Funerals

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Last summer a much loved family member died and although I was upset I felt completely unable to go to the funeral.

The thought that so much emotion would be shown by those I care about completely freaked me out and made me feel very uncomfortable. I guess I wouldn’t of had a clue how to handle it

On the day it self I was quite ill so had a genuine excuse not to attend but I did cry for a while when I was by myself and that was it.

Is it just me that can’t cope with big displays of emotion like that?

Most people find it very difficult to cope when people they care about are grieving or overcome with emotion. I think it pretty much accepted that people often don't know what to say or how to react in those kinds of situations.

Having said that, as a minister I have conducted over 60 funeral services in the past couple of years, and have attended a few as a mourner, and I would say it is extremely unusual for people to become very emotional at funeral services. People might get a little teary-eyed and sniff a bit, but usually that's it.

I've always managed to avoid funerals and I dreaded the fact that I will one day have to go to one.

I don't want people to see me emotional and I don't want to be seen as the heartless one either. I would have no idea how to react to all the emotional people. I wouldn't know how would be appropriate for me to act.

I have dreaded most of my life having to attend a funeral and am lucky I have avoided them so far. I feel very selfish for worrying about myself when someone has died but I can't see the point to funerals, I am sad the person has gone, I will really miss them but I would much rather cry alone than cry in a room as a group.

I know exactly what you mean. The things is though I have been to 3 funeral before this one but they were for people I didn't much care about and and I didn't really know most of the people there anyway.

I guess it was not being able to handle the displays of emontion from people I cared about, as well as being ble to handle my own emontion that stopped me going to this one.

Does anyone else have a simular funeral experience?

I never know how to act and what to say at funeral. All the emotions are so overwhelming. And it's even worse at the funeral of someone I loved. The worst was the funeral of my grandfather. I loved him very much but I do all my grieving in private. So when I went to the funeral I was literally unable to express ANY emotion. And I saw all the people watching me and expecting me to be grieving and crying and etc. And I just couldn't do anything. I was standing there in a corner all awkward and strange. And someone even said that I didn't love my grandfather enough to mourn him. I felt so awful. I did have a huge meltdown then. All that experience was horrible.
Somehow I managed to act "more appropriately" at my grandmothers funeral a few years later. But I still find it all extremely hard. It is already horrible enough to lose someone you love and then having to deal with all the people and their judgement... That's just awful

I'm usually the one who's doing all the crying and than the rest of the people are looking at me. It's strnge being the only one in the room crying, but that's just the way that God made me.

I get very emotional at funerals. When I go to one. I usually have to, because they are a family member/friend, or a friend's family member. I always have this sense that I have to go, because it's the last I'll see that person. When the loss is great, like a close family member, I want to be there to mourn them and be with them as long as I could. I hate the social interaction, and the loss makes the interaction worse, but I'd say I express too much emotion. I usually try to suppress it so I don't get others crying too.

I know how you feel, a couple of years ago my grandmother died, I wanted to go, but I know I wouldn't be able to handle being in the same house as the rest of my extended family (who are all very outwardly emotional) for a whole week... fortunately someone had to stay home and take care of the dogs, collect paychecks, and other stuff like that. It gave me a chance to process it on my own, I could mourn in my own way without relatives crying all over me, and I didn't have to deal with them getting mad at me for not crying too.

The few times I've had to attend a funeral I would hang around to back and crack jokes with my cousin or sisters.

I didn't go to my father's funeral, so I can probably be put in the "eviler than thou" category, if it makes you feel better
I just couldn't imagine doing it. I had a sort of mental block , I couldn't go, I would have had to be dragged there by the hair if people had really wanted me to. Too much emotion, too much faking it from people who never cared about him while he was alive, and what would he care if I was there or not ? He won't be here to check a list of people who attended or not. I was there when he died, I was still too numb to think, and there was no way I was going to go through anything emotionally disturbing so soon after.

It was the too much emotion for me, I just couldn't cope with it.

Am sure your not evil or anything for not going to your fathers, I know for fact, when the day come. hopefully many years from now, I will not be able to go either.

Funerals are a frakked up ritual. The person who is dead doesn't care, they're gone. The people who are living and were close to the departed are at their lowest point, emotionally....so they get put on the front row, on display or something, so everyone can watch them cry and be in emotional torment. That is so messed up. I've never understood funerals, they seem cruel.

I find funerals overwhelming, almost like I can physically feel all that emotion radiating off of other people. I do tend to get upset and cry but it's not out of sadness on my part. It's a reaction to the overwhelming sensation of everyone's else grief.

Even here, that still sounds more than slightly crazy.

Any big overwhelming emotion in a group setting does the same - group stress at work, etc... Oddly enough it works for positive emotions too but the overload was just as real.

I find my lack of emotion to be more of an issue.
I don't cry at funerals, I find death complexing, not really sad.
The exception is when pets die, for some reason that gets to me.

During my dad's funeral everyone kept coming up to my mother and saying 'Isn't she coping well' which made me want to scream at them as I couldn't understand how else I was supposed to be acting, during my best friends funeral as I was the one seemingly not emotional it meant I was having to support everyone else, and during my cousins funeral I was just freaked-out at my mother crying and aunt fainting onto me - I hate my family, their emotion didn't move me, I just didn't know how on earth I was supposed to act.

I sound cold, but by the time a death finally sinks in enough time has passed that I can deal better with it, the problem of death comes from the constant occasions in the future when you remember they're not there any more, I struggle to get my head round that idea. I just dislike that others think I'm so strange for not acting like they do, and not having that whole empathy with them to share in their grief.

My dad didn't have a funeral service when he died. (He didn't really have a permanent address when he died, which made it difficult for my brother and I to get his ashes--it's a really long story). But, I never actively pursued tracking down his remains and probably would have reacted very similarly to you, had there been a memorial. So, don't be hard on yourself. People mourn in their own ways and shouldn't be judged for doing so.

I know exactly what you mean!! It does not sound carazy at all. I can really relate to that.

I was supposed to go to one last weekend, but I completely skipped it without any reason. I feel like a jackass for doing that, but I didn't really know they guy. He was in my circle of friends when i first entered a 12 step program, but it took me years to really become close to anyone in the circle - and by that time he had moved across the state.

I should have gone to support my friends, but I'm not dealing with the idea of death very well right now (for reasons I won't go into now). I panicked over the thought of being the only one there that didn't stand up and say anything - as happened at the last funeral I went to where I was close to the person who died. I just couldn't control my emotions and couldn't put my thoughts together in any coherent manner.