Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi there, does anyone have any experience or thoughts on supporting a loved on through death, dying and grief - which importantly isn't based in whimsical cliches?
I'm struggling at the moment and would appreciate some specific advice, perhaps in the form of your own experiences of something like this.
My situation is that my wife's father is very close to the end of his life, is in some form of pain and has a small amount of delusions/confusion as to his own situation. I expect that the perception of his quality of life is quite poor.
This is where I am - I don't care, despite seeing him every day for 18 years, I have no emotional bond to him, I have no sadness towards his imminent passing. However, I do fully understand my lack of emotional connection to this situation is a product of autism, and that I understand that to explain this lack of empathy, feeling and care to anyone who does feel they love him, would be distasteful or even downright rude. So I'm very much not going to be doing that.
I am a very big supporter of allowing Autistic people to be who they are without the pressure of neurotypicals making them follow the social "rules". However, I think perhaps on this occasion I may need to be completely hypocritical and start pretending like I'm neuroT saying things like "there, there - it'll all be better... he's gone to a better place" etc. Although I'm worried it will sound very fake and will do more harm than good.
Does anyone have any thoughts?
Hi, I went through exactly the same situation when my wife’s father was near the end. I didn’t dislike the person but very often just don’t have any emotions.
I just had to mask and fake my concern, I gave hugs when needed, I’m surprised my wife didn’t notice as I never hug anyone. All you can do is support your wife and try to make all the right noises.
Its a conversation I’ve tried to have with my wife about my lack of emotions for people, it’s not easy without sounding cold or like a robot.