AIBU to be a bit shell-shocked

[JSlondon]

My mum died two months ago and things are obviously pretty hard at the moment. My parents were together for nearly fifty years. Shortly after she died, a woman my dad went out with briefly before he met my mum got in contact with him, having heard the news of my mum's death through a mutual acquaintance. She's called/emailed a few times to see how he's doing. She lives in New York and is now coming to visit my dad for a week and stay with him sometime next month. She is widowed. Does this seem a bit fucking weird and inappropriate? And very bloody SOON?

I was talking about this with a group of friends the other day. Two of us had DFs who were widowed and who had got together with new partners relatively quickly. - 6 weeks post funeral in one case. Their view was that grief sent their DFs a little bit crazy and this was a contributing factor. Loneliness was another. They also felt that in their experience, men who had had very happy marriages were more likely to get together with someone new relatively quickly because they were trying to recreate the happiness they had previously had.

I'm very sorry for you loss.

katemiddletonsnudeheels Tue 10-May-16 08:50:38

"Sorry, regardless of age it is just horribly disrespectful to the memory of their first wife."

doesn't that depend on what the attitude of the first wife might have been?

there is also the thought that somebody who has been living with a terminally ill person for a long time might already have done their grieving over year after painful year: it doesn't suddenly start at the funeral

and ime it is the partner who is likely to have done most pre-funeral grieving: children are often not told as much as early or live it at the same close quarters

when my friend died her husband got together with a friend of theirs really quickly; it didn't strike any of us as disrespectful as we all had a strong feeling that this would be what she would have wanted

Look at Paul McCartney - leapt into the arms of Heather Mills just after Linda McCartney had died. And then majorly regretted it...

cory, I think people often say 'it is what X would have wanted' when they mean it is what they want, but regardless you cannot live your live dictated by what a dead person would have wanted.

However, if a man can't face up to and ask serious questions about what sort of woman swoops on them weeks after being widowed, then that's a concern.

In my experience, the man is almost always lovely - decent, genuine, sweet - and weak.

The woman is ruthless and cold underneath a concerned persona.

It's an awful combination.

I'm sorry for your loss, it's a lot to deal with.
From your perspective yes it is too soon, and almost disrespectful to your mum.
The grieving process is long and you e barely begun it so this added complication on top of that is hard.
From your dads perspective it is probably a welcome distraction from the grief.
I actually would be delighted if my mum found a companion (lost my dad 19mths ago). And companionship from this lady might be a good thing.
Whatever will be, will be. It'll all play out. It doesn't mean your dad doesn't love your mum. Grief is a very strange thing.

Similar happened with FIL and his new partner - he introduced her to us six months after MIL died and had been seeing her a while then. My SIL was devastated and has never liked this lady. This was 14 years ago and they are still together and she has been a wonderful companion for him BUT he has never given SIL, DH or me the impression that this has in any way taken away from the love he had for MIL, he still has pictures of MIL at home and this lady wouldn't have been given a second glance had MIL not sadly died. DH and I just feel glad that FIL isn't rattling around on his own although it seems that SIL would prefer that. If it is any comfort I once read that people who have really loved have a huge capacity and need for love and so often move on again quickly when a much loved partner dies. Of course it does need to be handled sensitively though. Having said all this, I would have been shocked if my DM had met someone v quickly after DF died, so it's natural to be upset.

I think men tend to move on very quickly as they liked to be looked after but women will tend to remain alone once widowed after a long marriage

Logically, you know it makes no sense to be uspet. He loved her and obviously had a long, successful marriage.

The issue is that a mother cannot be replaced but partners can. You are conflating the two. He didn't love her less than you, but differently. And he is old, with little time left. Don't burn any bridges and just avoid it until you can cope civilly.

My sympathy JS it seems very quick. Perhaps as suggested, for your dad, she's a face from the past who represents the future and possibilities at a time when everything else is sad and bereft of your mum. Your dad can mourn your mum and simultaneously crave the closeness he had with her and look for a solution.

Tbh I don't think it's easy to pour cold water on this without damaging your relationship with your dad. Do you have siblings, how do they feel about this?

She could be a perfectly nice woman but you don't have to do anything you don't want to.

Difficult as the parents may have had these discussions among themselves and understandably would not have discussed with the children, however grown up. I'd be happy if my DH found someone to remarry if I died, in fact if I had a long term illness I'd prob be trying to match him up with someone I approved off while still hanging on :) He knows it, cos we've discussed it.

Our older parents are adults, they have lived longer than us, they had lives before us and after we moved out. As long as they still keep/improve their relationship with us then it's up to them. They are people as well (and before?) parents. Parenting is a long commitment, but once you're kids are adults surely you can be allowed to do what you like.

If your parents were married for 40 years, then you were lucky. There are people all over the country with dads shacking up with/marrying other women due to separation and divorce, replacing mothers of kids of all ages. You are not a child any more I guess so you can totally appreciate what it's like to be an adult with your own thoughts.

Perhaps they made a deal when younger that if this situation happened they would hook up? Doesn't mean he didn't love your mum any less, but if she's not coming back and he's not cheating, I am can't see that you can be anything other than happy for him. The woman may be lovely and make him happy.

katemiddletonsnudeheels Tue 10-May-16 09:25:53

"cory, I think people often say 'it is what X would have wanted' when they mean it is what they want, but regardless you cannot live your live dictated by what a dead person would have wanted."

well, if the dead person wouldn't have minded and the living couple would, then that seems fairly straightforward, though of course young children have to be considered very carefully

and ime some terminally ill people talk very openly about life afterwards

"However, if a man can't face up to and ask serious questions about what sort of woman swoops on them weeks after being widowed, then that's a concern.

In my experience, the man is almost always lovely - decent, genuine, sweet - and weak.

The woman is ruthless and cold underneath a concerned persona."

this does seem rather sexist and based on the underlying paradigm of man the provider, woman the gold digger

I agree cory.

I'm very sorry for your loss. I also completely understand how you feel. Pretty much exactly the same thing happened after my dad died (6 years ago now). My step mum (she married my dad when I was 10) is a lovely, youthful (for her age - she just turned 72), vivacious women and started seeing this bloke approximately two months after my dads death.
It was a bitter pill for me tbh.
However. He is also a widower. He was lonely. She was lonely and desperately trying to fill a void. Although it felt like it to me and my step sister at the time, he wasn't some vulture swooping in to peck at the remains of her life. He was a lonely old man who saw an opportunity and took it. He's a decent man - and I actually feel very sorry for him as he will always be 'second best'.
My step mum stays with him for the company, but he annoys her beyond belief, mostly because he isn't my dad. Hes not clever enough, wise enough, funny enough and so on. She fully admits this, but he's said he'd rather be with her and put up with it than be alone.

Except there are still adult children involved. They matter too, and he is still their father. Nobody is saying widowers can not get together with a new woman, but men could wait at least 6 months.

Sorry for your loss. Generally, men don't cope so well as widows. The old saying 'women mourn, men replace' has a lot of truth in it. When my mum died Dad got himself a girlfriend pretty soon afterwards (someone he'd known at the social club they all went to) and my sis was astounded. They didn't go so far as to live together or marry but I think we were all a bit shocked at the 'haste'.

I think the thing that's most troubling for the adult children is when their surviving parent opts out of mourning, is not available to remember the times they had together as a family, and goes merrily on their way. That's how it was with my FIl at any rate.

Sure, he'd nursed his wife through her final illness (though he hadn't done that with any particular compassion - he used to tell her with glee about all his plans for after she'd died). Sure, he felt the need for a bit of pleasure after all that strain. But a couple of weeks after she died he cleared out the family home without telling DH & SIL, chucked out all the family photo albums and all their childhood keepsakes, moved in with the woman up the road and never spoke about his late wife again. Any time his children tried to explain to him that this was hurtful for them, he accused them of 'living in the past', and then would put them on s the speakerphone to his new partner, who would shout and wail at them for denying their father happiness. This was not even a month after the funeral. It was awful.

I really don't think my DH's and SIL's sadness about this situation is wildly unreasonable or ungenerous. And I do think this sort of thing happens a lot and is a massive shock for the people who have no choice but to grieve, as they can't replace their mother.

Thanks.

I think first and foremost, it's the timing. My mum also died very suddenly and my dad had tried to give her cpr - there was no protracted illness first. We are/were a close family and my parents were happy together.
My dad has been accepting invitations left, right and centre; he wanted to go through my mum's stuff in the first week and is keeping ridiculously busy. I get that it's his way of doing it and am trying to support his way of grieving as best I can, even though it's so different to mine. If we were a year or two down the line, then him seeing someone else would be OK and preferable to him not being on his own if that's what he wanted.

Ironically, my dad had said a few days after my mum's funeral that he'd been told to be careful of widow-hunters and he thought it was amusing that this woman had contacted him the day after someone had told him that.

I'm struggling with the speed of my dad's way of handling it and other aspects of grief. I feel I'm struggling to find the time to grieve how I need to as I have an 18mo and a 4mo, grief compounded by my dad's way of handling things, along with my main support network (mum) also going. Whilst I want my dad to be happy, there is something my gut tells me is predatory rather than supportive about this woman. And almost desperate and shameless."Oh hello, I've been scouring the obituaries - how about I voice some fake concern and come and get my claws into you under the pretext of friendship. How about I stay in your dead wife's house whilst I do that? Great idea, I'll book a transatlantic flight.wtf?"
I feel torn between being unsupportive of my dad and disloyal of my mum. Mum would have wanted him to be happy, but she would've been fucking hurt that he's even entertaining the thought of this woman staying this soon.
Sorry, this is long.

Bipbippa - we must have been typing at the same time. That sounds like a horrendous situation and I'm sorry you've had to deal with that.

Why should old people be lonely and sad to make other people feel better? How selfish is that?

Stats tell us that the longer and happier a marriage is, the more likely a surviving partner is to marry again, and quicker. It's not disrespectful to be so lonely without your spouse that you want some comfort from someone else. After 50 years or more, you simply don't know how to be alone. And being alone after so long actually hastens your own death.

It's two months! Two months! Not forever - two months!

Yanbu but this is so common as to be something of a phenomenon.

I'm sorry for your loss

But he hasn't done anything except talk to an old friend? He's not getting married, he's not in a relationship, he hasn't even met her yet, she lives in another country. He has done NOTHING so far except re-connect with an old friend.

But obviously comments about not being alone were to others who said things like "if he had waited a few YEARS"...you might not have a few years if you are 70+.

Inappropriate, too soon - yes.
Weird - no. Happens a lot.
When my Dad was widowed a few years ago, he was warned by various friends (male and female) to watch out for the "women bearing apple pies". For some reason, he wasn't targeted by apple-pie bearing women - or maybe he just didn't notice! - but it's not uncommon for this to happen, apparently.

That's true.

In fact, it happened in my extended family - a man in his 50s lost his wife to cancer, and very soon, her cousin had ensconced herself in his life as a comfort, and eventually as his wife. To be fair, they're very happy together, suit each other - but it was still a bit of a "WTF?" in terms of the speed at which it happened afterwards.