grief and funerals

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This is a little morbid, maybe, but I don't seem to cry at funerals or in the funeral home or anything. Or I didn't, at least, when my grandfather passed on years ago. I used to spend time thinking about how I would react if someone even closer, like a parent, were to pass on. Could I cry? It bugs me now because I have a very ill parent. Is this normal??? I just don't know that I am really one for the public tears.

i dont think its abnormal, everyone reacts differently, i have to thought about how i would react to a close death in the family and honestly i cant see any other reaction than numbness. when my cousin died i had a tough time feeling much, that worried me but i did not know her very well really, i felt sad but i was not greiving, i dont know if that is cold or not, but its best not to dwell on what you may or may not feel, no one knows untill it happens.

and public crying is not something i would like either, but i am english.

It takes a lot to make me cry in general, so even when someone close to me dies, I'm not going to be very shaken. (Anger is a much more common emotion in me than sadness.) And whenever it comes to people who I wasn't close to, I won't pretend (like everyone else does) to be too grieved.

It's no surprise, then, that I avoid going to funerals. When it's someone I wasn't close to, it's just a bore, and I don't know how to put on the mask of fake sympathy that everyone else wears so well. When it's someone I was close to, I don't want to be there because I don't want my last memory of that person to be the sight of them dead in a box.

Of course, it makes the people I know think of me as a callous a-hole, and I got an earful of it when I refused to go to my grandmother's funeral, and later when I didn't go to the funeral of the guy I dated for awhile until just before the car accident that killed him. NTs just don't understand, and never will.

I don’t cry for the big stuff. Just the dumb little things.
Even then, it’s easy to stifle if I really want to.
I used to worry about it. I don’t any more. This is normal for me.

Once in a while, when I think I need a good cry, I’ll put on some corny old Elvis music.
Something that goes way back to your childhood, so it cuts deep.
And I sing along, right through the stupid tears. It sounds terrible.
(Not recommended if anyone is in the house.)

THIS. I only seem to be able to cry when I'm communicating my emotions on trivial matters. Usually, I smile instead (when I'm surprised or in a situation where smiling is considered inappropriate).

I don't cry about things like that either. I was told that those with ASD have emotions (obviously we do), but they are just expressed differently than NTs. And from my experience, they apparently feel different as well. I don't get all emotional all the time about things that it seems I am supposed to be emotional about. However, small, seemingly stupid things set me off.

I do have an unusual reaction to deaths. I didn't feel anything when my pet, my grandparents (didn't have much to do with them anyway) or other distant relatives died.

When I was 14 my father died. For weeks, the only thing I felt was numbness. I did cry a lot, but it was an automatic reaction. My brain couldn't make sense of the situation. After that, I developed a massive depression - mainly because my mother became depressive and everything was so grey and bleak suddenly. But it took even longer until I actually started grieving for my father. I still think I didn't feel as much grief as other people would, and I sometimes feel guilty for that. I actually had a good relationship with him, and he was a good person, but I hardly remember his face anymore.

When my adopted mom died, I did not cry at all. I did suffer effects later on in life that did cause me to cry. Same with my birth mom; did not cry at all. We all handle situations differently and never be sorry if you did not cry. Some people including myself want people to celebrate their death and mourn over it.

I hate crying in front of other people. My boyfriend is more comfortable with his tears than I am, so that's actually helping me to be able to cry in front of him.

Grief is so weird. I've had friends freak out on me when we were both grieving for the same person, and I wasn't acting right, or grieving properly, or whatever they wanted me to do that I wasn't doing right.

Even when I'm really sad, there's always that really logical part of me that remains in control. Some people don't know how to handle this. I'm really tired of those people.

I am glad to hear that I am not the only one. And that I have a place where I can ask these questions without having to actually consult family, because that would be rather weird and heartless for them, I think. I am not sure how often this happened, but people used to ask me why I did not look worried or sad or stuff like that from time to time. When I felt it.

This, in an odd way, is quite reassuring to me, as I often feel things. But I just get on about the business of living.

Some neurotypicals don't cry in public either, especially men. If you lose someone, you grieve in your own way. For me that is usually a feeling of something wrong, something missing; like when my routine gets thrown off and I can't figure out how to put it together again, only it doesn't go away if I just get things straightened out. It doesn't make me cry. I can't even really call it "sadness"; a better term is simply "distress"--almost more physical than mental. Grief is very individual. If you lose someone, you're already going through a tough enough time without being hard on yourself about how, exactly, you are dealing with that loss. Just because you don't cry doesn't mean you didn't care about them. For me, tears are an impulsive thing--frustration, especially at myself, will cause them. Grief and loss, I experience in a much more quiet fashion, only crying if the impact of this unwanted, unpleasant change actually pushes me into a meltdown.

If you're autistic you shouldn't have to be forced to do things "the normal way", if that's not the way that works for you. That goes doubly for something like losing a loved one. Don't ever let anybody tell you that your reaction is invalid or doesn't count or isn't the right way to react. You've already got enough on your plate without having to worry about playing NT.

I didn't cry when my great aunt died (I was 11 so I was told I was too young to understand death), then my grandfather died and I still didn't cry and I got told the reason is because he was already dead to me, he wasn't the same grandfather I knew growing up because he couldn't take care of himself and he had Alzheimer's so his memory was gone. Then my grandmother dies today right after midnight and I still didn't cry and the reason this time is I was prepared for it and expecting it and she already was gone because she also had Alzheimer's.

But how would I react if it were my own son or husband, I know I would be very upset. What if it were my parents? Maybe upset because if one of them dies, we lose the house because we have less income and we wouldn't be able to afford to pay the mortgage anymore since we both split our bills. Too much change and too much to do so it would be very stressful.

I used to cry at funerals as a child but I'm not so sure I have anywhere near the emotional range I did then. I would assume that if anyone in my family died a natural death I wouldn't be the least bit sad, on the other hand if they died an unnatural death I can't even predict if I'd be sad or angry or some combination of the two.

Hello,

I just was at a funeral of a relative. All my relatives looked so sad when we were at the church, but afterwards, when only all the relatives met at the dinner, they didn't seem so sad at all. It just surprised my how their appearance changed from so sad to ... well its all ok... - according to their appearance. I would have liked to know how the appearance at the church was influenced by external factors, and how much by internal ones......

anyone, who also was surprise by things like that?

anton

I am not. People like a party and time to talk too. I guess that is all part of the process, at least for some people.

It even mentions in my Children's Society notes that I expressed no emotion when my primary caregiver, my Grandmother died, and the only person I ever felt close too, my Grandfather, I still remember my mother telling me whilst we where on a train together, that he had died, and I wondered why I didn't even feel sad about it.

I was devastated when one of my Lovebirds died however, maybe its because Iam older now?