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 ?

Apologies I didn't think you were disagreeing, I was adding to your point. Poor wording on my part.

Totally this!

Sorry for your loss. Many people on here are being incredibly judgemental. You were there for FIL when it really mattered. I wish people could just be a little more understanding and accepting of other people's choices and beliefs and understand there are many different opinions in life and that's ok. Just to say I do understand where you are coming from. I decided a few years ago that I won't be having a funeral when I die - and I've been criticised already by family and friends who have said "don't you know that the funeral is not for you but for those who are left behind?" - so already people are having a go, and I'm not even dead yet! It's a sensitive and emotive subject so I hope your family can accept your decision in time.

So you and your husband, both neurodivergent, essentially invented your own personal religion with two members when you got together, involving rigidity of behaviour and fixed rules? Well, that explains a lot, but one worries for your children.

I completely understand. The idea that you must attend funerals to say goodbye or show respect is so strange to me. Why? Because it’s the ‘done’ thing? However I also feel the same about weddings so I recognise I’m in the minority.

Has your husband ever used an example of a funeral he went to that he found very difficult that contributed to his beliefs on funerals?

Do you mind if I ask - by saying you are both ND is it autism?

My daughter is autistic (and I suspect I am too). She would find funerals difficult - people don’t understand that people with autism can have overwhelming emotions they don’t show on their face but which can take them a lot to process. I can imagine that person then trying to process their own emotions while in a room of other emotional people would be overwhelming.

and of course there are the social codes in funerals that my daughter would find difficult to decipher - she would be stressed about that at any event but an event where she was grieving would be on another level. Plus she does not like to be touched by people and that could not be avoided at a funeral of people offering their condolences.

My daughter masks her autism and unfortunately burns out with the stress of doing so. So we as a family have had to challenge what we think as ‘regular’ behaviour for certain big occasions and get our heads around a balance of what she feels is ok for her to do. If I am honest it’s not always an easy road, because when my daughter feels she can’t do something, it often means that someone else has to step up to do that thing or put their own feelings aside. Like my husband recently, as my daughter felt what was going on in her life was too overwhelming for her to also to see him for his birthday which was on a weekend (she is away first year of uni) - we understand why but of course there is always disappointment.

it doesn’t matter why you and your hubby has developed this belief system - but it might help for you to understand why and articulate this to other people. For everyone’s sake to develop learning and understanding that not everyone sees the world in the same way helps pave the way for others to also stand up and say why going with what is the ‘norm’ can be quite upsetting for them.

My husband's funeral was a celebration of his life, conducted by a humanist celebrant. It was a lovely funeral.

The hard part for me was being expected to go straight from the crematorium to my home on my own and I don't think that I'll ever get over that.

It was lockdown at the time, but it would have been possible for at least one family household to agree to bubble up with me so that they could be there. Instead, a letter was read out at the funeral saying how sorry they were that they couldn't be there. I don't think that I'll ever get over that.

I agree with everything you've said here.

When I attended my dads funeral in 2017, when he died very unexpectedly at only 62, I was delighted to meet and speak with people from his life, who'd I'd never met, and only vaguely heard of, who all came up to me to say really kind things.

I'll never forget a colleague of his, who came up to me at the wake, with tears in her eyes, to tell me how much she'd respected and loved him.
People told me stories about my dad that I'd never heard, and are words I will treasure forever.

Missing out on that seems terribly sad.

The self-aggrandising use of "belief system" is also possibly quite grating for your dh's family. It is like one of those "irregular verbs":
I have a belief system
You have principles
They have opinions

I think your dh would have been better to say that he finds funerals very difficult and leave it at that.
Your own standpoint on funerals is very much secondary in all of this (regardless of whether you are united on your views) and that your dh should speak to his family; there's no need for you to be making joint statements about it.

Sorry for your loss.

It’s not all about you and your trumped up ‘ belief system’ it’s about honouring and showing respect for the dead, it’s a rite of passage. It’s for supporting the living. You can support whilst the person is alive, no medals for that, and support the living at a funeral.
Your not special.

I get that if that’s what you want for your own passing but I also agree with PP that funerals are a way for the living to say goodbye to their deceased loved ones. Having recently lost my mum, I would have been horrified if my DB had not come as I would have felt he was leaving me and my DF to just get on with it without his support. I completely understand your SIL’s feelings here. I don’t think you have fully considered the feelings of the living here, who you say you are there to support.

This strikes a chord.

When DH died, the funeral numbers were limited to 20 because of lockdown...but the people who should have been there didn't attend and I had attendees asking why. Having to give an explanation added to the stress and grief.

I disagree. I've been to several funerals where family members who couldn't attend were mentioned by the officiant. It felt inclusive, and saved the bereaved being questioned about their absence.

Well I'm glad it's been ascertained what this thread is actually about.

A bunch of people feeling superior to a couple who provided great kindness and warmth to another couple, both in life and death, but who chose not to attend an hour long performative ritual that is seemingly more important than long term time and effort.

What are you going to do when they teach things that are against your 'belief system ' though

Well, I got married with two witnesses, so I couldn’t be less interested in the ‘done thing’, and I’m not bothered about my own funeral because of, obviously, being dead and unaware of it. But if someone organises a funeral when they’ve lost someone close to them, I will of course be there, because it’s important to the bereaved. It’s not that complicated. I didn’t have a fiftieth birthday party either, but I go to other people’s when invited, because it’s important and matters to them!

How sincere is it to attend the funeral of a family member you didn’t visit or provide support to whilst they were alive (and ill)? Isn’t it actually rather hypocritical?

if the relationship was so difficult that you deliberately stayed away whilst the relative was alive, isn’t it a pretence to attend the funeral?

In the OP’s case she provided practical help for both her in-laws when it really mattered, and is continuing to do so.

Funerals vary a lot between cultures but I disagree they are a ‘belief system’.

Labelling your own opinion as a a ‘belief system’ is pretentious and twatty. I’d roll my eyes if someone said this in real life. Op and her DH (any anyone else) can have their own opinions and views on anything and everything but in my belief system opinion they don’t need to label it. Other people don’t care.

For me funerals are about supporting the grieving relatives. I find your point of view very odd.

I completely disagree. The OP asked for opinions on not attending a funeral. People said they found it unkind. It's not about being superior. If that was my son I would be devastated and I know it would have devastated my father if I had taken the OP's stance when my mum died. You are the one who has made it about superiority and are invalidating people with a counter belief system to the OP

Really odd, attention seeking behaviour that has caused problems within a grieving family.

I think you've had a particualarly hard time about this OP. I totally agree about the hypocrisy of people who rock up to a funeral, look sad and scoff the booze & food, haivng not seen or spoken to the deceased in donkeys years. For you aunt and uncle not to see FiL before he died when they knew he wanted to see them is particualrly awful. Taking food from a funeral buffet without it being offfered as leftovers is wierd and rude.

I don't entirely align with your view on funerals. I do think they are about the ones left behind, but that can mean many things in terms of how we acknowledge death. In fact we, her children, chose not to have funeral for my mother. She was 87, had been in a Home with dementia for many years and hadn't had meaningl friendships or realtionships with anyone for a long time, even before she went into the home. Many of her friends were dead or had dementia or serious helath conditions themselves so any funeral would have been tiny, just us and maybe a few staff from the nursing home, who go out of a sense of duty.

In your case MiL is OK with you and DH not attending and that's all that matters. I'm sure you appreciates the care and practical support she had from you both before and since her husband died and that sort of help and loving care is far more important than who just shows up at the funeral and wake. I can also see why you think it was SiL's 'turn' to do something, especially as you weren't attengint the funeral and if she hadn't been very helpful prior to his death. I can also understand why some posters think that as a bit blunt to say though.

Your belief system may be a bit unusal but so long as it focuses on helping the living, doing good in the world and allows your children normal contact and engagement with the wider world, I can't see it's any worse than a lot of the formal religions about there, many of which are rigid, controlling, racist, misogynistic and judgemental.

I will welcome any questions that they have and explain that people believe different things and let them form their own opinion. Another part of this whole system we have is encouraging seeking out information and questioning things.

OP, would you go to a funeral if you were unable to see the person who had died while they were living?
I think most people would agree that it's preferable to spend time with those we love when they are alive, but it's not a point system whereby you clock up enough points and if you get to a certain level you're excused from the funeral.

If you don't want to go, that's entirely your decision, but I do think you need to accept that people will struggle to understand.

And that was that person's very valid choice. You remembered him in your own way.

I think the biggest issue in this whole thread is the idea that tradition rules. You are free to choose the funeral you would like, or not.

Some people feel funerals are important, others don't. Others manage the discomfort of such occasions, others find it overwhelming. A bit of respect for EVERYONE, to choose what's best for them in any given moment would go a long way.

OP and ger husband were kind, supportive and respectful of MIL in her time of grief. Equally MIL was respectful of their choice. I think that is what OP and her husband should hold on to. MIL and FIL were likely fully aware of their son and his wife's neurodiversity. In all likelihood they will have made accommodations throughout their lives to support their son, and laterly his wife and ultimately understood their love and respect was shown daily and consistently and attendance at one event did not detract from that in any way.

I say this as a wife to my ND husband and mum to my 2 ND children. I get it.