Should my MIL and SIL come to DMs funeral

[missnevermind]

Mum died suddenly a few weeks ago.
Mum and Dad have been living in Spain on and off for the last 5 years and were there when it happened. Mum was cremated in Spain as per her wishes but within 3 days as is usual there. The speed of everything took us by surprise.
We are having ' a funeral without a body' here at the local church with drinks afterwards as Dad has brought her ashes home. We are expecting about 70 people.
Now my dilemma / bad thoughts
It has not even occurred to any of DHs family to attend. We have been together 26 years. Married 22 with 4 children.
Is this normal? Am I expecting too much? Would you expect yours to attend?

When I said I just would teacher I didn't mean I would just turn up. I meant I would have a conversation about whether I was wanted. I thought that was clear but perhaps it wasn't.

I'm not sure how you'd find out about a service without making contact with the family - unless it's someone famous like Alan Coren, you scour the obits in the local paper or just hang around graveyards.

You've said that you would ask because you are aware that people do things differently to you.

So would I, coming from the opposite view to your family, so no harm done.

We would both do what the bereaved person wanted.

I'm not sure how you'd find out about a service without making contact with the family - unless it's someone famous like Alan Coren, you scour the obits in the local paper or just hang around graveyards.

I suppose you might hear about it from friends, but then you'd have a connection, not be gawpers or gatecrashers.

Two people, who were the daughter and son in law of my mother's long-dead close friend, turned up at my mother's funeral in that way. They got in touch with my sister through the church at the last minute. They'd lost touch with us but the woman had been very close to my mother all her life.

I was pleased to see them and they felt it was important for them to come. They didn't come to the wake because her mother's old house was round the corner and she couldn't face seeing it.

My mother's wake was a reasonably jolly affair too. But there were too many sandwiches and not enough guests.

Normal. My mum did offer but it's not her family.

I wouldn't expect my in-laws to attend the funeral if one of my parents passed, however if one of my in-laws passed I would expect that my (irish) mother would attend to support me and DP. She would however ask if we wanted her there though. My sister would prbably also attend whether I wanted her there or not.

I am of the opinion that you attend funerals to support those who are living, so for example I attended the funeral of a friend's mother as although I'd only met her twice I lived with her son and his fiancee (who I had known for 10years or so). I attended for my friends to support them. I gave her husband my condolences and quietly helped my friends and made sure they didn't have to worry about things like food and drink for people.
If I knew however that my being there would make other people uncomfortable then I wouldn't attend and would send a card and flowers/other donation instead.

Sorry I missed this it would seem, to them, the height of bad manners, and bad taste, to intrude upon a bereaved family when their connection as so distant and they had not met very often.

But their connection isn't distant. They are connected by marriage and may even share grand children who might like to see them.

My MIL and mother barely met after my wedding in 1992 but she attended the funeral. She spoke to DH first and then to me.

They lived nearly 200 miles apart so it wasn't practical for them to meet frequently. The contact was just Christmas and birthday cards, postcards - MIL is about the only person I know who still sends postcards from holiday - a few dinners and an invitation to my mother to attend my BIL and SIL's wedding and their children's christenings. They liked my mum.

They didn't come to the funeral because it would have been difficult for them. But they spoke to me and explained. I wouldn't have dreamed of requiring their presence or MIL's.

MIL asked first but she never expected not to be accepted or thought it was the wrong thing to do to ask.

If your parents worried about it being intrusive to attend I would understand that. But I'd expect them to ask what I'd like them to do and express their thoughts. I'd regard asking advice about the funeral as part of the normal condolence procedure.

How hard is it to say: 'So sorry about your mother. What are the funeral arrangements? Do you want me to come, would you like me to send flowers or make a donation to charity?'

In turn I'd say: 'Please come if you can. Don't feel obliged, especially as you're really old and it's a long journey or you're young and it's a long journey and you can't get childcare.'

"I'd regard asking advice about the funeral as part of the normal condolence procedure."

But my parents wouldn't. They would assume that those who were close enough to be welcome would have been specifically contacted (and were in close enough weekly / daily / at worst monthly contact with the deceased and their family to know) and would assume that they were not in that circle.

Their normal condolence procedure would be to send a card. And, in my DM's case, probably read the funeral prayers silently for the deceased at home at the relevant time, in line with her daily unobtrusive, withdrawn religious observance.

I don't think your children being married to one another makes you connected. Other than very distantly. My parents and Pils had never met. Not even at our wedding - as pils didn't come. We don't have christenings or anything joint and we all spend xmas apart in our own small nuclear family units.

I am aware i now sound like lady Whiteadder - sticking forks into ourselves for fun and considering 2 spikes to be ostentatious (NOT the burning Catholics bit, so please don't accuse me of that!). But we just are used to a very reserved small family. We don't like noise and lots of people and fussing. DH and I are (sort of) only children. All this extended family all mucking in is totally alien to me.

My exH is scouse and exPils really wanted to meet my parents who just didn't see why they should and were not interested at all in a 'uniting of families'. exPils found this very hard to understand. It was a tightrope between the 2.

We always send condolence cards tho. Nice and neat and distant! No messy emotional stuff.

yes - interesting how many of us have Irish heritage .

As an example of how it works in 'our' culture - many years ago my friend's dad died. I don't think my parents had ever met him, I was working 300 miles away but did go back to my home town for the day to the funeral - only to find my parents sitting there in church. "we didn't know if you'd be able to get home so we thought we'd come along to represent you" was their logic (I hadn't told them I was coming as it literally was a flying visit to go to the funeral). My friend's family were really touched that they'd done that.

In my exH's small town the funeral is very much a social and neighbourhood event. The last one I went to (CofE) there were family, neighbours like me plus representatives from the guides, the WI, the local gardening club.... all because the elderly lady had belonged to them all (she'd been a big cheese in the guides in the 70's!). None of the guides knew her as it was many years ago, but they were there in their uniforms. She would have loved it.

I understand that private funerals are the norm in some cultures, even within the UK, but I think they are increasingly unusual.

My parents came to funeral when FIL died. They had met and got on but it was mainly about supporting my DH who they are very fond of and who was heartbroken.

My parents and in-laws did not attend each other's funerals-they knew each other only slightly. I would not expect them to attend.
Both my DDs ILs live a significant distance away-I would send cards letters and donations/flowers but it wouldn't have occurred to me to attend the funerals unless I was specifically asked. They are nice people and it wouldn't be lack of respect.

My Mum came to my MIL's funeral, despite only knowing her slightly (my Dad was too ill to come). She wanted to pay their respects. It was much appreciated by my husband's family.

Yes of course they should come. And yes to support you as much as paying their respects.

A year on and i am still harbouring grudges about family and friends who didnt visit my mum in hospital and didnt come to her funeral.

I dont think people realise how much it means until they themselves lose a close loved one. Feeling like people care and are there for you is so important.

Im speechless that some in laws haven't even mentioned about the ops parents death, how fucking rude

Sorry for your loss op

Im in NI so I would expect your inlaws to attend.

I would expect PIL to ask about the funeral arrangements of an opposite number and definitely to ask if they would be welcome to attend the funeral or explain why they wouldn't be able to. I would also expect the question to be a formality - of course they would be welcome.

If there were exceptional circumstances such as distance, age, holiday or work or family commitments, I would accept that excuse with no hard feelings. In the not unusual event that they hated each others' guts perhaps it might be inappropriate - but maybe not, because maybe the grandchildren would want them there.

In fact, I'd probably bring all those things up first without malice.

But yes, I would expect the default position to expect the attendance of someone from the other side of the family.

I find it odd that you wouldn't attend a funeral to support your daughter or son in law and particularly your grandchildren. Plenty of people have said that funerals are more about the living than the dead and the three most recent ones I have attended bore that out for me.

Two were for close family and one was for a good friend. He was as much a friend of my husband's than mine but DH couldn't make it. But I could.

I'm interested. If I were your MIL and called you to express condolences on the death of your mother and then asked if you would like me to attend her funeral even though we weren't close, would that offend you?

Because that's what my MIL did and she's as English as English can be.

Feeling like people care and are there for you is so important.

I agree with you about that more than anything hollie.

I'm usually not backwards in coming forwards but when you've lost someone close, you shouldn't be in the position of having to specifically ask them to attend. It's not a birthday party.

They should ask your partner, friend, priest or funeral director if they would like you to attend. I've buried both parents. You do tell people. In fact, with my mum, the funeral directors were wonderful and took it all out of our hands.

Some people don't want anyone but immediate family, and I completely understand that. I'm thinking of a poster who lost a child who has said that it was horrible that pupils from her school turned her funeral into a kind of day trip.

That should have been stamped on by the school and the children's parents who presumably knew what the silly children were up to.

My heart goes out to her and I hope that if she recognises herself she bears me no ill will. I don't intend it.

But I do think in-laws are family and close friends know who they are so the answer is halfway there.

Not to ask a discreet question because you'd be embarrassed is awful.

"and particularly your grandchildren"

Children (under 18s) do not attend funerals in either my family or DH's. I attended my first (not family) when I was in my 20s.

"He was as much a friend of my husband's than mine but DH couldn't make it. But I could. "

This is an interesting development in my parents' tradition, too. My mother has, in the last 10-15 years, been to funerals on her own, as a representative of my dad, whereas she will still very rarely attend them if he is available. So she will go 'to represent a male member of the family' but not to accompany them.

I have found this thread really interesting as a reflection of how the tradition that I was brought up in is out of step with the thinking in many families today ... storing up guidance for when the situation arises, so that i don't inadvertantly cause offence.

"Not to ask a discreet question because you'd be embarrassed is awful." Im my parents' case it is not embarrassment. Just a belief that their moral code, traditions and rules about what constitutes good manners are shared, perhaps, more widely than they are.

(It is probably lucky that they live in Wales now, and so the culture surrounding them is more in step with them than might be the case elsewhere in the country)

My sister's children did not attend my father's funeral because they were under six years old and it would have been difficult.

Her PIL did not attend. A neighbour else must have looked after the children that day. At the very least the PIL could have volunteered to look after the children and attend the wake.

When my mother died two years ago the grandsons were in their late 20s and did attend. I didn't go into it with them but to say my sister was disappointed that none of her in laws attended yet another important funeral to support her as a DIL and SIL of over 30 years and support the grandsons would be an understatement.

I wonder if she will attend their funerals.

I expect she will. But it will be with a heavy heart and much bitterness. I imagine they'll leave before scoffing many of the sandwiches.

I'm English and have attended many funerals of people I've never met, or barely met, to support a friend or friends. DH's family don't.

The last thing you want, though, is someone to be there who doesn't want to be, so if your SIL doesn't want to, be thankful that she's absent. So long as she isn't hanging back because she thinks she's not wanted or that you would find it presumptuous. Can your dh ask her?

Don't know where that stray 'else' came from.

And when I say wake, it's not like a massive knees up.

It's two hours of sandwiches, tea, cake and chat. And a bit of laughter and tears.

Sorry for your loss.

I would think it poor form for them not to attend.

My mother-in-law doesn't know my parents (they haven't met at all in 10 years - she didn't even come to our wedding) so in those circumstance no.

When my maternal grandparents passed away, one half of my paternal grandparents and my uncles and aunts on my Dads side came. As was the same with my mother's sibling's other side of the family... Does that make sense?

Because my maternal grandparents knew everyone and were lovely and we socialised all together as one big giant family 3/4 times a year so it would be weird if they hadn't.

My maternal grandmother lived and died abroad so we had a cremation out there within about 4 days just immediate family and friends in that country and then another funeral with the ashes back in the UK with everyone.

I meant to say sorry for your loss but hit send x

My PIL looked after ds1 (4 weeks old ) at my dad's funeral - and thought it was odd we took him to the tea after the service - it was a kind thing of them todo and they had a significant journey (3 hours) to do it. They didn't come to mum's and if I am really honest about it I was/am hurt by that and by the complete non- acknowledgment of her passing and loss - not for me but also for DH and our children. They had all stayed in our home together over the years and met at lots of family occassions and knew each other, sent postcards from holidays, birthday gifts etc.