Autism and grief

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My grandmother suddenly died from a stroke while I was on vacation a few weeks ago. Tuesday was her funeral, and it wasn't easy for me.

As expected, many of the 15-20 people attending were crying, but I was not. I came close to it several times, but that was because I was stressed and overwhelmed by everyone's emotions and not necessarily grieving for my grandmother.

Some of my family members later asked me why I seemed unemotional; I explained my reason and they thought it wasn't normal. Like how am I supposed to grieve for someone I wasn't close to?

How do you respond to grief? I noticed that there aren't very many resources for identifying grief in autistic people at all, so I'd like to start somewhere.

My condolences Warrior.

Here are some resources I was able to find quickly for you, so you'll know that you aren't alone struggling with autism and grief. I felt the same way as you when my grandmother died. Public displays of emotion are extremely stressful for me and I have trouble with alexithymia or trouble accessing my feelings, even at the best of times.

Two people I love are struggling with bereavement and the stages of mourning, so this topic has been on my mind lately.




https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-gu ... fessionals

https://autismnow.org/blog/bereavement- ... hallenges/



"The book is an honest, first-hand account of how people with autism deal with the loss of someone in their life. Unlike the non-autistic response, people with autism, when faced with overwhelming or stressful situations, will favour solitude over sharing their emotions, tend to focus on special interests, and become extremely logical, often not expressing any emotion. This behaviour often leads to the belief that people with autism lack empathy, which is far from the case. Through the description of personal experience, and case studies, the book explores how people with autism feel and express the loss of a loved one, how they process and come to terms with their feelings of grief, and offers practical and detailed advice to parents and carers on a range of sensitive issues."



"Autism and Loss is a complete resource that covers a variety of kinds of loss, including bereavement, loss of friends or staff, loss of home or possessions and loss of health.Rooted in the latest research on loss and autism, yet written in an accessible style, the resource includes a wealth of factsheets and practical tools that provide formal and informal carers with authoritative, tried and tested guidance.This is an essential resource for professional and informal carers working with people with autism who are coping with any kind of loss."
(meh: I don't like that it's written for carers).

Well that's just it, we kinda can't.
Seems folks on the spectrum really value being genuine.
Being expected to perform in some way other than we actually feel, feels fake. Like being an involuntary actor.

I suspect if there is genuine grief, we grieve.
But it has to be real.

There’s no “right way” to respond to someone passing away.

Even neurotypicals grieve in different ways.

Don’t listen to anybody who judges you when it comes to how you grieve.

I've heard multiple times that everyone grieves in different ways and that there is no "right way" to grieve.

My dad and his brother (both NTs) didn't really cry at their father's funeral even though they were close to him. My dad did have a few tears when his dad was dying but he seemed OK at the funeral.

One time I went to a funeral to support my friend whose brother had died, and I had only met the brother once and I didn't really know him. But I still cried, for my friend, as she and her mum were really upset.

When my grandmother died I cried so much between the minute of her death and the day of her funeral, that I had gotten all that out my system by the time I attended her funeral, although I had a few tears at the funeral and felt comforted when people cuddled me.

When someone close dies I need to be around others to keep sane in the grieving process, which is why I think lockdown was cruel for people going through that. My friend had a son die unexpectedly during lockdown (not from COVID), and she was in such shock, that she subconsciously didn't care about COVID and had to physically be with her daughters for emotional support. If she hadn't have been, she probably would have got severely depressed and even take her own life.

The lockdown was especially cruel for people who died of COVID alone.

After my mother had died (she had been nursed at home for months, she had cancer) we all came together around her body. My sisters, brother and father cried, I did not. What I felt was relief, for her, that she was finally out of her misery.
Later, my psychologist told me my father wondered how I was coping with her death.
Two weeks later, her mother, my grandmother, died. She was in her nineties, seems fair, so why cry?

My best friend committed suicide some years later. I came close to crying, but it was mostly out of anger, as I felt his suffering had been so unfair and unnecessary. Also his family's grief hit me hard. But again, I felt relief that his years of suffering had finished.

Yep….people grieve in different ways.

I didn’t react all that much when my father passed away 2 years ago.