Do I Have To Attend My Abusive Mother’s Funeral? in Miss Manners

[purlewe]

 DEAR MISS MANNERS: My mother is suspected of having narcissistic personality disorder -- one of the worst cases many have seen. Throughout my life, I was subject to verbal and physical abuse, as well as unreasonable demands to allow her control over my life, and further abuse if I deviated from whatever nonsense she dictated -- well into adulthood.

In my 30s, I began distancing myself from her, and her behavior became increasingly deranged. She began lying about me to friends and family, accusing me of suffering from mental illnesses I certainly don’t have.

As a result, in my 40s, I cut her out of my life completely and stopped responding to calls or emails. She then cut me out of her significant will, yet continued sending emails and leaving voicemails abusing me, and accusing me of shirking my duties toward her as she aged and grew ill.

She is now expected to die within three years due to numerous chronic diseases. When she dies, frankly, I will be relieved and grateful that I will no longer be subject to her sharp abuses that still leave me feeling like a vulnerable child. I will not mourn her, nor am I willing to lie and talk about how wonderful she was, when clearly she was anything but wonderful to me.

Do I have to attend her funeral? What should I say to those who offer condolences? Am I obligated to appear as a loving daughter after she dies?

GENTLE READER: You no doubt have a plethora of people, degreed or otherwise, ready to give you advice on why and how to make up with your mother before she dies. Miss Manners can instead answer the question you asked, namely how to behave after she is gone, assuming that no deathbed resolution occurred.

We do not speak ill of the dead because our sense of fair play demands that the subject of any accusation has a chance to defend herself, and this will clearly no longer be possible. But speaking ill and thinking ill of the dead are not the same. And one can refrain from saying harsh things without pretending everything was wonderful.

If things were so bad when she was alive that you had to cut off all relations, then etiquette makes no demand that you attend the funeral. If, however, you do attend -- or if people express their condolences to you -- the proper response is dignified and short: a serious “thank you,” without elaboration..

Comments

[purlewe]

I admit, I do this. And I do it now while mine is alive. But I use it as a way to get them to stop asking me to reconcile. "do you recommend all people to reconcile with their abusers? or just reconcile with abusive parents?" that usually gets them to stop.

[lilysea]

I admit, I do this. And I do it now while mine is alive. But I use it as a way to get them to stop asking me to reconcile. "do you recommend all people to reconcile with their abusers? or just reconcile with abusive parents?" that usually gets them to stop.

"You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better." - Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

[laurajv]

I remember having to say something similar once, when a friend revealed that he'd broken up with a girlfriend because she liked to punch him when she got drunk, which was often. People told him he was "violating her privacy" by telling people that. It's ASTOUNDING the things people will say to victims of abuse.

[julian]

I had the weirdest fucking conversation with someone about that.

This was a spontaneous and peculiarly deep conversation I was having with a random organic store owner.

*She herself* had just said she had, basically, given up on her biological family, that she had written a letter to them saying Various Things and pretty much cutting them off. (It was one of those situations where, as just one symptom, they expected her to be *at* every damn family event, but put no effort into asking her about them, and various other long-term manipulative and harmful dynamics.)

So I said my partner had cut off contact with her family, and she was like, "Oh, I hope not forever!"

And I was like... Pause pause... "Well, her mother was abusive. It may not be forever, and she's gotten back in contact with her father, but not her mother yet. I would have thought you'd understand, given your own situation."

People are effing weird.