a mausoleum as it is what I have always wished for myself. I simply cannot stand the thought of being buried underground. And for me, I take a great deal of comfort in visiting my son in the mausoleum. There is just something very calming and peaceful about seeing and being able to touch the front of the tomb.

"the gases and soups that were formerly known as jennifer" I DIED

everybody gangsta till you're laying in the hospital bed and hear *12 minutes you got 12 minutes*

Mausoleums do smell! I work night security at a cemetery with a few huge mausoleums and there is often a faint wiff of decomp in the air. It's masked by hundreds of cut flowers, but its there.

Q: Why doesn't a mausoleum smell? A: Because it doesn't have a nose!

My EX told me she was going to dance on my grave...so I've decided to get buried at sea..

Crypt liner = corpse diaper.

Well, this info has convinced me of one thing: no mausoleum for me! Being female, I have had it with the need for padded leakage protection! From diapers to feminine hygiene products to adult diapers, enough! Add yet another pad for leakage if I go into a mausoleum? Noping right outta that - LOL.

Burping Caskets Yet another great name for a band

I want to be cremated because funerals and looking at bodies in a casket and hearing people say "wow they look so natural" and "they did a good job on them" really freaked me out as a kid. I dont really want anyone looking at my dead body like that

I'm just gonna avoid making these decisions by not dying.

Half an hour ago, I was watching videos about why Cuban cigars are so expensive, then how meals are served on cruise ships... ...now I'm here.

I used to manufacture burial vaults and care take two cemeteries. One time after some really heavy rains our old mausoleum (which hadn’t had any new residents for decades) flooded and it took a while for us to notice since we didn’t go into it often. Let me just say that after the flood that mausoleum had a very distinct smell to it that I cannot really compare to anything. It wasn’t horrible, but it was definitely the smell of dusty ancient corpses.

Dude, I walked into a small indoor mausoleum once, and the second I opened the door I got WHACKED IN THE FACE with death smell. It was absolutely horrifying

I'm picturing if crypt liners had commercials on tv like feminine hygiene products, pouring 8 gallons of blue liquid onto it. 😂

My friend told me she wanted to be buried in a mausoleum so she could be "high and dry". Ummmm, now you've explained to me why it isn't possible to be "dry". My friend passed away suddenly a couple of years ago, and was buried in a mausoleum as she wished. When I go, no visitation, no embalming, wrap me in a cotton shroud, put me in a cardboard box, bury me in the ground on our woodsy property, no marker. This is not a sad ending--this is the perfect ending.

Some of my ancestors (great grandparents and such) preferred mausoleums bc they didn't want to be 'worm food'. If they only knew that they're now soup-in-a-box! 😂😂😂

When I was a kid going with my family to the cemetery on Memorial Day, I was attracted to the private, free-standing mausoleums owned by families of the wealthy. I used to stand on my toes to peek in the windows. They all contained gorgeous stained glass windows with religious scenes. The bodies were sealed in “drawers.” I told my parents that when I die I wanted them to bury me in a “little stone house.” My father said, “Well, you had better marry a rich man.” (Remember...this was in the mid-1950s...no one mentioned that I had the option of becoming rich myself.)

I’ve told everyone; I want my ashes to be mixed in with the soil and plant a blossom tree for me (as it’s my favourite). I think a grave yard full of beautiful individual trees for each soul would be a much more appealing place to spend time with your loved ones, instead of a cold concrete place known for horror films. +better for the environment.

Re: the exploding caskets thing .. Remember that dead sperm whale that was trucked into some town in (Wales? Britain?) a few years ago .. That thing exploded like a gigantic bomb when decomposition got a bit advanced and the gasses apparently had no where to go, or at least go fast enough .. It was captured on local surv. cams .. Imagine what it was like with all the dead whale bits, blood, etc. raining down on cars and other things nearby ..

My entire family including myself are all going to be laid to rest in a fancy Mausoleum. My grandma and aunt are already entombed in our family plot. It's comforting to know we'll all be close together again. Although, when I see the wall, knowing that I'm going to be in there someday, makes me a bit uncomfortable lol.

I'm not afraid to die, I just don't want to be around when it happens.

In Argentina, some cemeteries have this horrible mausoleums that go several storeys underground and smell like hell itself. I remember going to take flowers to uncle George as a small kid in one of those nightmarish places. Spiral stairs down with those putrid odors and the smell of decay, rotten flowers and humidity. "The caskets sometimes leak" was my mom's explanation. That place creeped me out and smelled like death itself 😔

When we buried my mom, some 6 years ago, we were told that we had to buy a hermetically sealed coffin for this very reason - to make sure that no gasses escaped from the coffin and got into the live persons part of the Mausoleum. The following year, my dad passed away. The same protocol was in place for the Mosleum. So, once again, we had to purchase a hermetically sealed coffin to ensure that no gasses escaped from the coffin and got into the live people's part of the Mosleum. As an aside, in 2001 I visited the crypt of Lenin (in Red Square, Moscow). He is in a glass coffin and readily viewable. I noticed that one of his fingers was slightly lifted off of the bed. This led me to conclude that they probably did taxidermy on him and that his skelton was replaced with a wire frame. But, of course, I have no proof of this. And the Russians aren't talking, so to speak.

My mother had my father moved from a mausoleum to a regular below ground grave after 30 years. We had to have a new casket cause the fluids had rotted out the bottom of the casket he was originally entombed in. The mortician had me come to the funeral home to show me the damage and told me my father was basically mummified . Now they both share a grave at a national memorial park . RIP Mom and Dad !

Burping caskets, by Tupperware!

Thank you for explaining this. As a priest of a large parish I had many visits to a local mausoleum that I just dreaded. One time, a little kid said at his grandma’s burial in the niche loudly to his dad, “ Daddy, what’s that horrible smell?” I so wanted to say, “ Oh, that’s your grandpa who was buried here two years ago.” I also one time showed the leakage on the wall in a mausoleum to one of the managers. She said , “oh, that’s the flowers rotting.” I said, “ Clean up the “flowers” or I call the town health department.” Amazingly it was clean as a whistle next visit!

As I sit here tonight reading a great novel, "The gases and soups that were formerly known as Jennifer", I look forward to tomorrow evening when I will be seeing the new broadway play "Drainage and vents". And this then this weekend My friend and I are going to the Burping Caskets concert in Kenosha.

The cemetery where my family all seems to be buried, have outdoor mausoleums and I feel like their giant filing cabinets... They freak me out, honestly... 🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Burping Caskets is going on my band name list

When I used to work HVAC, we were installing ac units on the roof of a mausoleum. Whenever you would walk near one of the “corpse vents” you would get blasted with the smell of death. Pretty creepy and gross.

One Memorial Day, I took my Kiddo (who was about 9 at the time?) to the local cemetery (like you do). She wanted to go in the mausoleum and see what was in there. I pointed out the "cubby holes" and explained to her that, despite her initial thought (they all slid down into one communal hole), that they each laid in perpetuity, alone, in each niche. She paused to think about it, then spoke the truth: "That way the little worms don't get to them!" There was a gentleman working on opening a niche for a future burial. How he didn't fall off the ladder with laughter, I will never know.

I just found you here on RU-vid, and it took watching three videos to realize something familiar about you…you wrote one of my favorite books (Smoke Gets In Your Eyes)!!! So happy to find this library of videos addressing death so honestly. I recently lost my mom, and without ever knowing it, you helped me thank her for taking such good care of me. Thank you for shining a light on the truth. ❤️

'Burping Caskets' would be a good band name.

You make death easier to understand and not be so afraid of.

I spend a lot of time in cemeteries & sometimes Mausoleums do smell pretty bad! Especially on really hot days here in southwest Florida 💗

My parents are buried in a mausoleum and I will too since my mom purchased a spot after my dad's passing and I've been there lots of times and it never smelled (thank God!). Thank you for explaining this.

Omg I've seen like puddles or like leakage outside of mausoleums I always thought it was just water 🤮🤮

sometimes they do stink like decay. A good friend of mine who owned a flooring installation company once had to replace flooring in a large Jewish Mausoleum,seferal halways lined with above ground crypts/graves whatever. it had like office type carpet in it and they were pulling it up and putting in tile.....well some of the crypts were leaking and had leaked down into the carpet and pad, it was a total disgusting mess, if I were him I would have refused to do the work and made them pay for a biohazard company to deal with it but they swore it was from a "roof leak" it definatly wasn't, he lived with me at the time and he came home each day smelling like a dead animal and would just throw up periodically from disgust. they got the job done but he said there was still yellow shit oozing down from several of the crypts , guess now its easier for them to just mop it up every day instead of it soaking in to the carpet. this was like 20 years ago, if I came across something like that now id be calling some sort of authority . that is unacceptable.

They do smell. My grandpa is interred in one and it’s a modern nice one. He’s inside an outside vault but when you go inside it 100% smells of death. Not much but it’s there. Maybe the vents somehow cause that air to go near the doors and then make it inside from outside. Not sure. But I 100% smell it when I’m there and it really bothers me. It’s just gross thinking you are just surrounded by bodies in different stages of decay.

@ 5:06, "CLEANUP ON CRYPT SEVEN" 😄

Donate me to medical school, soak me in plastic, slice me in thin disks, and find a way to cure Lupus.

“The gases and soups that were formally known as ‘Jennifer’ ...” I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so much at anything death-related. I’m so glad your channel exists - everything you put into your videos gives me new perspective on “what comes after”. I feel so learned after listening to you ❤️

🎶”DRAINAGE AND VENTS, GIVE ME DRAINAGE AND VENTS”🎶 gets constantly stuck in my head 😂

Caitlyn has such a fun quirky personality that even when describing body sludge she sounds light hearted and funny and you'd think we were having a historical conversation about...I don't know sunshine and unicorns.

So I'm watching this while eating a snack, and I laughed so hard I almost choked on my cheese and crackers. No mausoleum for me. What a waste of perfectly good fertilizer. I don't even want to be embalmed. Just put me in a pine box so people aren't too horrified and plant me, please.

I think the real question is why doesn't Congress smell like decay?

I love cemeteries, I feel an odd tranquility there, one of mine and my children's favorite thing to do when they were little was to go walk around the cemeteries reading epitaphs. I think the appeal of a mosaleam ( sp?) Is that you can't help but be like " wow he must have really been loved for them to get such an extravagant burial or headstone". I know that's not the case as I have lived ones FEIRCLY loved but without as much as a marker stone as of yet, but you can't help but think that when your looking three the headstones ya know? I love these newer headstones that are in the shape of a small bench! I love the idea of sitting with grandma ya know? Last thing I've asked before, what's the difference between a body, a corpse, and a cadaver?

I went to a pretty stinky one today which is what brought me here, lol! And yes, it was very unmistakingly THAT smell. It's a pretty big indoor mausoleum though and i imagine those can be tricky to maintain. It's a beautiful and peaceful place that I've strolled through before and I had the pleasure of talking to a secretery there (lucky since this is the weekend). She was very nice and said that though they were hoping to get someone in to take a look at it this coming week, complaints from the public help to make sure these things get done faster, so I posted a "complaint" through her (more like a polite observation) about the particularly stinky hall. Hoping it gets taken care of quickly. It's been hours since i visited and i still feel like it's stuck in my nostrils a little. I like to imagine that the spirit of someone's particularly stinky uncle is laughing it up in the afterlife.

"I don't want to go in the ground" ok, you'll be in a juice bag for eternity.

Oh no, you’ve given me a new catch phrase. “Of corpse!”

When we lived in Cedar Rapids, Iowa we used to visit a local mausoleum and cemetery every year at Christmas time. Each year they decorated thus huge mausoleum with various Christmas styles. There were toy trauns and giant candy canes and reindeer and angels. The whole place smelled of pine trees and peppermint candy. They also di and extensive drive-through light display through the cemetery and a living nativity (weather permitting). It never occurred to me that a mausoleum could ever smell bad because I had that memory of it.

Thank you so much for explaining the corpse decay process in a mausoleum crypt. I've owned a mausoleum plot since I was 12 years old and was thrilled to better understand the process.

When my uncle died my aunt bought 2 crypts at a mausoleum because she didn't want to bury my uncle in the "cold ground". It was the middle of winter and they already had a plot purchased at a cemetery. The decision just came down to my aunts feelings based on the time of year my uncle died. Funerals and final decisions are always for the benefit of the living. RIP uncle Wally, I miss you

I like the old-timey feel of a mausoleum. Somehow when you're buried, it's like the person isn't really there. I imagine each person has, like, a room where they're just corpsing away. It's probably putrid and all, but in my mind, corpses are cool with that. I kind of want to be buried in a necropolis. But like, one with little corpse apartments and corpse shops. Like a corpse ghost-town.

I worked as a Family Service Counselor at the Hillcrest Memorial Cemetery in Jackson MI. There are two chapels that have crypts. The oldest one we called " The stinky mauz" we would always open the doors at least an hour in advance before a service was held because of a few reasons. One reason was when it was built the exhaust was installed wrong so instead of exhausting out it kept everything in which caused it to smell horrible. Another reason was because some of the bodies had been intured prior to using liner trays in fact that was why there was a very bad stain on the wall and on an area of the carpet because as I was told before they started using liner trays there was a leaker supposedly even after professional cleaning it was never able to be removed. That cemetery has a crazy history. Everything from the legend of " Little Mary " and the movement of her body several times due to people vandalizing graves as well as holding seances and such. To the fact an old owner had embezzled $ from the endowment fund and when caught tried to burn the evidence which led to destruction if most if the vital records internment cards etc. So when I worked there the bottom drawers of our filing cabinets were full of bits and pieces of burnt cards etc. Because everything had to be kept if anything was on it. Families had to come out and verify the burial sites of loved ones they knew especially if the graves were unmarked to recreate records due to so much being prior to computer record keeping. In order to sell plots we had to have the grounds crew probe the ground 1st to make sure noone was already there. There's also a pet cemetery that surrounds the old bell tower that unfortunately had been the location of the original office when it was set on fire. The stories and things I could tell you about that cemetery are amazing.

The only thing id like to know is some of the oddest funerals you have been involved in. (Like odd things people want in their caskets etc)

Drainage and vents! Drainage and vents! To reduce odor, there's no recompense! When your loved ones are putrid, A good mortician's not stupid! It always makes good sense To have drainage and vents!

I have pre-paid to have a cubby next to my husband. I always thought it would be a nicer resting place. I thought being in the ground... the bugs, people walking above you, grass growing over the grave marker, someone visiting me and digging around to find the flower vase because the grass has grown over it, floods and uplifting the casket and exposing my body to strangers, the ground sinking or tree roots interferring with my grave. You burst my bubble what happens to a person with time. The little cubby I thought was a clean and peaceful space for my body. I was wrong. I did get a cubby on the outside of the mausoleum because my husband was an outdoor type of guy, with a water feature nearby and since we lived by the beach, I got our cubbies facing the ocean. No view of the ocean. Also for me, inside the maissoleum is a bit spooky for me to visit my husband.

Decades ago I was in a mausoleum that stank. You never forget that odor. Now I know what went wrong. Thanks Jennifer.

Special thank to *THE SWEET EMBRACE OF DEATH* cats and hard boiled eggs ;D

I’m sooo scared of dying but I like to learn about it. I think I really struggle to accept that one day I’ll be nothing but that scares me so much

My parents rest in a mausoleum in Louisville, KY. My Dad was cremated years before my Mom's passing, so his remains are in a box with her inside her coffin (casket?). I have never notice a particularly bad odor when I've visited, but the entire building does smell sort of like a thrift clothing shop...slightly musty and in need of laundering.

Ms. Ask (Caitlin to her friends) is so knowledgable and entertaining. And her deep velvety voice so hypnotising! Of course the big question which she always studiously avoids is 'What are those burning scented candles masking?' Does she have a few momentos concealed within those walls? Are they brought out, possibly late at night, for private party games? If so, how does one secure an invitation?

“Fluids” Okay... “Soup” Ick... “Post-Mortem sludge” Godammit Caitlin

I was in a mausoleum for the first time this year, and I was surprised how much I liked it. My husband's great grandparents are in the big one in Reno and it is gorgeous. I loved that the whole thing felt like a church. Quiet pews and couches, flowers everywhere, beautiful artwork. It was a wonderful place to come and remember our departed family. I felt I could have stayed there all day. I still like the idea of decomposing in the ground myself, but I can see why someone would chose a mausoleum like that.

I am still laughing at “your eternal cubby” 🤣🤣🤣

I have buds in and when that voice said, “Twelve minutes” It was surround sound and I jumped out of my chair. Lol

I never quite understood the appeal for those mausoleums. It's like being buried in a filing cabinet.

If I ever get buried in a mausoleum, I bags top bunk. I don't want somebody else's decaying goop running into my digs and ruining my peaceful slumber.

My Mom & Dad are in a tandem crypt. My Mom had been put in a single one originally and had to be moved because my Dad purchased the tandem one. Her casket was leaking what I thought to be rusty water at the time. I googled and found out I was wrong. I then understood why my Grandparent's caskets were put in those huge plastic bags.

I've been to a mausoleum where there was bodily fluid leaking onto the outside. I was confused on what was happening because I used to just think mausoleums were just walls with people's names on them. So me finding out later after I witnessed it that there were people's bodies behind those names, it was an experience

*gets notification of new video* *immediately walks away from desk to watch video in the lobby*

Burping Caskets.... Could have sworn I saw them open up for the Ramones in the 80s

I LOVE your videos. They are habit forming. You take a serious topic like death, and add an element of humor to it. Your delivery reminds me of that 1980s horror diva Elvira. The mausoleum was invented for childish people who believe that the body can be somehow "preserved" in a box forever, if its not buried. Just like the song says, no matter what we do, All we are is dust in the wind.

"Burping caskets." How much do I love your videos? And apropos of nothing, I love your hair!

Her haircut really compliments her character

A body isn’t you. A body is a shell that once held you. Why is that we spend so much money and harm our environment in massive ways all for the sake of storing our abandoned shell? I honestly would rather just decompose in a field somewhere and dissolve into the earth. Leave no eco footprints behind.

Some of my Dad’s ashes are in an outdoor one in Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn NY. My mom kept the rest. She got it so others would be able to “visit” or pay respects when they wanted and just to have his name in stone someplace in his beloved city. We put some other stuff in there. Tiny mementos. Most in that section are Thai I think, just going by the names and characters on the plates. So something about it is specifically appealing to that culture I have noticed

My Omma (grandmother) is OBSESSED with the mausoleum she bought for herself and my Otta. She calls it 'her forever home' and is so proud she got to make the choice for herself (having come from Romania where your only option back then was a church cemetery). At least I know now how they'll be taken care of in one of those!

I had a friend whose husband worked for a mausoleum and one of his jobs was “cleaning” out crypts that had “leaked.” For minimum wage....

I live in a small city in Brazil. Here we do not have embolming and cremation. Everyone has a natural burial. The "fun" fact is that whenever someone dies, people pay a car with huge speakers to announce to the whole city that the person died. Then, people have a funeral procession on the streets to the cemetery.

I really like the shade of lip color you’re using here, and the way you’re doing it. It’s really lovely & sophisticated.

I often thought a mausoleum might be preferrable to being buried 6 feet under in a cold, pitch-black hole in the cold ground, in a box likely to fill up with water over the years. But you paint a picture of something that sounds little better. It's all just nastiness! Cremation sounds like a much better no-fuss, no-muss "way to go".

Lmao why you still dead? Just press X to respawn.

I like the mausoleum idea so that way I can have a roof over my head for as long as the building stands for a one time fee. My way of sticking it to the landlord....lmao

why! why, are you so captivating to listen to? i have started just relisting to your videos. sigh you are a fun listen. :)

Drainage and vents! Give me drainage and vents! This tune often goes round my head and I’m not mad about it 😂😂

Hi hi! My name is Cher and I am a Native American. In my tribe, we have public cremations, I'd love to invite you to come witness our ceremony. Let me know if you're interested. Anyways, my question: I'm often asked to make clothing for the deceased, mostly dresses. How can I make my clothing to benefit the morticians? I had a dress that was cut in the back by the funeral home, how can I prevent this? I've thought about putting Velcro on the back seam of the dress instead of a zipper and make the sleeve loose and long. Would it be too forward to call the funeral home to ask them their advice? This one funeral home takes care of all of our tribal members, but they're often standoffish with us interpersonally. Thanks!

My cousin in Florida was buried in a mausoleum because "she wanted to stay in the a/c"...

I have been to several mausoleums over the years to pay my respect or for funerals, and I would say most were relatively odor-free. However, one mausoleum vividly stands out (I won't reveal where), and let me tell you, It was June and very humid- the odor was almost unbearable. We were taken aback because it was so bad. Apart from that, I always wondered about what truly happens when a corpse is interned in a mausoleum. Thanks for another great video!

Hey Caitlin, I Love your videos and bangs, also congratulations on one and a half million subscribers. =)

My will is going to say “Just YEET me into a hole somewhere and move on with your lives please”

A corpse is a corpse, of course, of course.... Sorry, couldn't help myself. Great video!

Great wuestion, Jennofer. I always wondered that, too. Tha ks, Caitlin. You make me so happy and inspire me so.

For some reason Caitlin, this reminded me of an NCIS episode (had to look it up - "Skeletons S4 E17). Appreciate you sharing your hard work.

Even in death I cannot escape pads. I will forever need them to soak up my body juices....