The most callous/inappropriate words of condolences you’ve seen

[Eastie77Returns]

My friends husband recently died. They were a lively, party hard couple who hosted parties with epic drinking sessions and were known as users of recreational drugs. The husband died from an illness that could be linked to excessive drinking but at this stage none of us (friends of wife) know exactly what killed him.

One of our friends has written on his memorial page (I’m paraphrasing a bit): “RIP xxx. Gone too soon, you were a lovely soul. Your lifestyle caught up with you in the end but you lived life to the full and not everyone can say that”. She is not a native English speaker so I have no idea if she meant it to come across the way it did but all of us were WTF when we read it😮

I’m veering between finding it comically inappropriate and a bit callous and not sure which of the two it falls under!

My mother, a big cricket fan, died at 97. My sisters and I all joked "she had a good innings". She was a brilliant mum and we all loved her dearly.
What can be inappropriate in some contexts is fine in others.
I think it's so hard to know what to say sometimes I guess that's why people cross the road. Which I wouldn't do.

Of course I have no issue with people grieving for their pets or being utterly crushed when they have to say goodbye - and in fact I have particular empathy for those who have to say goodbye to younger pets through illness or injury when it was much less expected than loss of a much older pet whose life has naturally come to an end.

Over the years I've lost many hamsters, rabbits and my beautiful, elderly, faithful and silly dog at the age of nearly 16. All of them were extremely sad in their own right and yes they WERE my family and of course I grieved for them.

But don't EVER sit there and tell us bereaved parents that that's in any way comparable as having our babies or children die. Just don't you dare make that comparison!

Grief isn’t competitive. To those here who are offended by people mourning their animals the way you mourn relatives — why not show some empathy? For many people, their pets are their family. Their grief doesn’t detract from yours in any way. Please don’t make them feel even worse.

All you need to know is that you never, ever tell someone who’s lost a child that you understand how they feel because your dog died. I can’t emphasise this enough.

My beloved Grandmother died. MIL (who has definite narc traits) said absolutely nothing about this when she saw me a couple of days later, but instead launched into berating me about some imagined slight. It was a complete character assassination. I held it together for as long as I could, but eventually started to cry. DH came into the room, asked what the heck was happening. MIL said she couldn’t understand why I was crying as she’d only said xyz. DH pointed out that not only was this horrible, but my Nan had just died. To which MIL replied that she didn’t understand why I was so upset about THAT, as DGM had had dementia and was “basically a vegetable who didn’t know who Patchwork was anyway”.

We’re NC now, for many reasons, but when I have a moment of feeling sorry for MIL, remembering that moment helps me to remember that she really is a nasty piece of work.

People who compare the loss of a pet to the loss of a parent or child to someone who is grieving their parent or child are the ones that need to show the empathy.

When you get a pet then you know, in the vast majority of cases, you will outlive your pet. It’s the way it is. To compare that to the loss of a child - and no-one should ever outlive their child - to a grieving parent is just ridiculously insensitive.

On the day of my mother's funeral. I had been sat inside the house with my dad and the rest of the family, waiting for the hearse to arrive. Other mourners were gathered outside as we could only have limited numbers due to covid restrictions. As she arrived in the hearse, we went outside. I spotted an old schoolfriend, who was a neighbour of my mum gathered with the mourners.
We were all quite visibly upset.
Old friend looked me up and down and said "fucking hell, you've got fat"

I can’t even equate the loss of my parents to someone who has lost a child. I remember talking to dad when he got his terminal diagnosis - he was early 70s and it was very out of the blue.

‘It’s sad’ he said ‘I’m disappointed - but it’s no tragedy. There are kids on the ward - and their parents are suffering so much, parents shouldn’t bury their kids’.

^^ obviously not words of condolence. But not something you should be saying at all, to anybody! Especially as they are going to their mothers funeral.
I will never forget

I agree with all the comments about how wrong it is to compare the loss of a child to that of a pet. I have lost three dogs and it broke my heart for several months, and I think about them with tenderness. When I lost my son ten years ago, it broke me. There is no comparison.

My parents had a very toxic relationship and had been separated for 10 years and mid-divorce when my DF died. The day after I got the news my DM called and said “I’m much happier that now I’m going to be a widow and not a divorcee”. Never once asked me how I was coping with the loss.

I would personally prefer chocolates to flowers 🤷🏻‍♀️

When we arrived at the nursing home to sit with MiL as she died, we were greeted by the carer rolling her eyes and saying 'bloody hell, why does this always happen on my shift?'

My mother after I miscarried my 1st baby said "well at least you know you can get pregnant" and "there must have been something wrong with it"
Also after my partners dad died very suddenly, he was distraught and needed 6 weeks off work, my mum said "well he needs to get on with it now, life goes on"

Not my bereavement personally BUT after witnessing a suicide in horrendous circumstances (not that there are any 'nice' ones) and consequently suffering from PTSD a year or so later, my mum told me it was "time to get over it".

This was years ago, but I still remember. It showed how much my boss took me for granted when he said that, after thinking about it, could I change my day off as it was really inconvenient for me to take the day off I'd booked off (with as much notice as I could give).

I told him I was really sorry it was an inconvenience, but my mother and brothers needed me to be at my father's funeral that day, so I wouldn't be in... 🌹

Coming back on here to add another, linked to the elderly relatives I mentioned before.
Dad died over a decade ago. He lived near the relatives in question and would pop in from time to time during the week to check on them (being their junior by about 6 years).
When he died - which entailed me and my sibling trying desperately to get to an inner London hospital to be with him in his last moments (and failing), and then hanging around to get the death certificate from the coroner, we went to tell the relatives.
The first thing they said, on being told was, "Oh, what will we do now if we need repairs around the house?"

My cousin died very suddenly. He was in his mid twenties. At his funeral my mum turned to my sister and said, “it wasn’t meant to be him. It was supposed to be you.” The person next to us in the pew was (understandably) horrified. My sister understood exactly what our mum was saying (she’d had several stints in ICU in the 6 months prior to this).

I think that it’s worth remembering people say bloody stupid things, particularly in extremis.

It is hard sometimes. I figuratively crossed the road when my work colleagues children were murdered. He lives in a different country and I could not type out a message to him. I was lost for words and everything I wrote seemed trite. I also thought he must be inundated and the last thing he needs are more platitudes. In the end, I eventually saw him face to face and simply said I’m sorry.

I think if you truly do not know what to say those two words are enough.

What a good man. I’m sorry for your loss.

@KittenKong your Dad sounds like a wonderful person. So sorry for your loss 💐

I've been thinking about this a lot recently.

My mum died at 76 and it was sudden and shocking and for weeks I was in a complete daze and fog of grief but then recently my friend's daughter died suddenly at age 32 (and left young babies).

I could empathise massively with my friend's feelings of horror and shock but I was really careful to not try and create any kind of comparison between her loss and mine.

My feeling is that yes, grief is grief but some losses will have an utterly devastating impact on your life, more so than others. Losing a pet involves some feelings of grief but in reality, it doesn't fundamentally alter your life. Losing your child on the other hand, completely reshapes you as a person and turns your whole world on its head.

Likewise with my mum, it was sudden, brutal and devastating but you always know that one day you'll lose your parents and so you usually have a knowledge that one day your life will change and you adapt. But you never expect to lose your child and so to me, the impact on your life is immeasurable.

Those initial feelings of deep grief and loss are probably similar but the long term life impact is different.

Bit of a ramble but that's my current thought process!

I crossed the road to avoid a neighbour whose wife had died. He had offloaded to me about it a few days before. But that morning a very close friend had died. I could not even bear saying the words to him about her death as she had killed herself, and I could not bear listening to him. He never talked to me again. I tried to talk to him to explain, but he just refused to listen to a word I said.
Sometimes people react in a way that is not about you. People have their own stuff going on too.

I can see this from both sides :(

it goes the other way too. Someone I knew relatively well lost his partner very suddenly. He offloaded to me in great detail (which was fine) but then ignored me for near on a year because he associated me with the full story.

I lost my friendship.

A colleague said, "Sorry about your husband," and a few seconds later, "Well, life goes on," which seemed rather tactless.

At the hospice when I was tearful about DH's admittance, "I hate these emotional types" - the only thoughtless thing said to me, everyone else was very kind. I should jolly well think I would be emotional about a terminal illness don't you?