Is grief an excuse?

[ostrichneo]

If someone has recently and suddenly been bereaved, can they be excused for lashing out and physically hurting someone?

I just want to clarify, no one has hurt me and I haven’t hurt anyone. I just know about the situation.

Both sides have told me their side of the story. The one who was hurt just wants to move on and forget. The one who hurt them is struggling with a whole host of emotions.

I just have no idea what to think or do. So far I haven’t really ‘done’ anything. Not really sure what I can do. I’m struggling to decide if grief is an excuse for their behaviour.

So, I wanted to get other’s opinions but didn’t really want to ask anyone I actually know.

YABU - grief is no excuse
YANBU - grief is/ can be an excuse

Yes, the relationship between the two is father and son.

The son has a history of SEN. They require a lot of patience and understanding as they can be quite full on.

The father was sober at the time and rarely/ never drinks. They do have a short temper but have never lashed out at a person before.

No. When my husband suddenly died I certainly did a few things I regret but never ever was it physical violence. I was sad, angry, overwhelmed (my kids were small).
Lashing out can happen at any time with provocation but there's no excuse for it.

What @PinkSyCo said. Never an excuse.

Well there’s no justification that makes physically assaulting someone acceptable however grief can completely consume you and drive you to do things you’d never think you would.
I was suffering with traumatic loss a few years back and the anger I felt was all consuming, I was not a nice person to be around. It did not escalate to violence but I can’t say that given the “right” circumstances it might not have. I was in extreme pain and I was filled with rage. I’d basically lost my rational and normal mind.

We tend to think in a strange dichotomy: Either someone has done something very bad, or they face difficulties that amount to an excuse and therefore what they did wasn't (so) bad.

The reality is that always, always, when a bad thing is done there are causes, difficulties, etc, behind the action. Always, always, there is value in compassionate understanding alongside judgement .

Of course grief may be among the causes of this person's action. Grief does all sorts of different things to people. In the situation described in the OP, it is like the victim and the perpetrator each hold one side of the ideal reaction to what happened -- one is understanding, the other judgemental. But each of those does not exclude the other, and it might possibly be helpful for them if they could find a way to blend their reactions.

OP I'm going to he really, really honest.. by removing the power dynamics from your first post, and by describing the son's (your son's?) SEN and him being 'quite full on' - it seems like you're trying to justify the father's behaviour?

What is it that's stopping you from being able to draw a very firm line on the sand and saying 'that was unacceptable'? There are no grey areas here, a child was assaulted. What message are you sending to the child by entertaining the idea that this assault may have been justified?

Grief can certainly mean you don't have a stock of patience and understanding to give. Not an excuse but a reason. And, if this is the case, then steps need to be taken to ensure that set of circumstances don't happen again.

@LakieLady so sorry for your loss. are you on the list for Cruse? Also not an ideal solution but if you can afford it I found monthly counselling helped me (it was all I could afford at the time).

No it's not an excuse. I'm assuming the one being violent is not the only person grieving. Others will be too and can control themselves from getting physically violent. If someone behaves like that, grief or not, they need to sort themselves out. That type of behaviour should never be accepted nor grief used as a reason to physically assault a child.

To be Frank, no.

Grief can be a reason for behaviour, but it doesn't excuse it.
I tend to give people a lot of leeway when they're grieving, but it's important that they own their behaviour and apologise for it afterwards.

If I am honest I don’t have the best relationship with the father. However, the circumstances around the death was horrific. I feel for them but the whole situation has left me very uncomfortable.

I have spent a lot of time with the son since and I have explained that what the father did was very very wrong and their father should have never done it. The son however always sees the best in people and as far as they are concerned they have forgiven their father and that is that.

I am asking for opinions because quite frankly I don’t always trust my own judgement. However, you have all helped. I am going to encourage the father to seek help and keep an close eye on the son.

No, grief is not a good enough excuse to violent towards a child with SEN
No under any circumstances.

The child loves their father, and will always forgive them, especially the first few times but he needs your protection op. I would be stopping contact until the father has a handle on his emotions, can be trusted not to lose his temper and when things have settled down.

Grief can mess with your emotions, but never to the point of violence.

And it the violence is uncontrollable that person needs to make sure they are never in a potions where they can hurt someone.
But uncontrollable violence is something else.

Grief creates a lot of fear, and fear often creates a fight/flight response. It’s not an ‘excuse’ to be violent, but perhaps there can be a bit of understanding around it. A person who is grieving can sometimes feel completely out of control. I always think it’s a little bit like being pregnant. You have all these things happening to you, and emotions running through you, and sometimes you say or do something and you are as surprised as everyone around you that it happened.

It’s perhaps one of the many reasons why bereaved people tend to isolate.

(My job is working with bereaved people).

If it was a one off then I think it's healthier to move on than to keep telling the son what a bad person their father is. Rehashing it isn't going to help anyone and makes it less likely they'll tell you if it happens again.

Also lashed out as in hit once and very remorseful and lashed out as in gave him a beating and feels bad but says it was DSs fault are very different

What a noble son with such a might and forgiving heart.
What does the father have to say on the matter?
Has he shown great remorse?
The short temper is a huge concern and personally, I would be really thinking twice about having your son alone with his father, who is coping poorly with his grief.
Look, none of us cope well with grief. We're not meant to. But the worry here is that the boy's father has shown that his response to grieving can be a violent one. It's impossible to tell whether or not this is a one-off event or the start of a very poor habit as a result of his inability to handle grief. His grief is a cycle. This isn't finished for the father. How safe is he going to be over the coming months?
What sort of therapy is the father going to do to ensure he is a safe parent?

Depends on so many things, really. Pushing someone away to get them out of your face and accidentally hurting is a lot different to cornering them and clouting them.

You described the circumstances around the sudden death as ‘horrific’ - which makes me think the person might be suffering from traumatic bereavement.

My DM suffered from it after DF suddenly collapsed and died in her arms. So called ‘typical’ grief is overwhelming and terrible, but traumatic grief is like a combination of grief and PTSD, with flashbacks, obsessive thoughts, huge amounts of anger and a host of other symptoms. It changed DM utterly and was very difficult for her to cope with (I came close to losing to her).

So grief isn’t an excuse so it can be a reason, as other people have said. It’s very possible that the person involved needs a lot of support, medication, counselling etc.

It can be, yeah.

If you've ever known anyone in the midst of grief then you'll know it can entirely change a person, for a period of time or forever. It would depend for me on the person's character in general and their prior behaviour. For example my husband has never been violent towards me, nor have I him. But if one of us lost someone close to us in a traumatic circumstance and in the heat of the moment slapped the other, I like to believe that as a one off with the circumstances taken into account we could move past it.

You put it better than I did.

And you're absolutely right, if it was a traumatic bereavement and the person has symptoms of trauma that often comes with anger, irritability, loss of control of emotions.

It can be a reason. Is the son still a child or an adult? Was it an actual attack or a push/shove?

How is the father acting now? Has he taken full responsibility, admitted what he did and is he sincerely remorseful? Or is he hiding behind the grief and pretends he did nothing wrong/nothing happened?

Grief does weird things to you...

My mum wasn't physical at all, following the sudden death of my dad. But right up to a year on from his death, she definitely said things, and acted in ways that were completely out of character for her.

That being said, there is absolutely no excuse for violence.

When my dad died i also lost my mum. She changed from a strong loving mum to a self centred selfish woman. Don't get me wrong she came back after about 2 years but it was hard. We got through it though

Is the son a child or an adult? 2 men squaring up to each other and one lashing out is vastly different to a grown man striking a child in my opinion.