We are being labelled disrespectful and I disagree over funeral

[Bluehummingbird]

We don’t agree with so don’t attend funerals. It’s part of a wider belief system we have devised part of it being to see those we care about as much as possible and do as much as we can for anyone we love who is ill or needs support.

Recently FIL passed after a long illness. We helped with care, spent a lot of time with him and supported MIL which we continue to do. We were with him in hospital and were able to say goodbye.

The issue is that we didn’t go to the funeral. We’ve had nasty comments from family members (who never bothered to see him or help MIL as they ‘lived too far away’ and who managed to travel though to the funeral and stuff their faces afterwards as they told us they even managed to take food for the journey home then the next sentence calling us out for behaviour).

SIL said it wasn’t fair she had to step up to help with funeral arrangements. I said to her ‘we arranged the care, we did all the hospital appts, I cleaned the house for MIL and we looked after the dog when they needed a break so it was your turn to do something’

Everyone is saying dh can’t have been able to say goodbye properly but he did - in the hospital? It’s like we don’t need to physically go to church each week to feel close to god or worship we don’t feel the need to go to a set place on a set day to say goodbye to someone who isn’t there any more and we find it performative.

I know most people do funerals but I’m struggling with having to repeatedly explain our position on this and we try to be good people and want to be judged on our actions for the last few years not for the 1 hour service and then the few hours after wake that we missed ?

You're right. There's no way she'll change or compromise this "belief" in not attending funerals.

Perfomative respect has its place - a funeral is one such place.

Are you JWs?

Perhaps it’s time to consider this. To you weddings are for the couple. To the couple it’s about sharing the day with everyone they love and bringing their families together.

To you a funeral is about the dead, but to the dead the funeral is for everyone they loved and who loved them to get together for just one day and support each other.

The most recent funeral I’ve been to was beautiful. Celebrating the life of the person but also sharing stories, holding each other. Giving them a proper send off. Final party. Laughing together. I learned things about the deceased I would never known, heard music they loved and made new connections to them that assisted in my grieving. There are things about them I only know because of that funeral. I’ve found myself closer to their other friends and family. We shared grief. We listened to each other. We honoured our love for them now they are gone. It’s not about saying goodbye. It’s about so, so much more than that.

To say you categorically “don’t believe” in funerals is to deeply misunderstand their purpose and what they provide.

I don’t believe you have a belief system at all. You are both ND and cannot understand or process the emotions of grief so have come up with a coping strategy that works for both of you.

I think @Ohwhydidntijustkeepmymouthshut is bang on. This is avoidance dressed up as a code of beliefs.

No

Well said. There's no care or thought for the SIL in all this, from the op and her husband, which is very sad.

The talk of a belief system you’ve devised by yourselves sounds very pompous at best.

It’s sort of coming across like you believe that you’ve managed to see through the whole silly business of funerals because you’ve realised the person is dead. As if the rest of us don’t know? All these people across the planet throughout history with their silly rites of passage to mark the passing of a loved one… if only someone told them it’s pointless because the person is already dead.

I agree with others that funerals are about supporting the living but I disagree it’s not about the dead. Funerals to me are about honouring their memory and giving them a send off fitting of their life. Their last party.

YANBU to not go obviously but I can see why it’s rubbed people up the wrong way.

I think this situation is really useful in showing the gap between a principle in idea and how it plays out in actuality.

One might have a perspective that funerals are upsetting, it's hard to see other people's grief and be around high emotions, especially when one is ND. So from this evolves a decision that one won't attend funerals in future, or have one oneself. In return, one will be kind to people in poor health.

It's all very logical, OP. But life isn't logical. What your DH-as-a-child didn't understand is that funerals aren't just a goodbye where lots of people are uncomfortably showing their feelings. It's about support, and marking a life. It's not always possible to be actively in someone's life as they get older, and not everyone is a long time dying. For example, a sibling who lives a couple of hours away and who you haven't seen for 6 or 7 months drops dead of a heart attack. Would you understand the importance of an opportunity to gather and be supportive of his widow and children at a funeral under that circumstance? Obviously attending a funeral is not the only way to show that this person mattered to you, but it can be meaningful.

I think one of the important things about ideas (which is what beliefs and principles start as) is that they can be based on a misconception, or as you get more information you might find your original idea was not as sound as you thought. Being able to reconsider is an important sign of intellectual maturity. You and DH shouldn't feel that by sticking rigidly to what you once thought was a good idea you are definitely "right" or being true to yourselves. Part of being true to yourselves is admitting when further information makes you reconsider. This has happened in DH's family now. You have discovered that other people have beliefs that attending a funeral marks a life and supports a grieving family; they noticed DH's absence in particular and feel it reflects badly on him.

In other people's minds, it looks like you didn't care.

If, heaven forbid, one of your children was taken before they grew old, would you want them cremated quietly in the night, alone and with nobody accompanying them on their final journey who loved them? It's entirely alien to me. And the tragedy is that DH is wrong. Funerals don't reopen a grief wound. As he is finding, grief isn't like that. Do you really feel that if one of your children died, you'd be feeling better until you had the funeral and reopened the wound? It's a staggeringly naive belief.

I hope this thread and the situation enables you both to have a discussion and maybe soften some of your "rules" - for example, "we will briefly attend a funeral for immediate family if it is important to them, as a sign of respect for those we love".

I can see both sides on this one. I note a lot of people are calling you awful but including no criticism for the SIL (who didn't help with FIL when he was actually alive - is the OP's harshness to her in words worse than her harshness in (lack of) actions?) or the aunt and uncle (who have behaved the worst here imo - not seeing dying FIL when he asked and then crowing about the food at the funeral - do they not feel guilty?).

On the other hand, I don't think you're following the principle of your belief system through logically, as funerals are about supporting the living (as the dead are, well, dead), so it doesn't make sense for you not to have gone or helped arrange it by your own explanation.

Views on the legitimacy of beliefs are interesting. I've seen people on here saying that your beliefs are only "preferences" and don't count, etc., whereas presumably if you had said "I converted to x religion where we don't attend funerals", there would be a grudging acceptance that that was legitimate. Why does a belief that you've developed yourself count less than one that came from someone else? Religious customs have of course become cultural norms, but I don't understand why that also prioritises religious beliefs over personal ones.

And a complete lack of understanding for what funerals are IMO. They see it as a black and white “saying goodbye” and as they feel they’ve ticked that box they don’t think it’s necessary.

They don’t actually understand what a funeral is or the real benefit of it. Clearly.

I wouldn't judge you, OP; and I think your extended family are behaving abominably by trying to make you feel bad for not attending a funeral, as if that's some measure of how much you love or cared about the person who died, or those left behind. You've provided significant support, by the sound of it, and your DH supported his mother before and after the funeral, and presumably will continue to do so. Don't apologise and don't feel the need to explain.

I attended the funeral of DD best friend a few weeks ago who was tragically killed (aged 20). It was an amazing day which paid tribute to the wonderful person she was. Nobody ever expected her to die and so the day was as much about celebrating her as it was to say goodbye. If it was you you wouldn't have gone and had the opportunity to be part of that day. What would happen if one of your children died? No funeral?

Oh OP! You should've mentioned this earlier. Then posters might've been more understanding! If your FIL knew and your MIL knew, that changes things. Get your DH to tell the aunt and uncle that his parents were aware and that's that.

Unless MIL explicitly begged him to come and he said no still, it's none of their business. SIL is slightly more tricky because of the unfair comment you made about her pulling her weight, but she must know her dad was aware.

Yes, I agree with you both. It's just about funerals and the attendant emotions.

I also wonder how else the SIL may have felt hurt by the op & husband in the past.

For example, assuming she wasn't one of the witnesses at their wedding. While fully respecting & accepting that decision, its their right of course, it can still feel painful to those who may have looked forward to sharing in the day. And may even have felt like a rejection.

Grief magnifies feelings and churns up those which have been buried.

But a wedding, as is so often said on here, is an invitation not a summons. Is that not true of funerals also?

I think it's lovely that the OP's husband went to stay with his mother for a few days after the funeral. Going home to an empty house, and waking up to one the morning after, must be so very hard.

I agree with you - it's annoying when people turn out to pay respects to someone they couldn't be bothered with when that person was alive.

However, funerals aren't just for the dead, they're for the living. And sometimes they can just be for the living, depending on one's relationship with the dead person. So I can see the other point of view. You'd have been turning up for husband's mum, not husband's dad.

My remaining uncle is very dear to me, but my lovely aunt has been dead for a long while, and I don't care about anyone else on that side of my family, so they can judge me all they like for not going to his funeral when it happens, because he's not there so there's no point in my view. I can pay my respects another way, privately.

But I think if you do care for husband's mum, then going for her and anyone else you like and respect could have been an option for you.

Sorry but I think it’s you who is being performative. You’re choosing to make it all about you in a very public way that you know perfectly well will puzzle and perhaps upset others.

Great that you did all the other support, but I don’t see why it would have been so difficult for you to adhere to the social and cultural custom of going to funerals to show respect for the person who has died and support for their friends and relations. If you choose to depart from that custom you can’t complain if people find it unusual and wonder why.

This is such an important question. OP has spoke about not wanting a funeral for herself but if her children died would her belief extend that far?

Not marking their life with any kind of celebration at all? No desire to gather everyone who loved her child and say a few words about who they were? No raising a glass to their memory, nothing?

Funeral attendance isn’t mandatory, of course. But the communication beforehand must have been less than ideal because the OP was left shocked and some of the family were upset.

OP doesn’t need them to agree with her or even like her, but achieving some understanding on both sides, so they can move forward, is reasonable and achievable. Improving the communication has to be the kindest solution for everyone affected.

Yes.

I have been doing 100% care for my parents this year (both have cancer) as db lives an 11 hour flight away. The care given and the funeral are not transactionally linked. I find that odd and calling it a “belief system” to solidify their “opinion” is nobby imo. You don’t want to go to a funeral then fine, don’t go, but don’t expect people to not judge that decision and your choice to ostracise you from the wider family.

Most people who don't attend a particular wedding do so for pragmatic reasons though - distance, family logistics, time off work etc. I cant recall anyone on MN (or in RL) ever saying their belief system prevents them from attending a close family member's wedding.

If you dont agree with funerals then dont have one.

It's miserly and mean spirited not to go to funerals of others because funerals are about supporting that person's relatives in saying goodbye.

I dont personally celebrate Diwali for example, but would always wish people who do a happy one and would happily go to a Diwali celebration if I was invited because I care about people other than myself. I think this is a very odd hill to die on (pardon the pun).

Those "kind words" don't have to be kept until the day of the funeral though do they? They can be said at any time. People saying that they go to funerals to "support those bereaved" are often the same people that haven't done or said anything to show "support" until then, or will afterwards. The OP showed support in the run-up to the funeral and for 1 day, she handed the baton to somebody else....1 day out of probably many others where she will be expected to be other people's emotional support human.