To think the behaviour of these mothers is shocking and they bloody well deserve a slap?

[SassySusan]

Message deleted

Firstly as a general comment I have to say I'm not totally comfortable with the idea of 'whatever gets you through' if whatever gets you through involves hurting other people either verbally or physically. Even in the depths of grief we retain certain responsibilities.

Op - in all honesty I don't think the circumstances you outline - meeting mums who knew you when Catherine was alive was ever going to be an easy or positive experience. It's just too raw and they could have read every book and every website and they would still in all probablity have fucked it up because so much is a knife to the guts for you at the moment.

Clearly the woman in question should have avoided the holiday/nice weekend remark but it's hard to avoid that sort of thing because it's in common currency all the time and even with the best will we make mistakes. I got 1/2 way through a story enthusing about a new arrival in the family recently before I remembered I was talking to a woman who had an ectopic and failed IVF. That wasn't great of me - but that's humanity. We mess up sometimes. You are right to expect a lot of us. Supporting the bereaved is so important and we are very bad at it - just don't expect universal perfection because it's just not possible. I'm sorry about that.

Oh, I don't know. The thing about grief that I realised is that it's utterly unique to the griever.

When we found out that dd1 was going to die, we actually went out and spent a stupid amount of money on comedy DVDs. Even typing it I can imagine people recoiling from the idea - if you'd told me I was going to do that, I'd have been horrified. But we needed to - needed to not face the terrible abyss we'd just been flung into, needed to not be in our heads if at all possible. And it helped. Sounds shallow and horrible, but it helped.

And yes, we booked a holiday. And we went. And it helped. It helped to be away from everything and everyone and just to be us, together, being heartbroken, in a sunny place. It started the healing process, and I still recall it as a wonderful holiday.

Am I shallow? Didn't I love my daughter enough? I don't think so; 5 years later I can still feel the pain of her loss as if I'd just ripped open a wound, but I learned a lot about myself, for good and ill, through losing my baby. No-one could get anything right for me - my sister had the temerity to be pregnant and I could not speak to her. People offered to pray for us - I raged inwardly at them and their god. People sent flowers - I tore them to pieces and threw them in the bin. People came to visit - I raged because I didn't want to see anyone.

I don't even know what point I'm trying to make. I look at me 5 years ago and feel so sorry for that woman, so sad for her pain. I don't regret how I dealt with it - I don't regret the rage, and the screaming, and the DVDs, and any of it - I needed to do what I did. Ultimately, I think that's all you can do.

just to back up aitch a little, I believe I also know one of those friends, and she herself described the trip as a holiday.

I struggle with what to say, my very best friends father killed himself and I can't remeber some of the things I said, I'm sure I said some awful ridiculous things. She said she liked us to moan about our problems because it made her continue to feel included in the world which generally felt like a very strange and awful place.

I do always try to say something, and I've never been aware of causing offence, but I may well have I suppose.

Oh, Habs. I am so sorry. Thank you for trying to explain the unexplainable, in such an eloquent way.

I agree with LeQueen. We have all had those moments of foot-in-mouth where we have said something inappropriate, realised and then felt terrible about it. It is hard but we should then take a deep breath, apologise for the comment instead of laughing nervously and buggering off, never to be seen again.

This is inexcusable, not the insensitive comment itself but the persons conduct after the comment is made.

I am so sorry for your terrible loss Sassy.

My sister had a stillbirth a couple of years ago. I tried very hard to do and say the right thing. My experience of infertility helped, a different loss, but still a loss. Still, I didn't always say the right things, & she told me. I'm glad she did. Frankness helped.

Sometimes she said herself it was impossible for people to get it right. Still, the onus was on us to try, not on her to help us do so. Some people need to try harder. UANBU to expect that.

If this happened to a friend or local acquaintance I hope I would offer practical assistance as needed, & an opportunity to talk, if wanted (but not pushed if not wanted.) I would try to take the lead as to what was wanted from them. I wouldn't run away. I would try to avoid crass comments. But I could only try, I can't promise that I would always say the right thing.

Personally in grief/ crisis I always hated the 'nothing I can say can help'line - I always thought 'well bloody well try'!

Again, I am so sorry for the loss of your precious daughter, and for the dreadful losses experienced by some of the other posters on this thread.

I hope you're ok, Sassy and this thread hasn't made things worse xxxx

i hope that too.

i think that sassysusan needs to log out now as she is not in the right frame of mind to communicate with anybody right now.yabvu.

Sassy, do others in RL know how angry you're feeling? Does your DH? How is he coping through all this?

dexi - out of order my friend, out of order.

Sassy made an error by putting this thread on AIBU....AIBU is never a great place to be.

shabba i don't think that aibu has anything much to do with it tbh. it would have been a provocative post wherever it had been placed.

i HATE the expression " sorry for your loss"
its an americanism i first heard on NYPD blue
its anodyne and meaningless

dexi???

I didn't find her posts provocative. Thought provoking, yes.

of course she can post wherever she wants, i didn't say anything different. but this is provocative, most of us are being addressed by it as we most of us have not lost children and have struggled with trying to say 'the right thing' when comforting (or not) friends.

fwiw re topics i read all posts with the same mindset, whcih is 'what is my opinion on this?' i never know what topic it's in, i see most threads in active convos and tend to try and avoid aibu because i think it's the worst of mn.

not in this instance, though. i think everyone is being most reasonable.

and yes, 'sorry for your loss' pissed me off when i had my ectopics. should only be said by dennis franz.

But her posts weren't really about us and the awkward things we might (or not) have said to grieving relatives/friends/etc.

I know that Sassy can post wherever she wants but like you Aitch I think the AIBU often brings out the very worst part of MN.

The anger and rage Sassy is feeling is supposed to be 'normal' - I hate that word 'normal.' Eventually after many years of trying to get through stuff myself I went to see a psychiatrist. He explained that anger was a very natural result of bereavement. I remember being angry with every last single person in the world.....a few weeks after my son was killed I came face to face with the man who had reversed his lorry into him. He was with a gang of lads and very drunk. I just stood and stared at me and then they all started laughing.

I.....did....nothing!!!! I was so shocked to see him. Myself and my DH walked outside and saw one of the lorrys that these men had been driving. We both got our keys out of our pockets and silently scratched the lorry till we couldn't scratch it anymore....childish????? Yes unreasonable???? probably. Knowing what I know now I would have lashed out at him.

look, argh, am uncomfortable discussing sassy in this 'does she take sugar' style but basically she was calling us all cunts, so that's provocative in my book. but let's not get caught up in that, she can call us all cunts if she wants, because right now we can take it.

dexi what are you on about? Sassy has been perfectly able to put her point across on this thread. Even when other posters disagree with her on this most sensitive of subjects, she has kept cool.

Pretty rare on an AIBU thread where flouncing and passive agression are the norm.

Did you mean your post to sound so patronising?

Because it really did. Pat the poor old bereaved loon on the head and tell her to go aand have a lie down till she feels better.

fuck no shabba, not childish or unreasonable. perfectly valid and completely measured under the circumstances imo.

Aitch, you are totally right, it is uncomfortable to discuss sassy's intentions.