Am I overreacting

[Anonymous]

To be fair, OP did post that her SIL has been a jerk to her in the past

I didn't see where OP said she'd been a jerk, just clueless. I'm sorry OP can't focus more on them showing up rather than the photo.

[Anonymous]

This is insensitive. Also, why were all your husband's siblings at your mother's funeral?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is insensitive. Also, why were all your husband's siblings at your mother's funeral?

It was a smallish service outdoors, with a small dinner afterward. They knew her and so were invited.

[Anonymous]

Very trashy!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is insensitive. Also, why were all your husband's siblings at your mother's funeral?

It was a smallish service outdoors, with a small dinner afterward. They knew her and so were invited.

How absolutely lovely of them to come. I suggest that you wait several months to deal with this situation. You will regret it if you act on your emotions now. You have suffered a terrible loss but are still blessed with caring family. SIL was clueless, but the sentiment was right.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You folks are very strange about death. In our large, Italian, Catholic family, weddings and wakes are the times we mostly get together, and to be honest the middle days of the wakes are fun. You see people you haven’t seen in ages, tell stories, catch up, and talk about planning that cousins club reunion that never really happens. As long as you’re not staging a photo in front of the casket or gravesite, it’s not a big deal. Twenty years from now, you're going to be happy to have large group pictures as you remember those who have gone and you start talking with your children and grandchildren about their family history and they want to know about them.

It’s perfectly fine to stick this picture in a closet for now if it’s hard for you. But it’s not a horrible offense.

I cannot believe this bears explaining, but: Weddings and funerals aren't the same at all. "Funerals are fun" has got to be a new one here. Maybe they're sort of a nice chance to reconnect if you're not close to the person. I'm willing to bet the person who lost a mom, dad, sibling, child, husband or wife isn't having tons of fun. Have you ever mourned someone close to you? If so, did you spend the time planning a "cousin club" (?) reunion.

There are lots of places to stage and then gift large family photos. A funeral just ain't one of 'em.

Maybe where you come from. But it’s not the distant cousins doing this - it’s everyone, especially when the deceased is older and has lived their life. We have bad luck around the holidays in our family, and everyone has the standing directive that if we die at the end of December, stick us in the morgue, everyone go about Christmas, and then hold the wake on the 27th and bury before New Years. We cry enough at home, and are glad for new conversation and seeing people for part of the day. We accept death as part of being alive, and it will be all of our turns one day.

Ok, so you'd gift a photo like this in front of a grieving person?
Maybe the mom died of COVID, painfully. Or by suicide. Or very young. Or violently. Not all death is happy.

DP. I lost 2 siblings and my father to suicide. I agree with the PP whose family can find solace and warmth at funeral events. Being about to reconnect to people, especially those we hadn't seen for a while, reaffirmed that life continues. Joy and fun CAN be found in such sorrowful times. Having some normality went a long way in helping us move beyond the tragedy we were immersed in.

I think those of us who have experienced profound loss, like a PP who buried a DH and 2 kids, may be able to recognize it more. It's certainly not a competition but having a lot more experience with it may make it easier for us to recognize and appreciate lightness whenever we can find it.

I would have had no problem with the gift OP's SIL handed out a Christmas. While the setting was for a sad occasion for me, it wasn't for them. They were there for me and good for them for putting the time to good use and getting a good picture. Life goes on.

Everyone agrees with this. The whole purpose of a funeral is to find solace from the people close to you. That doesn't mean it's a great time for a photo op.

I'm not sure why this is so difficult to understand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

To be fair, OP did post that her SIL has been a jerk to her in the past

I didn't see where OP said she'd been a jerk, just clueless. I'm sorry OP can't focus more on them showing up rather than the photo.

Why is going to a funeral so heroic? It's like... standard.

[Anonymous]

Everyone agrees with this. The whole purpose of a funeral is to find solace from the people close to you. That doesn't mean it's a great time for a photo op.

I'm not sure why this is so difficult to understand.

Not sure why it's so difficult for you to understand not everyone has the same opinion that you do. There's a long history of it. Have you never seen any post mortem photos - especially those from the Victorian era? The deceased were often posed with the living znd copies of the photos were given out as momentos. The movie The Others (with Nichole Kidman) included it.

I'd have no problem with what OP's SIL did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Everyone agrees with this. The whole purpose of a funeral is to find solace from the people close to you. That doesn't mean it's a great time for a photo op.

I'm not sure why this is so difficult to understand.

Not sure why it's so difficult for you to understand not everyone has the same opinion that you do. There's a long history of it. Have you never seen any post mortem photos - especially those from the Victorian era? The deceased were often posed with the living znd copies of the photos were given out as momentos. The movie The Others (with Nichole Kidman) included it.

I'd have no problem with what OP's SIL did.

You know you're grasping at straws when you're pointing to the Victorian era as an example of good behavior.

[Anonymous]

You're not over-reacting, OP. Your SIL was insensitive and really, really, really tacky.

I wouldn't want a framed picture of my mother's funeral on my wall either. And if I were to have a framed picture of that event, it would and should be of something especially meaningful to you.

It's shocking to me how badly mannered some people are, including many people on this thread.

I'm so very sorry for your loss.

[Anonymous]

NP, and yes, I'm aware this is long. It's mainly for OP anyway, so feel free to keep scrolling.

I am the kind of person who tries to see everything from all sides and give everyone the benefit of the doubt, and I just couldn’t disagree more with any of the SIL defenders here. I think they are the ones lacking in perspective-taking. And I mean even those mildly defending her. No one may be able to change her. And maybe her motivations were not intentionally evil. But that doesn’t mean she hasn’t done something that is even marginally okay.

1) This is not a general discussion of how different families and different cultures mourn, especially not in terms of judging one way as better than another, but really at all. Any adult living in the US should be able to at least recognize that many people don’t see funerals as a time for joy and celebration, especially the funerals of their mothers. Most people in the US probably don’t find much joy in funerals, especially those of their mothers. But that doesn’t matter, and that’s why I said “many” instead of “most.” Clearly at least SOME people don’t, and not some tiny minority. I.e., no matter her culture, it cannot or should not be a surprise to SIL that OP might have found her mother’s funeral and reminders of it painful.

THIS IS A THOUGHT THAT SHOULD HAVE CROSSED SIL’S MIND.

Can anyone truly argue with that? If she’s “clueless” or neurodivergent or whatever relatively innocent explanation, okay, maybe it didn’t cross her mind. But it is entirely logical and at least SHOULD HAVE. No one can seriously argue “How could she possibly have known?” Which gets me to…

2) Let’s say SIL’s family just loooooves funerals and she wouldn’t blink an eye if OP’s family took a picture like this at SIL’s mother’s funeral and blew it up and gave it out as a gift in front of her. Fine.

Has SIL… met OP? Has she any feel for how OP might think of her own mother’s funeral? Is there any sort of, say, event SIL could have attended to gain insight into how OP’S FAMILY THINKS OF FUNERALS? Ooh, ooh, I know what would have really helped SIL understand how OP might think of her mother’s funeral! Attending OP’s mother’s funeral!

Those of you talking about how Italians or Victorians treat funerals… you realize that OP’s (and it’s implied, OP’s family) doesn’t seem to share the same sentiments and traditions, right? This wasn’t a photo of the IL family at their own family’s funeral, handed out only to the IL family. It was a photo of another family’s funeral, handed out in front of the grieving daughter and given TO her and her husband, or at least her husband. (And please spare me the “ILs are all family”— of course they are, but that doesn’t mean they share the same cultural or familial traditions.)

I don’t care what SIL’s family does at funerals! Or any of yours! At most, it would be relevant to establishing how much of a monster SIL was being here, but OP doesn’t feel SIL was being a “monster” anyway. What it doesn’t do is make this any less insensitive.

“Oh, I did this thing FOR MYSELF (or my family) because it wouldn’t bother me if you did it to me, but I at no time took into consideration how you would feel, even though I have copious evidence that you don’t handle these things the way I do.” Yep, sure, sounds good.

People don’t have to have evil intentions to achieve mildly hurtful results, WTH— but it doesn’t make those results not hurtful, and it certainly doesn’t make them unpredictable.

3) I don’t even know how to respond to the PP who said SIL was “clueless, but the sentiment was right.” The sentiment that led her to attend the funeral was absolutely right! The sentiment involved in taking a photo of her own family, but especially sending it off to Shutterfly to get mounted and framed, and then presenting it to/in front of her grieving SIL… was not right.

And it’s not canceled out by her (laudable, or at least respectable) funeral attendance. “I threw you a birthday party at my expense! Then I got drunk and threw up on your presents. But the sentiment was right.” What. Even if it wasn’t that extreme or that proximate— “I came to your birthday party and brought a present! Then at the party, I met and later Facebook-stalked your coworker and made them really uncomfortable and now they’re avoiding you. But the sentiment was right.” Why does one excuse the other?

4) OP, based on the fact that you’ve just mended things with her over another “family feud” that has something to do with her “cluelessness,” I’d suggest cluelessness is not the word here. You haven’t given enough details, but there usually aren’t family feuds over even rude or ignorant behavior if it’s not also undergirded with narcissism or some other nonsense. It sounds like something else is going on here if she can’t take a gentle but fair criticism without throwing a massive, family-damaging tantrum, which is what I’m inferring.

5) I really don’t understand the point of Ms. Sweetie Honey Dear saying that OP only knew the photo was taken at her mother’s funeral because she saw it being taken or recognized the clothes or whatever. …yeah? So? What does that even mean? If she didn’t know it was taken at her mother’s funeral, she wouldn’t have a problem with it? Yes, that’s right. Because it wouldn’t have been at her mother’s funeral (or at least she wouldn’t have known it was). That’s just tautological.

It’s also true that OP was inevitably going to know, and it was intentionally handed out in front of her, so…? Ms. Sweetie, are you saying that the SIL probably didn’t realize OP would recognize the photo? If so, refer to point #1 about what SIL should have known.

If you’re just saying the only reason OP has a problem with this gift is that a photo of her mother’s funeral was presented joyfully by a person who treated that funeral and her mother as incidental at best, then yes, congratulations, you got the point. OP would not have been upset by the gift of a family photo taken at a cousin’s wedding instead, good job. And also probably wouldn’t have been upset if they’d had all surreptitiously changed clothes and taken the photo a block down the street from the funeral, at least if she didn’t think about it too much. So? What’s your point?

6) That’s the last bit, really, above. This was not a photo of a family taken at their own family’s funeral, intended to honor the deceased and include happy memories of her, shared in order to keep those memories alive. I gather it was an opportunistic photo shoot to which OP’s mother and OP’s grief was completely incidental. And I say opportunistic in a neutral sense.

But to make a show of gifting it to other people who didn’t have a major connection to OP’s mother— in front of OP? Just purely self-centered at best.

Phew.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It was very kind of them all to come to the service. Not all inlaws are that considerate.

Ask your husband to store his photo away in a closet. a
And try to forget about it. If it were me, I would only say something to the inlaws if they asked why you aren't displaying the photo. I'd start with explaining that the photo only reminds you of your mother's death. If they push back or act defensive, "Well Jane, what did you expect? I associate that day with mourning, not a happy family photo op."

Just because it was a funeral doesn't mean that people cannot be happy about other things. There should be laughter and smiles just as there will be tears and sadness. It is all part of life and death.

There’s one like you (above) in every crowd. Wait until you lose someone close to you.

Sweetie, I am 10:46, the woman who has buried a husband and two children. If you cannot understand that life goes on and that you will need to be able to smile again one day then you might as well crawl into the grave with your dead.

I imagine the only reason why OP knew the picture was taken during the funeral reception was because she recognized the clothing that the people were wearing or perhaps she recognized the background like someone else pointed out. Either way, it isn't like this family planted themselves on the grave of OP's mom, started dancing and took a picture. It sounds like they saw they were all together and they took a family photo.

I think that OP's reaction is over the top. OP needs to change her grief therapy strategy (she acknowledges on page 2 that she is "in" grief therapy) because whatever she is doing isn't working well for her. I know many of you mean well but validating blindly as you are doesn't help OP address her grief in a positive and productive way.

NP. And another person with a good resume in the grief department, although who really wants to be able to say that about themselves?

Yes funerals should be celebrations as well as mournings, and there can be happy and joyous moments at them. But the problem here is that OP's SIL is centering her immediate family in OP's grief. OP isn't complaining that her husband and SIL and MIL had a bonding moment at the funeral. She is upset because they are taking a still of probably the worst day of her life in recent memory and reframing it as a time they were all together. It is EXCEPTIONALLY insensitive. And I do not think it would be insensitive if the SIL had framed and hung the photo in her own home, or if a friend or other funeral attendee took the photo there and ended up posting it on social media or something. But this is being given to OP and her husband to hang in her home. For OP, any photos she puts up of that day would center her mother, as that is what that day was for her (which is how it should be). That doesn't mean every photo she appreciates from that day is sad, but in this case, the funeral of her mother, her loved ones should be thinking about her reaction, not how they can use the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It was very kind of them all to come to the service. Not all inlaws are that considerate.

Ask your husband to store his photo away in a closet. a
And try to forget about it. If it were me, I would only say something to the inlaws if they asked why you aren't displaying the photo. I'd start with explaining that the photo only reminds you of your mother's death. If they push back or act defensive, "Well Jane, what did you expect? I associate that day with mourning, not a happy family photo op."

Just because it was a funeral doesn't mean that people cannot be happy about other things. There should be laughter and smiles just as there will be tears and sadness. It is all part of life and death.

There’s one like you (above) in every crowd. Wait until you lose someone close to you.

Sweetie, I am 10:46, the woman who has buried a husband and two children. If you cannot understand that life goes on and that you will need to be able to smile again one day then you might as well crawl into the grave with your dead.

I imagine the only reason why OP knew the picture was taken during the funeral reception was because she recognized the clothing that the people were wearing or perhaps she recognized the background like someone else pointed out. Either way, it isn't like this family planted themselves on the grave of OP's mom, started dancing and took a picture. It sounds like they saw they were all together and they took a family photo.

I think that OP's reaction is over the top. OP needs to change her grief therapy strategy (she acknowledges on page 2 that she is "in" grief therapy) because whatever she is doing isn't working well for her. I know many of you mean well but validating blindly as you are doesn't help OP address her grief in a positive and productive way.

NP. And another person with a good resume in the grief department, although who really wants to be able to say that about themselves?

Yes funerals should be celebrations as well as mournings, and there can be happy and joyous moments at them. But the problem here is that OP's SIL is centering her immediate family in OP's grief. OP isn't complaining that her husband and SIL and MIL had a bonding moment at the funeral. She is upset because they are taking a still of probably the worst day of her life in recent memory and reframing it as a time they were all together. It is EXCEPTIONALLY insensitive. And I do not think it would be insensitive if the SIL had framed and hung the photo in her own home, or if a friend or other funeral attendee took the photo there and ended up posting it on social media or something. But this is being given to OP and her husband to hang in her home. For OP, any photos she puts up of that day would center her mother, as that is what that day was for her (which is how it should be). That doesn't mean every photo she appreciates from that day is sad, but in this case, the funeral of her mother, her loved ones should be thinking about her reaction, not how they can use the day.

I think this is really it, they made OP’s funeral about themselves. My MIL side of the family is big on showing up at things but are the most insensitive group of people you have ever met and it would be far better for them to NOT come to a funeral than be drinking and laughing and guessing how much things cost. So showing up is not always a good thing.

All that said I would probably have quietly walked out of the room rather than sat and listened to them talk about my mother’s funeral like a photo op but can also see being sort of shell shocked. I would be upset my husband could not see my point of view but it’s probably not worth a big fight now

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:NP, and yes, I'm aware this is long. It's mainly for OP anyway, so feel free to keep scrolling.

I am the kind of person who tries to see everything from all sides and give everyone the benefit of the doubt, and I just couldn’t disagree more with any of the SIL defenders here. I think they are the ones lacking in perspective-taking. And I mean even those mildly defending her. No one may be able to change her. And maybe her motivations were not intentionally evil. But that doesn’t mean she hasn’t done something that is even marginally okay.

1) This is not a general discussion of how different families and different cultures mourn, especially not in terms of judging one way as better than another, but really at all. Any adult living in the US should be able to at least recognize that many people don’t see funerals as a time for joy and celebration, especially the funerals of their mothers. Most people in the US probably don’t find much joy in funerals, especially those of their mothers. But that doesn’t matter, and that’s why I said “many” instead of “most.” Clearly at least SOME people don’t, and not some tiny minority. I.e., no matter her culture, it cannot or should not be a surprise to SIL that OP might have found her mother’s funeral and reminders of it painful.

THIS IS A THOUGHT THAT SHOULD HAVE CROSSED SIL’S MIND.

Can anyone truly argue with that? If she’s “clueless” or neurodivergent or whatever relatively innocent explanation, okay, maybe it didn’t cross her mind. But it is entirely logical and at least SHOULD HAVE. No one can seriously argue “How could she possibly have known?” Which gets me to…

2) Let’s say SIL’s family just loooooves funerals and she wouldn’t blink an eye if OP’s family took a picture like this at SIL’s mother’s funeral and blew it up and gave it out as a gift in front of her. Fine.

Has SIL… met OP? Has she any feel for how OP might think of her own mother’s funeral? Is there any sort of, say, event SIL could have attended to gain insight into how OP’S FAMILY THINKS OF FUNERALS? Ooh, ooh, I know what would have really helped SIL understand how OP might think of her mother’s funeral! Attending OP’s mother’s funeral!

Those of you talking about how Italians or Victorians treat funerals… you realize that OP’s (and it’s implied, OP’s family) doesn’t seem to share the same sentiments and traditions, right? This wasn’t a photo of the IL family at their own family’s funeral, handed out only to the IL family. It was a photo of another family’s funeral, handed out in front of the grieving daughter and given TO her and her husband, or at least her husband. (And please spare me the “ILs are all family”— of course they are, but that doesn’t mean they share the same cultural or familial traditions.)

I don’t care what SIL’s family does at funerals! Or any of yours! At most, it would be relevant to establishing how much of a monster SIL was being here, but OP doesn’t feel SIL was being a “monster” anyway. What it doesn’t do is make this any less insensitive.

“Oh, I did this thing FOR MYSELF (or my family) because it wouldn’t bother me if you did it to me, but I at no time took into consideration how you would feel, even though I have copious evidence that you don’t handle these things the way I do.” Yep, sure, sounds good.

People don’t have to have evil intentions to achieve mildly hurtful results, WTH— but it doesn’t make those results not hurtful, and it certainly doesn’t make them unpredictable.

3) I don’t even know how to respond to the PP who said SIL was “clueless, but the sentiment was right.” The sentiment that led her to attend the funeral was absolutely right! The sentiment involved in taking a photo of her own family, but especially sending it off to Shutterfly to get mounted and framed, and then presenting it to/in front of her grieving SIL… was not right.

And it’s not canceled out by her (laudable, or at least respectable) funeral attendance. “I threw you a birthday party at my expense! Then I got drunk and threw up on your presents. But the sentiment was right.” What. Even if it wasn’t that extreme or that proximate— “I came to your birthday party and brought a present! Then at the party, I met and later Facebook-stalked your coworker and made them really uncomfortable and now they’re avoiding you. But the sentiment was right.” Why does one excuse the other?

4) OP, based on the fact that you’ve just mended things with her over another “family feud” that has something to do with her “cluelessness,” I’d suggest cluelessness is not the word here. You haven’t given enough details, but there usually aren’t family feuds over even rude or ignorant behavior if it’s not also undergirded with narcissism or some other nonsense. It sounds like something else is going on here if she can’t take a gentle but fair criticism without throwing a massive, family-damaging tantrum, which is what I’m inferring.

5) I really don’t understand the point of Ms. Sweetie Honey Dear saying that OP only knew the photo was taken at her mother’s funeral because she saw it being taken or recognized the clothes or whatever. …yeah? So? What does that even mean? If she didn’t know it was taken at her mother’s funeral, she wouldn’t have a problem with it? Yes, that’s right. Because it wouldn’t have been at her mother’s funeral (or at least she wouldn’t have known it was). That’s just tautological.

It’s also true that OP was inevitably going to know, and it was intentionally handed out in front of her, so…? Ms. Sweetie, are you saying that the SIL probably didn’t realize OP would recognize the photo? If so, refer to point #1 about what SIL should have known.

If you’re just saying the only reason OP has a problem with this gift is that a photo of her mother’s funeral was presented joyfully by a person who treated that funeral and her mother as incidental at best, then yes, congratulations, you got the point. OP would not have been upset by the gift of a family photo taken at a cousin’s wedding instead, good job. And also probably wouldn’t have been upset if they’d had all surreptitiously changed clothes and taken the photo a block down the street from the funeral, at least if she didn’t think about it too much. So? What’s your point?

6) That’s the last bit, really, above. This was not a photo of a family taken at their own family’s funeral, intended to honor the deceased and include happy memories of her, shared in order to keep those memories alive. I gather it was an opportunistic photo shoot to which OP’s mother and OP’s grief was completely incidental. And I say opportunistic in a neutral sense.

But to make a show of gifting it to other people who didn’t have a major connection to OP’s mother— in front of OP? Just purely self-centered at best.

Phew.

TL;DR

[Anonymous]

NP at 12:03, I appreciate you laying it out there - I slapped back at some of the grotesque critiques of OP by the I’ve Suffered Worse brigade. But those people are proud of never taking a note. They’re right, they’re more experienced, and they’re far too proud to consider another point of view, especially that of a person in pain. At least the OP has a sense that plenty of people find SIL’s actions deeply repellent.

I’m sorry for your loss, OP.