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Funerals

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris
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Chris

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What experience do you have of funerals and how did you... 'act' at the ones you've been to?

I went to my first funeral today - my grandma's - and I know it was sad and all, I was close to my grandma, but the main sadness was drawn from seeing my family so upset, whereas I didn't think I was too bad. Do you get upset at funerals, etc?
 
I get pretty emotional at funerals even if I didn't know the person.
IMO it's a stupid ritual. I'm not going to have one. I don't want everyone standing around my degrading corpse to remember me... talk about being way too literal.
EMZ=]
 
Chris said:
What experience do you have of funerals and how did you... 'act' at the ones you've been to?

I went to my first funeral today - my grandma's - and I know it was sad and all, I was close to my grandma, but the main sadness was drawn from seeing my family so upset, whereas I didn't think I was too bad. Do you get upset at funerals, etc?
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I went to my step nan's funeral. I met her once and hardly knew her. But I saw my step cousin crying, and her mother, and my step dad. And I just couldn't hold it in. I cried SO much. Then I just ran up and hugged my step dad and cried onto him. Despite not even liking him that much. All he wanted was a handshake, LOL.

Honestly I cried more at her funeral than I did my own granddad's - and I saw him a LOT.

Meh. It's weird, right ?
 
That's a little strange. I guess the living's influence always has to be stronger than the dead's though.
 
I have never cried at a funeral. I couldn't understand why others would be sad. They were old so they died. My grad aunt died because she was old but she was also sick so I couldn't understand why everyone was crying. I was 11 then.
When my grand dad died when I was 21 I did not cry. I stayed neutral and I acted my normal self. He was old and sick and could no longer do anything anymore. He had caregivers 24/7. I wouldn't want to live that way. All he did was sat all day watching TV and had difficulty moving. He couldn't take care of himself. Then when he died, it was a relief. I was in shock because I wasn't expecting it and I knew he was going to die but I wasn't expecting it that day. So everyone was crying and it didn't make any sense because he couldn't even do anything. I don't think everyone cried but my mom said lot of people did cry.
 
When I was 10 I said loudly that my grandmother's skin looked like it was made out of plastic. (This was before they closed the casket.) I had a list of verboten words, and "casket" was one of them, and I was worried the others would think I was saying something about the casket because "plastic" and "casket" sound sort of similar. So I said it like 3 times, loud. I also talked about school with my dad's great aunts at the wake. Me and my cousin, who was 7, played happily and found that day to have been an adventure. I cried a few months later in my sleep. In real life I didn't have much empathy. Then I cried years later feeling bad that I hadn't cried at her funeral but had enjoyed it. I mean, like, WOW, I'd never seen a dead person before.
 
I get so upset at funerals that I refuse to go to them now, it mentally and emotionally scars me so deeply I never get over the death. I handle death about as well as anyone else, it's hard but it's not earth shattering for long, but a funeral will completely ruin any chance I have of recovering emotionally. I went to my friend's father's funeral in high school and I'll never go to another one. When I die I want my family to bury me privately, no viewing or religious ceremony, and have a party celebrating my life.
 
I think it's a little harsh to expect your family to celebrate your death (well, life, really) through means of a 'party'. They will have lost you, what makes you think they'll be able to handle that much better than you handled someone you're not even related to, dying?
 
In other cultures that is exactly how they do it, and that is even how some American families react to death. It's not as though I don't expect them to feel sad, I just don't want them to wallow in it and make it worse than it has to be. In our culture people put so much emphasis on the pain of losing someone that it is ten times more traumatic than it has to be, I don't think it's healthy to make death even more depressing than it already is. If we didn't focus so much about how awful we feel, the bad feelings we do have would be much more tolerable.

I was actually totally fine with my friend's dad dying. It was sad, but not traumatic--to me, anyway, it was for my friend. His funeral damn near broke me though, who wants to stare at a dead body in a dark, solemn funeral home and talk for hours about how sad you are and sob, when you could be celebrating how happy you are that that person LIVED. Life is a miracle that should be celebrated, even in loss. I have felt the same way when it was my family who had died. I would just much rather we not concentrate all our agony in the mourning process, it just makes things worse. I'm not saying they shouldn't be sad, but I don't want them to spend three days in a dark, creepy funeral home mourning. That is a big waste of the last chance I'll get to be relevant, I'd rather they focus on the happy parts of my life and let that guide them through their mourning.
 
I think it's a lot easier to say that until someone very close to home dies. My Grandma passed away recently - death doesn't usually bother me, I accept it. Move on. But the thing that got to me was the finality of it. If not the guilt of not being able to somewhat repay her for all she did for me - I never got chance, she was very good to me throughout my childhood.

My sadness is degenerated from the finality and or guilt of the situation, not so much the fact that they're no longer there - hell, I only saw my Grandma once a week tops for the last year or so... :/
 
People very close to me have died. I guess everybody just mourns differently. I just hate how strong the expectation is that you go to the funeral. someone died a while ago and I said I refused to go and my mom got REALLY mad and said it was disrespectful and I was grounded for weeks. I needed to protect myself from the emotional trauma, there was no way I could have gone without seriously damaging myself, but nobody cares and I am just expected to go anyway.
 
You're right, everyone has their own methods of coping. I can't say the funeral I recently went to was exactly a pleasant experience... but I dunno. I just felt like I owed my family the support of being there - which is another thing to consider.
 
My family feels I owe them the support, but I don't think they understand that if I go to the funeral I will NEVER get over the death. I went to my great aunt's funeral when I was a child and it was so traumatic that I don't even have any memories of her anymore besides her dead body in the casket and how miserable everyone was at the funeral. The experience of being there permanently wrecks my ability to get over the death. I don't think I owe anyone anything at that cost.
 
My father died when i was 15 years old, i did cry at the hospital he was only 48, but at the funeral i just couldn't, there was this obsolete thing; i couldn't get him back, so i kinda felt like, life goes on, somewhere i do have the feeling i am going to meet him soon enough weird though...
wtf2.gif
 
My father-in-law died a couple of months ago and now I have to buy at least 3 buffaloes and a bunch of pigs to sacrifice at the ceremony out of respect. Lucky they keep him in his house for 7 months before the funeral so I have time to save up.
 
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