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More people die in January and February than at any other time during the year, according to statistics from the National Vital Statistics System; but you’ll rarely see the word “died” in their death notices. Obituaries are rarely cut-and-dried factual articles written by newspaper reporters; most are memorials created by the family of the deceased. Perhaps it’s a wish to soften the finality of death, perhaps it’s an effort to keep the inevitable at arm’s length, maybe it’s human denial; but when you read an obituary you’ll find that most people tend to distance themselves from death by using euphemisms for life’s final event.

“Death is hard to deal with,” Geoffrey Nunberg told McClatchy Newspapers. The University of California at Berkeley linguist said most people avoid the “D” word when describing death. “This is one reality that’s hard to face head-on.”

Our avoidance of death is nothing new. Euphemisms for death can be found in the Bible, Homer and Shakespeare. The phenomenon seems universal, cutting across centuries and cultures. “Passed away” is the phrase most favored in obituaries, although there are many others:

• “Crossed over”
• “Joined his wife”
• “Left us suddently”
• “Passed over to his reward”
• “Returned home”
• “Went to sleep peacefully”
• “Taken away from us”
• “Slipped away quietly”

Some psychologists believe it would be healthier for us to face death head on. They believe using “dead” and “died” to describe death helps people face the finality of death and grieve.