While this might not exactly be the “unexplainable” you had in mind, for me, it’s providing postmortem care.

Despite losing track now of the number of times I’ve had to do it, it’s an experience that is extremely difficult to explain to someone who has never done it before. Once the grieving family has left, it’s just you and a co-worker or two providing a deceased person with their final wash before they’re placed into a body bag and transported to the morgue. It’s a very quiet, gentle, emotionally sobering thing. We talk to them and explain to them exactly what we’re doing, as we would any time we assist a living person with their wash.

It’s really hard to put unto words what it feels like. It’s this weird blend of sadness for their surviving family, grief if you’ve known the patient long enough to build a connection with them, relief over the fact that their suffering/pain has finally ceased, and that unexplainable emotion that goes along with knowing that you’re one of the last people to provide physical contact to someone who has lived and then died.