To think grief is sometimes self-centred, more about identity than loss?

[MourningMirrorOtter]

Some people seem to fall in love with their sadness. AIBU to think grief sometimes becomes performance when healing threatens attention?

I don't think grief is performance. Loss and grief is shattering. It changes you, sometimes forever.

I think a good example of what you mean is Queen Victoria, who made her whole life about grief and mourning after Prince Albert died.

OP, posting about grief and loss was always going to make people think you were writing about a dear loved one, not the pet hamster.

There is actually a name for it - prolonged grief disorder. Grief is a natural, healthy response, but its not considered typical for severe effects to persist for years.

Solidarity to all in the shitty club.

At the risk of being accused of being performative or engaging in bereavement top Trumps, I would like to share that since 2020 I have lost my Mum, my DP, several friends, and this year I've lost my Dad, my MIL, my Uncle and three friends within three months of each other.

My DP was well known in our community, so my grief was "shared" so much by others that I almost felt embarrassed to be upset myself. He "belonged" to so many people you see. Which I was told to my face by someone who had been close to him for a long time. We'd only been together 11 years, so of course I had to defer to those who'd known him longer. (Sarcasm btw).

Society gives us the identity of grief on top of the profound actual rearrangement of our being, because it's not just the actual loss, it's secondary losses, home, income etc et that all change everything, plus the labels - you're "the widow" and gere are a list of tropes and expectations that go along with that which only reflect what people think you should be doing, not how you actually are.

I don't even know what I'm trying to say here tbh.

Probably a more polite version of "ODFOD" to anyone who hasn't been through it to whatever degree and doesn't get or care that every situation is unique and personal. It's almost pointless even talking about it I think.

I've come across as much performative stoicism as I have performative grief. Ultimately what we think or feel about how someone else is dealing with their lot in life won't change their inner turmoil or landscape, it might just isolate them and prevent them from seeking any kind of support, living half lives to appease others sensibilities and avoid judgement and useless advice.

Ultimately it's exhausting. But never mind eh? Chin up.

Hugs and presence and patience. That works a bit.

Quite honestly I would just be the same as you always have with them. The beginning everyone is out wanting to support, wanting to know all the details and go to the funeral. But most of them don't check in after. People swerve you when they see you because they don't know what to say. Make a note of the firsts, all those dates that would have been celebrated and remember the anniversaries and check in. Little things like that mean a lot.

We're weird about grief in the UK I think. I prefer it if people act as normally with me as possible. But I know im safe around them, if I'm feeling wobbly.

I was expressing how what OP has said (which I didn't think was about people pretending they missed the Queen or posting on social media, but about people taking "normal grief" too far) struck me. But it's ok for you and I to read it differently.

That is such BS (the diagnosis, not you). When my child died you really think profound grief lasting beyond a year is abnormal (because that's the definition)? It's not. It would be abnormal to not still be very lost in grief after the one year mark. In fact, pretty much every bereaved parent I known (a lot since I had my own loss that made me meet lots) found the second year harder. If you think there's something wrong with that, you lose a child and see how you're feeling after a year.

Someone could also suffer delayed grief which means their grieving process could start years later, so that it's fresh at that time for the first time. With that kind of loss, severe effects can last forever. We just get better at hiding it from those who haven't been there (and who, if they're lucky, never will be).

I'm so very sorry you lost your parents when they were both so young. That is very hard to bear.

Caring for very elderly people is incredibly hard. The knowing there is no happy way out but not knowing how long it might go on for. A day, a year, ten years? The uncertainty, the continual, slow decline, the slipping away of the parent you once knew, absolute frailty, a different low every week and the guilt of a bit of you wanting it all over for their sake and yours.

I am at an age where several of my friends have extremely elderly parents. Their lives are on hold because of it and the grief comes in drips not a wave. There is also the fact that if you are in your 70s and your parent int their 90s your entire life has been tied up in them for so very long. You are old yourself before they are gone and perhaps your resilience is on the wane. It will be another loss in a lifetime of losses. The net closes in.

This isn't to minimise the appalling pain of losing someone at a young age (I have experience of that and it is brutal) but to point out that all grief is grief.

Absolutely. I function, I make it to the end of every day, I do interesting fun things....but I will never be happy again.

This shows a common fallacy about grief. The intensity never fades. Someone told me, after my DH died, that grief comes in waves. As time goes on, the distance between the waves may become greater, but the intensity remains the same.

How do you judge what is 'genuine' grief? There is no 'correct' way to deal with loss.

I will never get over the loss of my child. I doubt that any bereaved parent ever does. I am certain that is normal.

I am so sorry for your loss. I am nearly 10 years on. I am living with it, but my son is still my first thought in the morning and my last at night. It is a new way of living. I hope you have people around you to support you.

The bereavement board on MN is a good, safe space.

My mother died suddenly (car wreck). It was over twenty years ago and I still will sometimes cry in the shower.

You know what, the way this thread has been posed has really pissed me off.

I get that AIBU is the place for challenging discussions but honestly this subject matter is so broad and sensitive I do wonder at the motivation of the OP.

Making grief one's identity my arse. Once someone has died, everything has changed. You just can't pretend it hasn't. Even if you go the route of "we will never speak of this again" and starching the upper lip, there's a bloody great elephant in the room.

We live in a commodified and solution seeking world which serves some people well and not others - neither is wrong if it gets people through.

But that's what it is - getting through, aware that as a bereaved person you are a source of pain, awkwardness and embarrassment if you don't conform to other people's expectations, which brings extra layers of guilt and shame on top of the likely complexity around the actual loss.

When you love someone deeply, whether their loss has been expected, or sudden, it's out of your control, but the "coulda, woulda, shoulda" is for the majority a strong feature, despite resilience (ugh, I loathe that word) or rationality. For many it's utterly conflicting, throws up existential crisis, and becomes part of who you are.

The framing of the OP suggests we have much more choice than we do, because our loved one's death was not our choice, and that's the foundation of every choice going forward. We can't identify ourselves out of our grief, it's now part of us. How it is expressed is also dependent on so many factors - as I said before, society projects notions of performance upon us, and sometimes we can't even identify the roller coaster of emotions that we experience, let alone script the correct "performance".

I can be functioning relatively normally in a social setting while inside I am physically "fizzing" with anxiety. I can hold normal conversations while my internal dialogue gives me unwelcome subtext because resonant with one of my experiences. I can support others going through stuff that is similar without making it all about me, but internally I'm bracing the whole time because having an inkling of their pain is challenging.

We're sociable creatures but we've lost so much actual connection in the noise of psycho babble and superficially, that such fundamental experiences as loss and grief are, have been somewhat reduced to processes and systems. But we're not robots, and I think the biggest reason many people struggle so much is because when they can't comply, they think there's something wrong with them when actually they're just in a deep and unwanted and unfamiliar pain.

And each loss hits differently, so you don't just find it easier each time, the reverse can be absolutely true.

So if anyone else has a sour taste in their mouth, and are feeling even more unsettled on their "grief journey" (Another ugh phrase that makes my teeth itch) please accept a hug, and know you're not alone xxx

You’re right that it’s part of identity because some of us lose a part of ourselves when we’ve had a significant loss. For example my identity and who I was changed drastically when I lost my mum, dad, brother and step dad all in the same year. I wasn’t the same person. But to say it’s performative seems quite insensitive? Grief holds no time frame, grief never truly leaves, grief can creep in just as hard a decade down the line as it did at the start. It can be isolating, because we don’t want to be the “downer” of a group gather. And posts like this reinforce it. I’m sure you mean no harm and it could be a poor choice of words, for some people the comfort they receive during the grieving can almost feel like a replacement for the things they’ve lost and sometimes that can be hard to let go of too, but overall I would say YABU 🙃

I certainly think some people enjoy the drama of weeping and wailing publicly over the deaths of celebrities they didn't know. And some people who have major main-character syndrome like to create a bit of drama around themselves and attract some attention over the deaths of people they weren't very close to, and act as if it was their tragedy, rather than that of the deceased's spouse / kids / close friends etc.

There are a lot of toss pots on MN and you have to wade through some incredible shite some times.

Then along comes a post like @MistressoftheDarkSide's (14:27) and you remember there are some brilliant and wonderful people and things to be found on here.

Oof, thank you x much love ❤️

This is a horrible post. Grief is different for everyone. The people you're calling out are suffering complex grief. Unimaginable impact on their lives.

I lost my DH nearly 3 years ago, and it’s been unbearable at times. I’ve pushed through it, and I’ve never needed attention.

But, until you’ve walked the walk, you have no idea. 🙄

@Brightbluesomethingwho are you to say what is “genuine grief”? There’s no right way to grieve. I have experienced the death of several close friends and relations, and I think they’d be disappointed in me if I spent my time grieving instead of living. Of course it hurts like hell, but we will all die and we don’t get to choose how.

It's an interesting concept. I lost my husband to a brain tumour in 2012. He was 50, I was 48. I grieved but got on with my life. When I was 54 I met a man and fell in love. My mum was horrified I had taken my wedding rings off. 'But you're a widow" she said. From that moment I realised she was telling all her friends how tough my life was because"she's a widow" and the fact I was getting on with my life was detracting from her narrative.

She came to like him very much and was happy for our wedding. She sadly died 3 and a half months later but she missed out on my joy so much by saying this.

One of the last conversations we had was her telling me how kind my new husband was. It did mean a lot.

I'm a very pragmatic person. I was widowed and went back to work 8 weeks later. I recconned if my son could sit his highers then I should be back at work. Grief is hard but you can sink or swim. I chose the latter.

I think you are very lucky not to know about grief Op.

I lost a teenage DC to suicide 6 years ago. No one knew anything was wrong, so their death was like a grenade going off in my little world.

It is not something I will ever ‘get over’ or forget.

If you met me irl you wouldn’t know anything was wrong.

I work, I socialise, I smile and I go on holiday. On the surface everything is normal. My mask is firmly in place in public and for much of the time in private.

However I am a different person now. I keep going for my other Dc, but I think about my loss every day. I feel guilt and anger and sadness.

I talk about all of my children to friends and family. Most of them can look forward to many years together with their kids and that is as it should be. All I have of my lost Dc are memories and I am pathetically grateful when someone remembers their name or talks about them.

Am I the sort of person you are taking about?