Celebrating female funeral directors on International Women’s Day

It’s International Women’s Day (8 March) and Dignity Funerals are taking this opportunity to recognise the dedication of thousands of female funeral professionals in the UK who are caring for the bereaved and those they’ve lost, day-in-day-out.

Once a rarity in what was previously a traditionally male-dominated profession, there are now many female Funeral Directors, Arrangers and Crematorium Managers helping families to say farewell to their loved ones that have died.

In pre-Victorian times, before funeral directing became a profession, the practical tasks required when someone in a community died were divided amongst the male and female members of the family or village. The caring job of ‘laying out’ the dead would be allocated to a local woman or women, who may well have also acted as a midwife. The men would be responsible for physical tasks such as digging the grave, making a coffin, transporting the deceased and - if the family did not have enough men to fulfil the task - providing additional men to carry the coffin.

Nine years ago, Sheril Udberg was training to be a midwife when she decided she was destined to help those at the other end of life’s cycle. Since 2016, she has been a Funeral Director at Mitchell Funeral Service in Exeter, part of nationwide funeral firm Dignity.

“I do feel it is much harder for women to gain employment in the funeral industry,” said Sheril. “I never had any luck gaining employment with any independent firms and it took me four years. I was very lucky that Dignity gave me a chance to prove myself.”

“I gained valuable experience at Mitchells’ learning from my colleagues who have always been very supportive and accepting of me as a woman. I independently studied with the National Association of Funeral Directors to gain a professional qualification passing my Diploma in Funeral Arranging & Administration.”

Continued Sheril: “I think if you are a woman looking for a career you need to have all the support elements in place, especially with a job such as a Funeral Director, and to manage domestic chores I have to do a little bit everyday. My partner also works at Mitchell’s so we have to be ‘on call, out-of-office-hours’ at separate times and have good childcare for our children.”

Facing death as part of her daily life and work, might seem difficult for some but like many in the funeral sector it’s a vocation for Sheril.

She says: “It’s very rewarding when a family tells me that I’ve helped them or provided comfort. There’s always people who think it’s a morbid job, but my friends admire me for doing it and my family are especially proud of me.”

The theme of this years International Women’s Day is “Choose to Challenge” – which is somewhat appropriate for the funeral sector as it strives to cope with the changing demands of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“The past 12 months have definitely been the most challenging time of my career,” said Sheril. “We have had to quickly adapt to both the restrictions on funerals and constantly changing circumstances to ensure that our clients and colleagues remain safe. Funerals may not return to how we knew them for a while, but we are working tirelessly to help families organise a respectful funeral for their loved one.”