Would you be upset with a family member in this situation?

Everyone mourns differently, some not at all, to each their own.

My kids would always come before a funeral. The person is dead – the funeral service is not for them – it is for others. Why should others come before an event important to my kids? If you want to talk about respect – it is too late – you have already respected the deceased or not. Nothing can make a change at this point.

I would respect their choice but still be upset.

Given the ‘old-school’ Italian, his cousin should have known to put family first…. I think your husband & his family have every right to be upset about this!

You can’t be everyone at once, other people would think the same thing if parents missed a kids baseball game, so it doesn’t matter really, you can’t please everyone. I would not be upset.

I would let that one go..Life is too short to be mad about things you can’t control:)

Your husbands cousin may not have had a close or happy relationship with his Grandfather.
Let it go.

I have seen the best and worst in families come out around times of death. We all deal differently with loss and grief. Although we like to think we know our relatives well sometimes we don’t know what is best for them and even though it may be disappointing that they make a choice that we disagree with or don’t understand, it is they and not us who ultimately deal with the consequences of their choice.

I would be very upset and even more upset that the reason is for Baseball!

I think he has a valid point. Why is vacation more important than baseball? Especially when the entire family is involved in the sport. Both parents are coaches and it is understandable that they don’t want to miss the opening of the entire season.

The funeral should come before baseball, but it should also come before vacation. If the family is willing to accommodate some, they should accommodate all. Sad all around, IMO.

It’s interesting to see the different reactions. Personally, I don’t think it’s that big of a deal. Everyone has different priorities, but usually in this family the priority is family. This cousin was as close to his grandfather as the rest of the grandkids. They’ve always lived nearby, visited often, and pitched in when Grandpa needed help painting his house or taking on projects.

No one is going to shun the cousin or start some kind of hurtful drama. One thing I love about my husband’s family is that they can disagree or get upset with each other, but not hold grudges or continue to rehash grievances.

@Supacase I agree with you, but at the same time, I don’t know if they were consulted about dates or not. I know the aunt in charge checked with everyone else, and I would imagine she’d have called him too…but I can’t say for sure. The memorial has been planned for almost a month, and he only called people yesterday to say they weren’t coming because of a conflict with baseball.

Going to a memorial service is ia personal decision, family or not.

I think that they are putting their own family first. They may regret later not making different arrangements, but since we don’t know the particulars in the case I think it would be a mistake to make an adverse judgment on the.

I can totally see their point – they’re coaches for the kids’ team (important) and they’d be missing opening game (also important) for something that could have been moved around if anyone cared to do so (and was done for others). This isn’t about baseball, this is about this family being oriented more towards their children (a good thing, in my opinion). I think that’s how my husband and I would do it as well.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir I see their point too. Really, it doesn’t matter to me what they choose to do. We’ve all known for a long time that they are very involved in the kids’ sports activities and have always made them a priority.

Knowing how everyone in this family talks about everyone else, I think someone would have said something sooner if the date was known to be a conflict. Part of what upsets my husband (who thinks the memorial service is more important) and his other cousin (this guy’s brother) is that the date has been set for a month but he only called his mother to say they weren’t coming yesterday. He probably has good reasons for it, the game date could have been changed due to weather for all I know.

@Trillian I am far from judging anyone, and I don’t hear a lot of judgment coming from most of our relatives. There are only two, actually, that I know for certain are angry. Since one of those two is my husband, I know I can manage to reason with him. By tomorrow he’ll be feeling more inclined to give his cousin the benefit of the doubt. My husband is so smart, he actually listens to me most of the time.

Anyway, thanks for all the thoughts so far. I just wanted to see how others in the same situation would feel. At some point next week I might be asking a question along the lines of, “Have your children ever said something at a funeral that made you want to crawl under your seat and die?” :)

@MissAusten Yeah I think, perhaps, they shouldn’t have left till the last moment. I certainly wouldn’t feel good about missing the memorial service – just that my kids would come first.

Why exactly would someone be scandalized by someone else not attending a funeral service? I might be surprised, I might wonder, but why would I be angry? It is not something away from me (well, unless it is say my husband that would need to be there to support me), and the late person surely does not care anymore. Let those come who wish to come, and let those who don’t wish to, for whatever reason, go in peace.

Funerals should not be a time when the remaining family quarrels.

It’s their decision. People will be upset with them, but there’s no need for it. Leave them alone about it. They will have plenty of time to think about it later, perhaps when one of them goes and the other sees the grandchildren choose a baseball game over marking a major family milestone.

What they are teaching with their example won’t be lost on their children.

@Jeruba It’s not the same as grandparents, imo – the person was not a grandparent to the children.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir, the deceased was grandparent to the person making the go/no-go decision.

I must agree with the cousin. If you are going to work around the schedules of some but not all potential attendees, you can’t be surprised if some folks are irritated by being treated differently. Are the lives of living people a priority over a person who has died? I think so, because you can pay respects to a dead person literally any time at all. Can you get back that fist time your 8 year old hit a double? No.

Whoever is charged with making all of the memorial/reception arrangements is usually emotionally and physically exhausted by the task. Trying to accommodate the schedules of all of the relatives is just ridiculous. Set a date that’s as reasonably soon as manageable after the person’s death and stick to it. Everyone isn’t going to be able to come, no matter what you do. In several religions, people are required to be buried within 25 hours of death. That would certainly relieve a lot of tensions.

I agree they should have perhaps spoken up sooner. Even if they didn’t have prior knowledge of the game, or if it was changed at the last minute, they had prior knowledge of the funeral and could have gently informed everyone that their absence was a possibility.

Personally I loved and respected my grandfather dearly, and I treasure the memory of his funeral. If one of my cousins had not attended for the sake of a sporting event, I admit I would have initially found it difficult to stomach, but I wouldn’t have been scandalised. If they are refusing to go as a reaction to feeling sighted by being left out of the arrangements, that is a different matter. In that case I would be very upset indeed. It is difficult to accommodate everyone in situations such as these; death is never really convenient.

Anyway, it sounds like on the whole your family is dealing well with the situation. Compassion, understanding and forgiveness all round is what is needed during times of family sadness.

No I wouldn’t be upset, in fact I’d probably be the family member who didn’t attend, I don’t do memorial services I pay my respects when my people are alive and thats that.

The memorial service was yesterday, and my husband’s cousin did come. His wife and kids stayed home to make sure they got to their opening day games on time, and then he drove back right after the service to join them. He chose well, and kept his mother happy. :)