Grief Grabbers-why do they do it?

[PerryPerryThePlatypus]

There was a death in dh family just before Christmas, a much loved uncle passed away suddenly. Funeral was held a couple of days before Christmas.
At the afters of the funeral there was a screenshot of a post by someone who met this uncle maybe twice at the most (she married dh cousin and they moved away didn't keep in touch etc) being shown to family members. It basically said how am I going to get through Christmas knowing Uncle X is not here anymore. RIP I'm heartbroken.

She never even sent a card or came to the funeral. Just a rant.

My sister loves a funeral! Well, more the wake afterwards. She's often 'too busy' or 'working' when the funeral is on but will usually find time for the wake. Doesn't matter how well (or not!) she knew the deceased. So long as there's a link no matter how tenuous, she's there. Except she usually 'can't find a baby sitter' so 'has' to take the kids. And has been heard on many occasion to say to her DC 'eat as much as you can....saves feeding you later'. If the opportunity arises, she WILL take a plate of food with her for later or 'saves doing DC a packed lunch tomorrow'.

You shouldn’t moan about not getting to attend the funeral of a close relative you haven’t bothered to make contact with in over 15 (more like 20 probably) years.

I fully agree.
I often think when DM goes, would I be bothered to tell family she hasn't seen in decades. She has lots of sisters she is the quiet one, so has been treated badly by a couple of them. I don't think I would want them to turn up, I'd be even more annoyed if they grieved on FB.

My mother died last year, after a very long, very painful illness. She was bedridden at home (though had frequent bouts of hospitalisation) for the last nine months and visitors were her lifeline to sanity.

Her 26 year old granddaughter - whom my parents had undertaken a great deal of childcare of when she was growing up - did not visit her once in her last two years. She lives about 500m from my parents' house. On several occasions her 9 year old son was dropped off at my parents whilst she went off and did her thing - and she didn't even enter the house at drop-off or pick-up, but sat in the car.

After Mum died, she posted a weepy-waily thing on Facebook (my nephew, her half-brother, told me) about how distressed she was and "couldn't cope".

In the last 18 months she hasn't been to visit my dad - not once.

Ooh joining in. Dearly departed DFil's family washed their hands of him after his divorce as he slid into ill health, leaving his 20-something sons to support and care for him. Then they tried to make DH delay the funeral-which would have meant nearly a month in the big fridge-because it clashed with an uncle's holiday.

Oh god I went to a funeral for a group of people I know from a hobby, and two of the women burst through the doors in the middle of the service, 20 minutes late, wearing wigs and stiletto heels and then cried for the remainder.

So crass.

Oh (and this is outing) there was a cousin who wailed through the whole thing...but because her horse had died and she was reminded of it. it was so out there DH and DBIL actually managed to laugh

@Yabbers- because, as I explained she would’ve needed to be picked up and taken home, plus looked after at the funeral because she is unsteady on her feet; she didn’t know my mum- they lived in different parts of the country, and my DH wanted to be there for me after the sudden loss of my previously fit and well mother.

We lost our step-grandfather a couple of years ago (I'm fine with it - he'd been at the point of DNRs and then bounced back so many times we were pretty relaxed about the inevitable by the point he did finally decline and die) and my poor stepfather who had done ALL the to and fro to hospital daily for months and months through various admissions (like I say he'd been at the point they thought we'd lose him a fair few times) and had been the one doing daily visits to him in his sheltered accommodation flat when he was out of hospital, and my mum who'd basically had the whole family social calendar arranged around who was going to bring him and feed him cups of tea and cake - they took so much shit from the two superficial facebook obsessed grandkids who let the poor guy down constantly when they said they might pop into see him and never came, then finally rocked up to the hospital after a month and a half and spent the time doing selfies with him in the background... oh my God the facebook whining and ranting how they were the only people who'd ever cared about him and rushing to loot through his belongings so they could take photographs of little mini shrines of the things "he had given them they would treasure forever" that I know full well got put away 10 minutes later as they didn't fit with the interior decor in their houses. Lots of thinly-veiled digs at me to as I was "only a step-grandchild" and apparently didn't do much for him - I was the one who lived at the other end of the country and actually took my kids to see their great grandad to the point they had such a tight relationship with him that he often started commenting on them having the "family chin" as he'd completely forgotten about the step thing himself!

Now we're getting the FB memories of it all as well - all done just to get social media likes and validation - they're young, they're still very superficial, and they're just more than a bit pathetic. I cut the pair of them off over how they treated my step father over it all - he ended up not having any chance to grieve over the loss of his own father from the dramatics of this pair.

People liking to go to funerals has always been a bit of a thing though (no idea why - I hate funerals - I'd rather remember the person living myself) - my nan and her friends used to pore over the local newspaper death notices for anyone they remotely knew in order to have a nice little outing to the funeral service and that wasn't an unusual thing in our neck of the woods when I was growing up.

I do have a friend who is forever missing trains though as his general punctuality is appalling - and he's managed to avoid being in two major rail crashes as a result of his habitual lateness. We still give him shit over his timekeeping.

I've experienced this

About 5 years ago my social group experienced a shock death which impacted everyone in really different ways as situation was complex

But one person, REALLY tried to make it about THEM in a very crass and embarrassing way, and that was the turning point for me in how I viewed them personally

I've had the same recently, a friend died and it was all over Facebook as that's how we all found out about events we are interested in but one newbie who met him once is making it all about her, about how he used to phone her up asking how she was etc (I doubt he did-he was a nice person but not a saint!) it's ok for her to be sad about it but stop competing!!!

Nothing to add except I hate this too.

I know someone who literally claims to sob into her pillow every night after the death of a pop star several years ago, and she posts stuff on facebook EVERY day about him. Like her grief was bigger than anyone else's. I loved this star too and have all his albums, and cried when he died. Still think about him now sometimes, and still play his music. But I don't garble on about him on facebook. Attention seeking weirdo! I had to unfollow her in the end!

I had a friend who did this about someone who died who she knew from a hobby, he died on his stag do abroad but she had never really mentioned him before but then posted continually about him for a few years after but then tragically died herself

We're having similar at the moment. BIL passed away just before Christmas, DH has had messages from former colleagues (of his, not BIL!) asking about the funeral and saying they'll take time off to be there...um no, you won't. You never even met him!
MIL is barely coping, DH and his other brother have asked/posted on FB/texted everyone saying please give her some space, it's what she wants just for the next few days until New Year is out of the way, and yet people insist on calling her and wailing down the phone about how devastated they are and what a terrible Christmas it's been. She has lost her son. Just take one second and think about how much worse she must feel.

I’ve got one of these on my FB right now, and it’s a doozy. A girl has been tragically killed six miles from where we live. It’s in the national papers so big news. Grief thief has posted duck faced selfies in front of the floral tributes left for the poor girl, captioned “heart broken at the loss of x”. Someone asked how she knew her, and she replied they went to the same school.

The poor kid that died is 18, duck faced dick head is 42! Yup, they went to the same school alright, 25 years apart .

People are so weird.

My brother died as a teenager 12 years ago and up until maybe two/three years ago his peers would post long whining ‘I miss him so much’ posts on Facebook on his anniversary. None of them ever thought to ask how my Mam or I was feeling or how it felt seeing that plastered over the internet. They’re the kind of people that if we passed in the street would put their head down and walk away quickly.

It’s all for attention.

I do agree that it is an awful thing; I have no idea why people do it, really - maybe there'd be an interesting thesis in it?

I am not normally a grief grabber, but when my favourite author died (Robertson Davies, a brilliant and funny Canadian) back in the late 80s, I did feel that the world was a smaller, darker place without him in it, and also very upset that I could not look forward to the pleasure and anticipation of opening a new publication of his. I wandered a bit aimlessly in this grey world for a few days. Didn't cry though and there was no sm, or even internet as we know it to post on and get whipped up by.

That’s very sad animal. I hope there are others who do support you both.

A young friend of mine died in tragic circumstances a few years ago. People still post on her fb to show her family that she’s still thought of. I did it this morning because it’s a significant date. Just a few kisses to let them know she, and they, are in my thoughts. Sometimes people post a memory of her too, but on her page, not their own- so the only people who will see it are her family and friends. I assume that her family are ok with that because they keep the page live- they often like the posts too.

A few years ago a neighbour told me, in a very dramatic fashion, 'Nobody in this village will miss X more than I will.'

Er, except perhaps X's daughter, who was still living with X and caring for her in her house two doors down from you?

We call them grief perverts in my group of friends. We have family friends and their dad died last year. It was a competition to see who was most upset culminating in some serious keening and wailing at the funeral. They now bring it up at every family event such as a wedding and make everyone uncomfortable. Yes it was very sad their dad died but the over the top grief was painful for the rest of the family and his friends

The other one I wanted to mention but I pressed send too soon is tragedy vampirism/tragedy wanking, when grief isn't there yet but grief is a possibility

See the recent thread about the sportsman and his ill child and the OP who wanted to support and discuss, but knew very little about the man and couldn't spell his name. It wasn't that she wanted to support this man it was that she was feeding off his tragedy.

Do you know it's weird but I always feel the opposite at a funeral - I can be genuinely upset but I always feel that my grief must pale into insignificance compared to the direct family. I think when my Gran died (who I was very close to) my mum made it all about her (even though there were lots of siblings) and I felt guilt for feeling so sad as other people had it worse iyswim. The same has happened with every death in the family - i just feel like a fraud - I'm not drawing attention to myself or putting anything on social media but I just feel that I don't have as much right to be upset as everyone else.

My ex-BIL is a total grief junkie. Goes to every funeral of anyone he has the smallest link to. His Dad's neighbour, bloke who drunk in his local, his Aunties best friend (who he never met) and a neighbours niece (again who he has never met).

Now, when we hear someone had died, we immediately ask 'Is BIL going to the funeral?'

My sister does this. Any accident, serious illness or death happening to anyone remotely connected to her is all about her. When I had chemo I discovered she was telling her friends and colleagues how stressful it was for her and how much she was having to deal with. She visited me twice in that six months!

Have to agree about the Diana effect.

I was disgusted by the national display of undignified, attention-seeking ‘grief’. And can quickly turn to condemnation and self-righteous anger - of anyone, especially those who don’t emote enough.

That’s why I’m wary of grief parasites. They’re usually nasty, not just selfish.