about people who announce deaths on facebook??

[citruslemon]

My aunt died late last night. She had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and just yesterday the doctor told us she was unlikely to make it through the weekend. She died peacefully with her family (including my mum) around her.

Now I get up this morning to see that two members of my extended family have written about this as their fb status. My aunt was in her 70s and didn't know the first thing about computers. These two distant relatives don't live in the same city as my aunt and I doubt they had ever met her more than a handful of times. They are so distantly related that even I don't understand how they're related. But I think EVEN if they has been closely related this isn't right is it?? AIBU to think that things like this should not be your fb status??

BOF that goes back to my point about people stopping to consider the feelings of somebody who is emotionally affected more than them.

janedoe!

How absolutely awful for you. I'm so sorry.

YANBU at all. I was devastated when I lost my mum and a friend of mine announced it to all and sundry on facebook. She had never met my mum and knew nothing about her. I did not want it on facebook, all it did was create a thread of people, some of whom I didn't know as they were her friends not mine asking what had happened, how had she died etc. I was really upset and it ruined our friendship. It was a heartbreaking time and she should not have been putting my private grief on facebook it's just wrong. I'm really sorry about your aunt.

Incidentally I only found out because another friend rang me to tell me (as she knew I wouldn't like it and would want it to be removed) because at that time, the last bloody thing I was interested in was updating facebook.

So perhaps that is how people find the press intrusive when they announce a birth, engagment or pg before the happy couple or not so happy couple when it is a divorce have had time to think about how they want to announce things - but it doesn't stop people buying newspapers and it will not stop people deleting facebook profiles as the world will get used to it, accept it and move on with this new media type

I suppose it depends on circumstances.

My Step-dad died 2 weeks ago, everyone close was told in person but he was in the Navy, then the Prison (as a warden, not inmate) then the RFA so he had a lot of really close friends from all 3 careers that he didn't get to see very often but kept in contact through FB.

So my mom put a status up on his FB page to let them all know and so those who could knew where to attend the funeral etc. She had to, lots of people wanted to be there but she had no other way of contacting them all.

I wouldn't like it in the way it was done in your situation though.

Sorry for your loss. X

And I probably should have read the other posts first!

Emotional incontinence sums it up perfectly in most cases but in some its just an extension of the "comment on my status and love me" culture which is rife on FB.

My sister and I lost our beloved grandad three years ago and had a similar experience to the OP.

The day before his funeral, we both saw that our dad's distant cousin's daughter had updated her status so that it said "[Suchabody] is so sad. RIP Uncle [my grandad's name]".

What followed was a huge public outpouring of hugs and "so sorry for you babe" etc that turned our stomachs. She hadn't seen him for at least 5yrs prior to his death, so it was simply a device to get sympathy for grief which I very much doubt she was feeling, certainly not to the extent that my Nan or my Dad were feeling it.

I had to be restrained from adding to the FB thread to express my sympathy for her loss and make some sarcastic dig about not realising how close they'd been if she felt it appropriate to grieve so publicly. Needless to say, my sister and I totally blanked her at the funeral - we would've lamped her!

I think facebook is such a part of peoples everyday life now that announcements like that are ok.
I did it last year when my Mum died, I wanted to let everyone know, but couldnt actually face speaking to people.

All I wrote was RIP Mum, no other words were needed.

I still have that announcement on my wall ( I delete most things) and occassionally I still go back and read the messages people left.

At my Mums funeral it transpired that a cousin who we rarely see had learnt about Mum not from facebook but reading in local paper. He is now on my friends list for the sole reason if anything else happens within the family I can let him know (we dont see each other otherwise)