the burden of speach

[chhotii]

I have had the following irksome experience a few times now, mostly at the memorial service (which is to be expected), but also at other large parties:

Some acquaintance, not well-connected socially-- a socially awkward person-- approaches me and says "Alex, I am so, so sorry." And looks at me with eyes filled with sorrow. Sometimes they go on to try to talk about some aspect of how tragic it all is. Then (as is typical in human interaction) they expect some response in return that is somehow relevant to what they said and the feeling that they are expressing.

And I'm like-- what now? How am I supposed to react to this? What am I supposed to say? Not "yeah, thanks, probate sucks and cleaning out a house after a hoarder dies sucks"; because, I think, they are mourning Rich, not my suffering per se. Not that I haven't but... from my perspective, the person I knew disappeared about 3 years ago, so I am in a quite different place about all this. Also, I have had weeks to process.

Your sorrow is intrusive if it comes out and wants to hang out together with my sorrow. My sorrow can't even begin to explain where its head is at to your sorrow, and therefore wants your sorrow to STFU and go away. (N.B.: I don't mean "you" literally here. People who read my LJ are clueful enough about my life to not do this.) This is actually the current #1 thing giving me pause about going to Baitcon...

If we were any other species of ape, we would sympathize by grooming each other's fur, which would be far preferable. Normally I'd rather have language than fur, but not in this case. Actually, I'd rank a massage as the #1 thing I would prefer. Still haven't had the Round Tuits to arrange a massage; back worse than ever, grr.

Comments

I understand.

[taura-g.livejournal.com]

It is perfectly OK to say:

"Thank you, but I don't want to talk about that (or him) right now".

It is not your responsibility to help other people with their grieving process...even though many people may act like it. The only people you need to worry about are you and your daughter. Everyone else can go pound sand.

Unfortunately, you will probably run into more of this and I have found that just stating "I can't/won't/don't want to talk about that right now" is the best way to just head it off. The very rare person who doesn't respect that much deserves whatever anger is needed to get them to go away.

Re: I understand.

[taura-g.livejournal.com]

The above response is assuming you don't want to engage in further discussion.

[tb]

Yeah, those not very close or clueful people are often the hardest to deal with as they make it all about them. It's okay to cut them off after the initial expression of "I'm so sorry" with something like, "It really has been hard and overwhelming but Sophia and I are getting through it thanks to all the community support we've had. I know you'll understand that I really don't want to talk about it more right now, but thank you for your sympathy."

If they persist, "No really, I just can't talk about this any more" and disengage. You can totes walk away from someone that clueless.

For Baitcon, maybe a buddy system can help? As in, ask a few people to help run interference if needed. That's the kind of social grooming humans do pretty well.

[tb]

... or what taura_g said while I was typing.

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

If you like, I'll pick imaginary nits out of your hair the next time I see you. :-}

[rmd.livejournal.com]

OOK OOK OOK OOK

Every grief is individual

[drwex]

You have every right to set the boundaries you need.

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

I can occasionally be socially awkward, even sometimes not on purpose. I might choose to start saying, "I appreciate how the loss of Rich affects you, but, really, probate is a bitch."

:)

This may, however, not work as well for you.

I am, however, sorry that other people are causing awkward circumstances for you.

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

other people are hard.

have you gotten in touch with ron hod? last i talked with him (last month) you and he were mutually trying to arrange for a massage....

i don't do massage proper, but i'm pretty good at kiatsu, and would be delighted to do some if you like. (it is the hands-on-feeling-better aspect of aikido.)

[achinhibitor.livejournal.com]

This seems to be a general problem in life. But it's a subset of the situations where people want their emotions to come and hang out with your emotions. As far as I can tell, the way to deal with it is as a formal situation; you're not trying to achieve actual communication (and perhaps they aren't either). "Yeah, it's hard ..." covers a lot of territory.

[quietann.livejournal.com]

Hm, this is a tough one. No, you should not have to deal with others' issues, and I like some of the tactics others have offered.

In fairness to everyone, Rich's death and your role in his life and what followed doesn't fit with the standard script. Many of us will just reflexively say, "Oh I'm so sorry" and then (hopefully) realize later on that it isn't the right thing to say to you... but is there any right thing to say to you? "I'm so sorry" would be better directed at Sophia, but she's too young.

If I ever said that to you (and I am not sure I did), what I really meant was "I'm so sorry you're having to deal with this mess." My primary feeling about Rich's death was and still is anger at him for the choices he made.