To ask you to ‘Destroy without reading’? (Bereavement related)

[Izzy24]

Would you?

So if you were coping with clearing personal belongings and you came across a package marked as above, would you respect that person’s privacy and dispose of it without reading? Even if it was unsealed?

I would 100% read it!!

I have a locked bag in my bedroom which my best friend has promised to destroy. It is full of sex toys so not exactly unexpected just gross for anyone else to find!

having had to go through deceased relative's belongings after their deaths you really need to look at any paper for documents that might be needed to handle the estate.

Not sure where the idea I’m offended comes from?

"Whether you “need” to read the diaries is not the point; I and many others would like to have done regardless of how you feel."

Emphasis: mine. Implication: displeasure and offence. I had nothing to do with the destruction of her diaries, so you've no reason to be displeased, offended, overjoyed or whatever it was that made you in any way concerned with how I feel about it.

You asked.

We aren't entitled to the journals. I'm no fan of Hughes as a poet or a person so I'm not inclined to think sympathetically towards him generally. But I can understand why he might not have wanted the diaries leading up to the suicide of his children's mother to survive, and why the interest of the outside world might not, for him, have outweighed the cost to his family.

Yes, I guess!

I mean I never spent much time thinking about this before but I honestly had never thought people might do otherwise then asked.
Been a useful thread then I guess ;-)

No you misread it entirely. “Regardless of how you feel” referred to the fact that you didn’t “feel the need” to read the diaries, whereas others would like to.

Whoever said we were “entitled” to read the diaries? Clearly not. I understand why he didn’t want the diaries to survive, I just don’t think they were his to destroy. Equally there are ways to preserve them without allowing the children to see them at least until they were adults, but even in their lifetime if he felt necessary.

I’d look. They’re not going to care, they’re dead.

Had this with my now ex-H's father. Terminal diagnosis and rapid death meant he didn't have the opportunity to clear out his business premises. He told ex-H he should burn everything on first floor without looking. Of course he looked.

There was a dark room and some grim photography of a woman. Said woman also appeared in photos with a child. Turns out ex-H had seen his father with this woman years before and it appeared that FIL had a second family. There were loads of financial documents with odd payments etc to support this.

I found a big envelope with 'do not open' written on it after a relative died. I kept it, it was the last thing I had left of them. The last thing left to know, if you like. It was a bit like keeping them still with me. I have read a few of the papers inside it so far, but not all. They are full of that persons inner thoughts and some stuff that is pretty shocking, but I knew them enough that it hasn't changed my view of them or love for them - just given me a little more of them than I had when they were alive. They probably wouldn't have wanted me to read them, but they're dead, it's not going to hurt them now and I'm alive and it helps me. Weirdly the nosiness I have in all other areas of life was mostly absent here - I've had them five years now and have read less than half the papers!

I'm childless.

And don't you think that information should be public?

Haven’t read all the responses but I would definitely check the contents. All other considerations aside what if somehow the thing in the envelope isn’t the thing the person intended you not to read anyway. What if they took that out and destroyed it ages ago and then absentmindedly put something else in the envelope. If you find something that’s private and maybe would embarrass your relative for others to read it will be apparent very quickly and you can destroy. Particularly if it’s open I wouldn’t be able to get rid of the thought it could just be mislabelled and what if it is actually important.

A very direct woman on the edge of my social circle was sadly widowed at a young age. She came to a catch-up, which was unusual for her - in order to ask how she should recycle the sex toys she had used with her late hubby.
She shared her thinking, at some length that she wouldn't be comfortable using them with anyone else ... even the ones that hadn't been inside him.
Keep your friend close.

@lurkish what did I just read?

There were around fifteen or twenty of us there when the Scandinavian woman made her earnest request for advice. I'm glad that she got closure - we weren't so lucky.

Scandis are much more open about sex than the British 😆

Get someone you trust to watch the video first and if it's a guilt trip they can advise you not to watch it - at least leave it for a couple of years.

I'm glad that she got closure - we weren't so lucky.

@lurkish LOL! I'm not surprised.

what advice did you give her? freecycle? the neighbours? keep them as a momento? bury them in the garden with a little memorial?

We had an interesting time going through my dad’s things. Nothing marked private don’t read. But lots of folders of papers dating back so far we sent them to confidential waste - bank, pensions, house purchase documents etc. we kept relevant things. We also found his porn stash and just laughed and binned. My sister was expecting to find it. We found diaries but not the journal type. He kept obsessive notes about eating and drinking and whereabouts. We kept them in a box and didn’t read.

Yes I have a letter like this & I'd be devastated if someone didn't respect my wishes

But those examples are not people who had wanted the stuff destroyed?

My Mum died unexpectedly so she didn't label her diaries. I did look at them. I don't understand why she wrote them. They say things like 'went to the work, then dentist. All fine'. I would love to know why she wrote them.

I honestly don’t know, I wouldn’t destroy it though I would put it somewhere safe and have a good think about it.

I wish i could say I wouldn't read them. That is definitely the ethical thing to do. In reality I'm too nosy

Definitely destroy, it could be someone’s diaries that they have kept for years, some people put their most personal feelings in those, which they wouldn’t want to share.

Not even gonna pretend ….id look 🤷‍♀️😂