DS (21) Refused to go to grandmother's funeral

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, when I was in college (10+ years ago) I missed my Granfather's funeral. I regret it to this day.

Thing is, I could not go. I had a shitty job that I may have been able to get out of for the weekend. But I learned about his passing five days before the funeral, and learned the date of it three days before. It was not possible to suddenly drop everything and fly down on such short notice.

Luckily, my family was very supportive. My grandmother told me, when I called to offer my condolences, that she completely understood I would have been there if I could, but she planned the funeral so quick afterwards for a reason (so she wasn't mourning for a month until it happened, and it could be over with).

It didn't mean that I "didn't fucking care" about my grandfather, I loved him. It didn't mean I didn't regret not being there, I still do. But maybe cut your son some slack? The fact that so few of his cousins showed up suggests to me that maybe there was more to this then just him saying "Fuck it." Maybe they didn't have much notice, or maybe his/their relationship with his/their grandfather as you thought.

To cut financial support seems like a drastic action to me.

OP, you really need to read the above post. I would wait until your anger and grief calms and then think about the situation. If you still want to cut support, then do so. Maybe it would be best for other reasons, but not so sure missing the grandparent's funeral is one of them, if most of the other cousins didn't come it sounds like there was some kind of disconnect happening there--either among your siblings and their children or the cousins and the grandparents.

I've been treated so badly by my family after my DH missing a family funeral that I pretty much wish now that I had not shown up. If you cut financial support over this issue, your son may not come crying back to you like you want. It may just create a permanent rift and he may be just as happy to go his own way.

Pp, you are projecting the dysfunction of your own family onto OP's. There is no indication that their relationship is so bad that the son would cut off all contact after this incident.

OP is clearly very angry. There's no way that's not going to bleed into their relationship.

[Anonymous]

Op, we don't know your son.
We don't know if he is a good guy.
We don't know if he loves his grandmother, or respects you.

We do know that missing a funeral does not prove anything.

Many of us have made that decision.
And have not regretted it.
We love our family. And we are loved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here:

Thanks to the people who said kind words.

The cousins are not off the hook. I think most people were appalled at how few of them showed up. I know it really saddened my father, who planned the funeral expecting that of course their grandkids would show up.

I've let DS know how much his actions hurt both me, and more importantly the rest of the family and he has just repeated that he couldn't get off work.

Honestly, after talking to DH I think we will be lowering the level of support we give DS as he finishes up college. If the money from his job is more important then his grandma's funeral, I guess he can use it productively.

(Before everyone jumps down my throat, he has the ~10k from his grandparents in a savings account, plus more then $3000 in his personal account, so he is not going to be homeless. Plus a couple hundred in cash, at least, according to him).

Wow, I hope your relationship with him is strong enough to withstand this.

I suspect it isn't, though, or this wouldn't have become such a big issue to begin with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here:

Thanks to the people who said kind words.

The cousins are not off the hook. I think most people were appalled at how few of them showed up. I know it really saddened my father, who planned the funeral expecting that of course their grandkids would show up.

I've let DS know how much his actions hurt both me, and more importantly the rest of the family and he has just repeated that he couldn't get off work.

Honestly, after talking to DH I think we will be lowering the level of support we give DS as he finishes up college. If the money from his job is more important then his grandma's funeral, I guess he can use it productively.

(Before everyone jumps down my throat, he has the ~10k from his grandparents in a savings account, plus more then $3000 in his personal account, so he is not going to be homeless. Plus a couple hundred in cash, at least, according to him).

Wow, I hope your relationship with him is strong enough to withstand this.

I suspect it isn't, though, or this wouldn't have become such a big issue to begin with.

Wow, do you assume a lot, pp!