My husband just speaks and I want to put my fingers in my ears

[ilovetoloveyoubaby]

First off, I respect people's right to voicing their opinion but sometimes I wonder why people voice certain opinions.

I've just had a conversation that turned into a rather heated debate around people grieving.

His words were "people grieve for far too long for people"

I countered with the fact that I think it's a ridiculous statement and you cannot put a time limit on someone's grief. He conceded that grieving for a child is different but other wise people need to pull their socks up and get on with life. I'm now sitting watching television wondering what and who I married.

AIBU to think what he said is just plain strange and horrible.

I agree toast

Badders your dad sounds wonderful - and your whole situation eerily similar to mine. My dad was wonderful, another one of the good guys and everyone loved him. He still worked incredibly hard running his business (his work clothes, hanging up in his room when I got there, still haunt me), and he died of a heart attack in front of my mother and oldest brother when he was 69. My brother performed CPR.
I was very lucky to have been spared that and my heart truly goes out to you because I know how awful it was for them too.

No need to be nasty op, are people not allowed to disagree without threat of their entire MN history being wheeled out?

I've been grieving for over 20 years, so obviously i don't agree there should be a time limit.

But wondering 'who and what you married ' in response to his musings, does seem ott to me, but, whatever.

yes isnt it horrrible when people grieve and bother others

i lost my mum 10 years ago this december-she was 57 diagnosed with cancer 6 months before

its all a bit of a blur b ut in another way like a horror film nightmare-ive never got over it never will and until op husband has lost someone close to him he shouldnt have an opinion-or maybe he just wont feel grief because in his own words u should ge ton with it

Everyone should be able to deal with death in their own way. Apart from him apparently. He's doing it wrong

That's not what she's said, though. He can deal with it in his own way; the problem is he's criticising how other people handle it.

I am sure the people on this thread who are grieving for losses years on, are also simultaneously "getting on with life".
Though I have seen widows (well one widow) who visited the grave daily and talked of nothing else even when other people suffered losses - they did not get on with life at all. Others grieve but also (eventually) rebuild their life and move on, while always holding their loss with them of course.

That's exactly it strange

I'm sure I can be a hypocrite about a great many things in life but I'm pretty sure I'm not being a hypocrite about this.

I've watched people I'm close to grieve for various people in their lives in vastly different ways and it seems ridiculous to me to tell them that their grief should have come to an end by now.

And badders my heart goes out to you. My dad is still alive but he is just the loveliest man and I'm not sure what would happen to me if I lost him. The circumstances in which you lost your lovely dad are horrendous. I do hope you find some peace one day. I also hope it's helped a little bit to be able to talk about him on here.

Can I ask for a bit of context without getting shouted down?

You said up thread that he lost his grandparents recently? Was the conversation started by that?

I can just imagine that this went something along the lines of you questioning his (lack of) grief and him defensive stating that people grieve for too long.

Which, if you had questioned his apparent "heartlessness" would be a snap back I would do. I would never really think that or question others who grieve but I wouldn't want to defend my own apparent lack of grief either.

Neither of you have lost anyone really close, it was a stupid comment. Unless there are other issues here where he is always cold and evil then I think some posters are ripping him to shreds needlessly by potentially exaggerating the issue.

OP my rule to live by is the saying that somewhere between your truth and their truth is the actual truth.

Sorry for all who are grieving and have had this jarred by the thread.

He doesn't really understand what grief is does he? I think only once you've been through it can you begin to comprehend it.
I was quite blasé about it all before my dad died and only then did I truly comprehend loss. It still hurts, I don't think anyone ever 'gets over' something like that they just become different people for it and that loss is part of the new them.

I do understand what he's saying, to an extent. I think he's referring to the kind of protracted, all consuming grief that seems to affect some people, where every waking thought, action and conversation is dominated by that state, and they never seem to move on from it. It's not easy to understand unless you've been there.

I used to work in a mortuary. I was much younger then and it skewed my attitudes towards death and grieving quite significantly. I was largely detached from it. I could acknowledge others' grief, and make the right noises, but because of the work I was doing I personally couldn't afford to get overly invested in one person's death. The job played havoc with my mental health as it was, and I couldn't seem to empathise with the emotions of the people in mourning, because I was so focused on the 'procedure' of death, if that makes sense.

I made a lot of mistakes with grieving friends and family over the following years. I had to relearn a degree of compassion for the living, which sounds awful when I look back on it.

As others have said, he probably hasn't experienced a major, life changing bereavement himself. Maybe it's fear talking, maybe it's ignorance - who knows? Maybe he feels like opening himself up to grief would somehow make him vulnerable, and ultimately remind him of his own mortality. Or he may just be an unfeeling shit. It's a complex issue.

Toast...thank you. How awful for you too. Yes...I'm glad my siblings weren't there (but of course they feel guilty because they weren't!)
Op...I love to talk about him :) he would be horrified of course :)
Iggi...that's my mum sadly. She is stuck.
Btw, for all those grieving I really recommend a book called "you'll get over it:the rage of bereavement" by Virginia Ironside.
I found it really helpful, especially as it deals with the less acceptable and less edifying aspects of grieving.
I never thought I would be capable of the boiling, visceral hatred and anger if felt after my dad died.
Grief can surprise you.
I hope it doesn't surprise ops Dh and he copes as well as he thinks others should :(

I'm with WellErrrr.
It's his opinion, he didn't air it in an inappropriate context , he told his wife.
It's an opinion I can relate to as can my husband so we are a good match in that we are both stoic and we aren't naïve , we've had plenty of loss .
Are you really angry with him?
I was hesitant to post until I saw that you wanted to show him the thread and then reading your response to WellErrr, well it would be cowardly of me to say nothing knowing I agree .
I honestly don't think your dh has done anything wrong .
I hope this doesn't drive a wedge between you it really doesn't warrant it.
I don't know how to name change so feel free to check my posting history if you want.

Yes.
And it upset his wife
Ans she came into a support forum for support.
What is it you dont understand?

jackie I'm far from naive but I really think it to be an odd opinion. I doubt it will drive a wedge between us but it did make me think that he is a but heartless to say such a thing. I told him I hoped to god he never repeated it to anyone who was grieving for someone.

So what exactly does it mean, to be "stoic"?
Because as I said earlier, that just tends to be how it goes in the UK.
Someone openly and publicly grieving would be a rare beast indeed.
We all carry on. We all have to. But I would have been desperately hurt if my DH had suggested I should have "moved on" a few months after my mother's death, when I was in the crying phase. Although I did mostly do that privately.

I'd also like to add that I'm not ripping my husband to shreds and given some of the posts about people's husbands on AIBU I think this is pretty tame. He's a brilliant dad and a great husband. I was taken aback by that comment last night and wondered what other people thought.

Well going by the response to your thread op I think it must be an odd opinion.
I'm a bit startled to be so much in the minority.

I think grief is up to the individual. But I also think to start a thread entitled "my husband just speaks and I want to stick my fingers in my ears" is really rather OTT. Do you want us all to bash your husband and tell you how emotionally switched-on you are? I disagree with what he said, but I think your posting style is overly histrionic.

We'll have to disagree then tooextra I actually posted to find out the opinions of others.

Probably wouldn't be histrionic if you were grieving and someone said to you that you had to pull your socks up.

I dont think im any more emotionally switched on than the next person but I was taken aback by what my husband said.

Also....have you read half the threads on here? This pales in comparison to some of them in terms of "histrionics"

"Stoicism" is an Ancient Greek philosophy.
My aunt (who died) was what I would call a stoic. In the months it took her to die I never heard her complain once. Not once. Not even when she could no longer swallow and was vomiting blood.
But you know what?
She cried when my dad died.
The first time I'd seen her cry in all my 40 years.
What the actual fuck has being stoic got to do with anythjng!?

Too...have a gander at Aibu if you want histrionics! :)

Grief is absolutely up to the individual, and no-one can really foresee how it's going to affect them.
I always thought I would be in a terrible mess when my parents die, and my DH predicted that I'd be "beside myself" with grief.
My Dad died 3 weeks ago, and I feel a bit sad. Nothing more. The odd weird thought that I'll never set eyes on him again, but pretty much nothing.
I had a little cry on the day he died when DH hugged me which lasted for all of 10 seconds. My chin wobbled at the crematorium when the curtains closed on him. Other than that, nothing.
This is not at all how I expected to feel, or how DH expected me to feel, but it's what's happening. Perhaps it'll "hit me" later on, but I really don't think it will.
I'm actually wondering if I've got some horrible coldness about me?

As for the OP's husband? He was expressing an opinion which he's entitled to do. Did the OP come on here for support with her comment of AIBU to think what he said is just plain strange and horrible.? No, she asked a question for which there have been many answers. Perhaps the OP's husband has only experienced grief like me? I expected to feel terrible but I don't, so perhaps he's projecting his experience onto others and therefore can't quite get his head around long term grief.

My DH says things sometimes that makes me but we agree to disagree and I certainly don't wonder what and who I married.

I hope everyone here who continues to struggle finds peace eventually. Not to forget, but to come to terms, to live and to carry on.

Girl....I cried more at my aunts funeral than at my dads.
I think the reason was I was so concerned with mum, and my siblings, and doing the reading I wanted to do....I just sort of did "head down and get through it" really.
No right way to grieve.
No right length of time either, which is the ops point, I think?

Badders No right length of time either, which is the ops point, I think?

Exactly!

My DH just can't get his head around the subject of depression for instance, and quite often says that people ought to just "snap out of it" berk But he literally has no understanding of what it is or what it's like, and so will come out with stupid things like that. Perhaps not so much lately due to many years of me giving him THE LOOK Maybe the OP's husband is a bit like that with regards to the subject of long term grief? After all, we're none of us cut of the same cloth. I think sometimes it's a lack of thought before actually saying something. At least he didn't say it to someone who has been bereaved, but just to the OP.