Hi Lila. My heart is with you on this. I just lost my mom in January. The only other funeral I was really involved in planning before was my father-in-law's. He died very suddenly and unexpectedly of a stroke, and he had never discussed with anyone what he might want in terms of a funeral, or any of that stuff. It scared him, and he didn't like to think about it. Well, really, who among us does, eh? The result was that when he died, different people had different ideas about what he would and wouldn't want, and there were arguments that were pretty horrible and damaging to the family. The unscrupulous funeral director tried to upsell my mother-in-law on a $20,000 casket (which she didn't fall for) and charged $200 for a pot of coffee at the prayers (which she did pay). My Mom's death was completely the opposite. She had time to think about what she wanted, checked out the various funeral homes set things in place for how she wanted them to be. She had pre-planned most of her funeral, and thank goodness she did because I don't think we could have planned how to make a sandwich, let alone a funeral, after we lost her - we were so very, very sad. She hadn't written her obituary, but I did start on that before she passed away when she was very ill in the hospital. I bawled like a baby while I did it, and it DID hurt horribly because it really underlined for me who this wonderful woman we were losing really was. But it also reminded about good times, and how much she had accomplished in her life, and gave me things to talk about with her that I hadn't realized I'd never explored with her. Again, I was glad I'd done it, because it was so much easier on us after she died. I really couldn't have done it then. My guess is that your Mom probably feels like so much of this is out of her control and beyond her ability to do anything about...and she's probably hoping that the pre-planning will give her some peace of mind and a measure of certainty in the midst of this maelstrom of anticipatory grief. You have a chance to get to know your parents on a whole new adult level now...and from both a practical and an emotional standpoint, I hope you can find a way to work through the horror to make the most of your time together.