Quote:
Originally Posted by stopdog
I don't think funerals are for the dead people - I think they are for the family and friends and those supporting them - it is their private grief I think a client or therapist would be intruding on - not the dead person. I am an atheist so I think once you are gone - you are gone. The funeral has nothing to do with the feelings of the dead person. In my view, at that point the dead person has none left- so the potential dead person's ok would not be the thing that would sway me. On this, it has nothing to do with the profession of therapist particularly- I would feel that way about anyone I didn't know and didn't know the family/friends of. I was always interested to see how much people tried to control from the grave in their wills and funeral requests.
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I'm not sure what I feel happens after you die. I guess maybe I think of my grandfather's funeral, where hardly anyone was there. Which made me feel sad (he'd kind of become a recluse after my grandmother passed, then he spent a few years in a nursing home after a stroke). I could see where it might feel nice to the surviving family/loved ones if lots of people came.
At the same time, I could see it being weird for the family if there were some seemingly random people there. Which is why I'd just sort of hang back. I wouldn't be, say, going up to his wife or son (who I've never met) and saying how sorry I was for their losses. That would feel intrusive. I even felt a bit awkward expressing my condolences to H's close friend's parents at the friend's funeral. I think I'd met his mother once, but not the father. They knew H though.