7 year old not allowed to attend a funeral.

[Rhian1]

Hi Mumsnet, long time lerker - 1st time posting.

My granddad passed away last week. We have talked about this very openly with our seven year old son, who is quite (i think) emotionally mature for his age.

We discussed the funeral, talked about what to expect and what will happen on the day, I believe he should attend.

However, after speaking to my grandmother (deceased spouse), she is amendment that he will not be allowed to go under any circumstances and if we do take him he will be asked to leave, even if that means me leaving as well.

I have tried talking to her, I believe this isn't her decision to make.

The funeral is some 120 miles away from our home, we have no options of childcare and I wish my husband to attend (for his own personal respects, and selfish reasons that I would like his support).

What do I do now?! I have prepared my son for this, how can I possibly tell him he cant go? Or that none of us are going? I really dont want to make a scene at funeral.

Rock (me) hardplace.

Please help!

OP - I'm sorry for your loss.

However, I find it very surprising that you say you don't have a single friend you could ask to look after your son so that your DH could support you at the funeral

I think it would be worth asking around

justmyview, I think the OP said the funeral is at 9am & is 120 miles away. So she'd have to arrange for her son to go to someone else's home very, very early in the morning, or to stay overnight the night before. Not quite as simple as just letting him go to a friend's after school.

Rhian, why don't you go, and let your DH take your DS off for a walk around the graveyard.

It's not rocket science for me to see you need to go, you need your DH there for you and you have no childcare, so your DS HAS to come - just do t ruby our gm's nose in it.

Afaik funerals are public affairs and anyone is able to attend- maybe your gm thinks children will be disruptive and wants to make sure there are no tantrums and noise.

Maybe she thinks all children are a fuss and a bother and are badly behaved hooligans, and in her grief doesn't want any children running about or making noise.
It's an old fashioned view I grant you, and based maybe on her experience, and not the reality of your DS, but she's entitled to her wishes being respected, even if she's wrong.

Bring him to the church and graveyard, but I wouldn't bring him to any private house tea or private wake. Your DH will have to take him for a walk for that bit.

Sorry for your loss.

Ruby our= rub your

I would get one of his school friend's mum to have him- I can't see them turning you down if you ask.

Sorry- cross posted- didn't see the early start.

IF you have to take him anywhere . take to the wake and NOT the service;.

Shame on you , badgering your gm at a time like this!! How utterly selfish and disrespectful you are!

I understand your point of view but your gran obviously has set views on it and I think it will be much easier to say 'change of plan' to your son ( that is a learning experience too after all) than to upset your gran and cause a scene at her husband's funeral.

He will have other chances to go to a funeral. He's not missing out on something essential to every 7 year old. This is the only funeral your gran will be having for her husband.

I am so sorry for your loss.

I know you want to have support from your dh and maybe your son needs to go with you to the hotel or whatever, if so, then it will be that way.

My hubby's grandmother died and the funeral was almost 200 miles away. My dd would not have benefited from the funeral and certainly I think my hubby would have found it very hard to have her there and so I stayed home and he went. I was a bit sad to miss the chance to go, as I missed a funeral when I was in my 20s, of a friend, and felt very bad for a long time. But it ad to be Hubby had all his extended family around him and was fine. If you need support from your hubby that is perfectly understandable but please do not be tempted to add to your grandmother's distress by going against her wishes.

I think suggestions that you go against your grandmother's wishes are very unwise and were you to do that it would be very hurtful.

You can pay your respects and say goodbye to people without being at a funeral and so can your ds. Lots of good ideas how to do it.

I think children may well behave well at a funeral or they could very much take attention away from the solemn occasion. Generally, even well behaved children need to be looked after, often their needs come first, they need the loo at inopportune moments, can't always eat the food on offer and generally tend to create a degree of havoc! My nephew (aged about 18 months) had a big meltdown and nearly chocked on a chocolate at the crematorium when we went for a visit. Others there were quietly remembering their loved ones. We decided our kids did not need to go to the crematorium when we went to remember my dad.

Harry1603 I am very sorry that you had a terrible time when you lost your grandmother. I don't know all the details but I wonder if your mum had a very good reason for not wanting you there and maybe felt it was for the best. You said you could not forgive her. I hope you will. Life is too short to hold onto that type of grudge (IMHO).

Rein it in sunhinecity, the grieving OP has said she didn't badger her gm, rather that the vicar and her mother suggested that children should come and gm said no. RTT.

Fair enough Kitty- you agree with OPs grandmother and mine. But seeing the terrible pain it put a lot of my family through it seems a very odd- and I do think controlling- stance to take.

I think some are giving you a hard time on here OP.

I can understand why you want your son there and I can also understand why your GM says no.

I have not once thought you or she is being selfish but it is a terrible time for you both.

In your position I would attend the funeral leaving DS with DH then when everyone else is attending the wake I would take DS to the cemetery/crematorium to say goodbye. Afterwards you, DH & DS can then go somewhere for a quite meal and celebrate your grandfathers life.

It is all getting rather heated!
It is unfortunate that OP has a different view to her grandmother but it is all fairly simple.
DS has been said to be mature for his age so just explain the his great gran is of a generation that don't think DCs should be at funerals.
Discuss what he can do instead e.g plant a tree.
If she can't get childcare she will have to go without DH.

It's right to respect grandma's feelings, here. When my older sons' grandma died, we thought they were too young to go and one of the other school gate mums had my sons after school - very kind. When my dad died, one of my sons was 7 and we decided to take him to the funeral so he'd have closure. (My stepmum didn't object - if she had, I would have got someone to babysit him). My son had this huge, Italianate emotion - crying loudly, and almost inconsolably (his 18 year old cousin stuck with him throughout, held his hand and calmed him down, in the end). And I got some pretty evil looks from some of the (older) people present. But I knew I'd done the right thing, and that my dad would have actually been very moved, to see how much the 7 year old loved him, and if it distressed other people (close family all approved) - then tough. It was my dad and I wanted my kids to say goodbye. My youngest was 5 and my friend babysat him all afternoon.

Now the 7 year old is 14, and he remembers that day and is glad he went.

If you can find some other way to give your son closure - get a nice photo of grandad framed, for him maybe and maybe you could go and lay flowers with him somewhere, or nicer still, plant something in your garden to remember him by? And make that your son's little ceremony?

It is hard enough dealing with your own grief, but a child's? Very tough. You never know how they will take it, til it comes to it. On the way home from my dad's funeral at a service station, my 7 yr old saw a little toy stuffed dog and fell in love with it. We were pretty broke and spent our last few quid buying him it to cheer him up but I remembered when I was a kid and my parents once spent their last £5 on a toy dog for me I fell in love with and treasure to this day... And so I told my son about it and that maybe it was grandad buying him a present, like he once had me... He still loves that dog, despite being a macho, football playing teenager.

I would take my children to their grandparents funeral, primarily because I was not allowed to attend my grandparents funeral because'it wasn't the done thing' for a female to attend. And I've felt excluded even now, many years later. So if my dcs wanted to attend any funeral, I would take them. Maybe not to the wake afterwards if it would cause offence, but certainly to the church service.

I think the OP is getting a hard time from some posters too.

It's all about respecting the gm's feelings, but why can't we respect the OP's as well?

She has lost someone she loves as well. No doubt her feelings are all over the place; I think she deserves some compassion as well.

She is not being mean or disrespectful towards her gm for not agreeing with her stance. They are both grieving and struggling.

The OP has not put pressure on her gm or said anything mean to her, or even that she is going to take her child. She is struggling with the decision her gm made. She is human, calling her selfish and stuff is really mean when she too is grieving.

If the gm can be shown compassion for her feelings why can't some extend the same to the OP?

Oh wait, this is AIBU. Some don't understand that you can disagree with someone without accusing them of badgering and being selfish and disrespectful.

It really isn't gm's place to say who can and can't go. No one owns a funeral. If a complete stranger wants to go to the service they can, gm may not like it but funerals are open to everyone.

I think Funnyfoot's suggestion is great.

I am staggeredthinking op's attitude, basically brow beating a widow when she's just lost her husband. No children at funerals is very much a widely followed custom and is probably the majority view amongst older people.

What were you thinking op?

When you discovered that it was no children, regardless of your views you should have accepted silently abd with good grace. (As it goes agree that pre-teen children shouldn't go to funerals but that's by the by)

Your grandmother has lost her husband of many years, your loss and your son's loss doesn't even come close to what she is going through. She has the absolute right to mourn her husband's death in the way she sees fit.

Imagine your husband died and how you'd feel.

Imagine within days of his death his great uncle (or someone who isn't immediate family) starts openly lobbying for the makeup and tone of the funeral for your husband be significantly altered. How would you feel? How would you react?

I think it's awful that adults try not to let children see them grieve. It's not a bad thing to cry or express your feelings over a beloved who has died, but it is a bad thing to make kids think that.

I would be truthful with him. Great Grandma has some rather "outdated" ideas, and as she is Great Grandpa's wife, she gets to say who goes in the family and who doesn't. Tell him that you disagree with her, but adults disagree with each other all the time - it's not something for him to be worried about, and you and him and his dad will do something to say goodbye to Great Grandpa on another day.

I don't believe children need to be sheltered from seeing adults upset at a specific event like a funeral. Somebody they all loved has gone and that is unbearably sad so it is only normal people express that. It is odd and unhelpful in our society that death is such a terrible taboo and grief is an adult-only emotion.

Exactly. Grief is normal, it is not something to shy away from and I do not understand why anyone would feel they would need to worry about a child at a funeral witnessing it. It's ok for a child to witness grief.

I have spent 6 months with child grief counsellors, researching things, talking to people, reading books etc and I firmly believe that it is just as important for a child to go to the funeral as it is an adult if they wish to go. I think it is more damaging to not allow a child to go when they want to.

brow beating?

Hardly?

where is the proof that she is brow beating her?

Sorry, but the gm's feelings are not the only ones that count here.

Do people really specify who can and cannot attend a funeral? Do you draw up a guest list? When we organised my Dad's there was no question of telling anyone child or otherwise that they couldn't come. I think we had people there who had waved at him in passing sometime in the last 20 years. When my DGM died my 4 month-old-niece was the youngest there. If you have a church service you often get regular church goers who attend.

My dd attended her gf funeral when she was under 12 months old. No one thought anything of it. Both my dcs gave attended funerals for gps when they were little and no one was concerned. It's up to parents to decide. You don't give out invites to funerals.