My husband just speaks and I want to put my fingers in my ears

[ilovetoloveyoubaby]

First off, I respect people's right to voicing their opinion but sometimes I wonder why people voice certain opinions.

I've just had a conversation that turned into a rather heated debate around people grieving.

His words were "people grieve for far too long for people"

I countered with the fact that I think it's a ridiculous statement and you cannot put a time limit on someone's grief. He conceded that grieving for a child is different but other wise people need to pull their socks up and get on with life. I'm now sitting watching television wondering what and who I married.

AIBU to think what he said is just plain strange and horrible.

[NeedACleverNN]

Everyone grieves in the own way for however long they want to.

Your dh is a twat for saying people should just get on with it

[Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost]

Your husband is the one who needs to pull his socks up. The heartless cold twunt.
He's not thinking of becoming a bereavement counsellor is he.

[booksandcoffee]

It sounds like your DH is of the old school, stiff upper lip variety. Has he experienced berievement directly yet?

[ilovetoloveyoubaby]

He is a heartless cold twunt, isn't he?

His grandparents have passed away but he seems relatively unaffected by it. Sad at the time but it seems to pass quickly.

[Dontyoulovecalpol]

I don't think he's awful at all. People deal with grief differently and you can't criticise him accepting death- some people just do.
It's hard for you to understand him not getting why other people need longer yet you can't understand that he doesn't?

lts the sort of thing he probably shouldn't voice though

[smallandimperfectlyformed]

TBh, I can to a certain extent understand his perspective... I know that people can and do grieve for as long as it takes, and I am sad when I think about family members/friends who have died but I must admit to slightly rolling my eyes or similar (from my living room, not in front of them) when people post Facebook updates about endless anniversaries of their loved ones passing. As long as he is supportive to you and doesn't belittle your feelings I don't think he's wicked or heartless, he just feels slightly differently to you.

[ilovetoloveyoubaby]

How he deals with grief is up to him but to tell other people to get over it is really not right imo.

I don't think I could say that to someone

[Iliveinalighthousewiththeghost]

Yes people do grieve at their own pace, but OWN is the keyword here. He has no business in dictating how long other people grieve for.

[smallandimperfectlyformed]

But did he actually say it to anyone or was he just expressing an unpopular opinion to you? If he had the ill manners to say it to someone he considered to be grieving for too long, I would consider him very rude and actually I would believe that to be heartless.

[TheDevilMadeMeDoIt]

Give him some reading to do:
How long does grief last?

[ilovetoloveyoubaby]

Ah devil I could cry just reading that.

He didn't say it about anyone in particular, it's just a view he has.

He doesn't really have much empathy at times and it frustrates me

[TaliZorahVasNormandy]

Something tells me your DH is the kinda of person that would get remarried about 6 months after a spouses death.

[toadgirl]

Maybe he really does think that.

It's hard to hear if you have a different style of grieving. You may interpret his remark as being unfeeling. It isn't necessarily.

What does he actually mean by "grieving" anyway? Perhaps he means people should stop openly grieving after a short time, but that doesn't mean he doesn't keep someone in his mind and thoughts all the same.

Sometimes people who have appeared to cope just a bit too well with a death have a nervous breakdown over it later on. It means they did care terribly, but for whatever reason didn't make it apparent to others.

[Badders123]

I wonder what your Dh would say to me?
I lost my beloved dad nearly 3 years ago now.
He collapsed in front of me
I tried CPR but failed.
I can still hear his ribs cracking
I can still see the paramedics inpubating him
I can still hear the noise I made when the dr told me he was gone
Oh, and then later that day my mum had a heart attack (the Drs called it broken heart syndrome)
I suppose I'm just a joke to him? That I am still grieving? I suppose my mum should just suck up losing the man she spent over 50 years with?
What a nasty, hateful man he is.
:(

[Enjoyingthepeace]

Unpleasant, unempathetic and actually really thick.

You are absolutely not being unreasonable.

[annandale]

Has he actually been bereaved?

I have now lost all my grandparents (quite a few years ago) and my grieving was very limited, so much so that I thought perhaps I was a coldhearted person. This is still a possibility, but it's also true that I come from a big extended family and was very much 'one of a crowd' of grandchildren. We did live next to a grandparent for much of my childhood but although I loved her and spent some time with her, we weren't super super close like some GC/GPs. I also felt that all my grandparents were ready to die when they went and I think this does help.

I think what I'm saying is that just because he has lost grandparents, he may not in the least understand what bereavement is actually like. It's odd that he doesn't know he doesn't know, IYSWIM. I haven't lost anyone else either but at least I know I am inexperienced at grief. For example, it is more than possible for someone to 'pull up their socks', get on with life and still be grieving.

[Birdsgottafly]

I agree that it depends on what he means by grieving.

I'm 48, my Grandparents, Parents and Aunts/Uncles have all died. Whilst I'm still missing my Mum (who died in September), it doesn't affect me getting on with life. I do take the veiw that your Parents etc will all die before you, so there needs to be a level of acceptance.

[Birdsgottafly]

Just to add that I'm also Widowed and my grief came out as anger, which was very unhealthy.

I had to move myself on, for my own sanity. It still took a couple of years, though.

[Iggi999]

I don't think we should police grieving.
We should certainly hold back from saying things to others about their grief, but that isn't what your husband is doing I think?
Sometimes "getting on with it" is a person's way of surviving.

[HemanOrSheRa]

Badders . That is awful .

People grieve differently at different times. I lost my Mum 13 years ago. She was only 55. It was awful. My poor Dad was devastated obviously, so I put my grief on hold to support him. It took me the best part of 7 years to come to terms with her death, culminating in a breakdown.

I lost my dear Dad early this year. It was a complete shock. However, for me, it was and is a much more selfish kind of grief. If that makes sense? So I have been much better at dealing with it. Even though me and my Dad were very close. My Sister and me have talked about it at length and we both agree it is very different.

[LoreleiGilmoreIsMyBFF]

Grief is so incredibly personal, I don't think anyone can really understand it apart from the person going through it. When my dad died in 2009, so many people told me I was 'coping really well'. I actually believed I was coping. I was almost proud of the fact. My son was born in December 2011. The first song I heard on the hospital radio that morning was 'Living Years' by Mike and the Mechanics. I sobbed my heart out. It was two years before I was able to actually 'miss' my dad. I think grief is a fluid thing; it comes and goes - some days you completely forget, and others, you are right back in that most painful moment. Certainly not something to be judged upon.

[BiscuitMillionaire]

I'm with annandale. He hasn't experienced losing someone really close to him yet. So he has no idea, and shouldn't pontificate.

to Badders.

[BeauHeaux]

He won't know what he's talking about until he actually experiences the hollowness of true grief. He sounds blissfully naive to me!! I certainly wouldn't blame him for that though or waste my time worrying about it.

[BiscuitMillionaire]

If grief could speak