How to Know if You Should Go to a Funeral
"I don't know if I should get or non."
My friend was facing a determination many of us have or will face — should she go to the funeral of someone she didn't know well?
On 1 paw, she hadn't seen the person who'd died for many years and had never met their family unit. On the other hand, mutual friends were going and had asked her to go with them.
What would you practice?
Unless the family states information technology's a private matter, funeral and memorial services tend to be open to anyone. Merely just considering you tin can get, does that mean you should?
For the purposes of this article, nosotros're going to focus on the broadly common secular funeral services held in Australia. If y'all're thinking about going to a funeral held with cultural or religious traditions you're non familiar with, it's of import to speak directly to the family concerned to piece of work out what's most appropriate.
The big question: Who is the funeral for, actually?
Scott Turnbull grew upward in a family funeral concern and worked as a funeral director for many years.
He'southward currently involved with a theatre product exploring the topic of expiry and funerals.
Mr Turnbull says, despite his experience with funerals, this is a dilemma he's faced.
"When my birth-father, who I never knew, died, I received a telephone call from an opposition funeral home … to ask, did I desire to be involved?," he says.
"I didn't feel that I needed to exist at that place, or wanted to exist there."
But when his siblings said they were going and they wanted him to be there, he decided to go to show his support to them.
Julie Lamberg-Burnet is the founder/director of a Sydney-based etiquette and protocol school. She says she found information technology very touching to see people she hadn't seen in many years plow up for her mother'due south funeral.
"We felt so good at the fact that people make the effort," she says.
Ms Lamberg-Burnet mostly thinks you should e'er go to a funeral if yous have the chance.
"I call back when you come away from a funeral where you were in 2 minds about whether to become, you always say, 'I'm really pleased that I went'," she says.
Leanne Orr is a civil celebrant in Hobart. She says while the focus of a funeral or memorial is the person who has died, the event is actually more for those all the same living.
"You're not always going for the people that passed away. Information technology's the people that are left backside … you're going there to back up them," she says.
Introduce yourself, only don't push to front and centre
If you're non shut to the family unit and loved ones of the deceased, you might feel like an outsider.
Turning up to what can be an emotional time and continuing around at the edges non speaking to anyone can brand the family wonder why you're in that location, and peradventure even make them slightly resent your presence.
Ms Lamberg-Burnet says information technology's best if you wait until the service is done and find a moment to arroyo the family, or a family member, and introduce yourself.
You likewise don't want to push button in and brand a big bargain of who yous are and why you're there — it's non about yous, it's most letting them know yous're non a total stranger, and you're there to pay respects, and so accept an thought of what yous can say, and keep it brusque.
For case, something like: "Hi, I'yard Ballad. I worked with Lucy for about five years. She used to burst into song at the near surprising times in the office."
If you're there to support someone but you never met the deceased, still innovate yourself and so the family know why you lot're at that place. Something like: "I'grand a friend of Graham'southward, he asked me to come with him today for support. That was a lovely service, I'm deplorable I never got the take chances to meet Lucy."
Should I have the kids with me?
While it depends on the circumstances, all three people we spoke with say children, even very young ones, should be involved if the funeral is for a family unit member.
"My response was always, if they're family unit and they're going to everything else, then it's entirely upwards to the individual, only I would not hold annihilation back from my [kids]," Mr Turnbull says.
Mr Turnbull worries that if you keep funerals secret from children they could grow up with a fearfulness of the unknown that makes it harder for them to deal with decease and loss later in life.
Ms Lamberg-Burnet says if you have a very young child or baby and you're worried they might disrupt the service by crying or playing upwardly, don't let that end you attending. Only make certain you're sitting somewhere you can popular out if you need to.
"Sometimes it's not always practical to attend with a baby or very modest children … [but] information technology's part of celebrating people's lives. The whole family unit are involved," she says.
I want to get, just I can't
Maybe instead of request yourself IF you should go, you're wondering if you Tin can go.
"My terminal [funeral service] I did, there's a was a big rift [between the family] going on," Ms Orr says.
Ms Orr says she's had quite a few instances where a family has told her they don't want certain people at the funeral, which she says is a "really tough i" to navigate.
If you know you'll upset people past going to a funeral, it might be worth reflecting on the reason y'all want to go, says Ms Orr.
If your motivations are to reconcile your ain emotions or to honor your personal connectedness with the deceased, but you know it could cause upset to others, it's probably best to stay away and find some other way to process your emotions.
Even in the absence of drama, at that place are plenty of reasons why you might non be able to attend a funeral: distance, work commitments, wellness reasons or maybe you just didn't hear of it until it was also belatedly.
Yous might non be able to take leave from work as generally compassionate and bereavement go out only applies if the death was of an immediate family member.
Ms Orr says you lot also shouldn't experience bad if yous're not able to go.
"The hardest question that families get asked by a funeral habitation is: 'How many people do you call up will nourish?'," she says.
"I always say to my people, the number of people that go to a funeral is no reflection on the person that passed away."
Mr Turnbull says some people don't experience the demand for a funeral service at all because they've had a full life with that person and have said all they feel they need to.
If you can't go and you want to show the family yous care, sending a handwritten card is a adept way to let them know, says Ms Lamberg-Burnet.
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In the terminate, information technology'south upwardly to yous
Anybody's life is dissimilar — so is their death and their funeral.
It boils downwards to working out:
- WHO you are going to the funeral for;
- WHY yous're going and;
- IF yous can even make it in the first place.
"It'south non blackness or white, and there is no right or wrong," Ms Orr says.
"Because you can honour that person in your ain way. You don't have to become, you know, simply to be able to sign your proper name [in the guest book]."
Posted , updated
Source: https://www.abc.net.au/everyday/should-you-go-to-the-funeral-of-someone-you-did-not-know-well/11551822
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